Receiving prompt that an audio file will be permanently deleted. Why?

[Maestro777]

Silly question I'm sure since a prompt to permanently delete a file is pretty self explanatory. BUT I am struggling just a bit to understand why I have been able to delete every other audio region in my project without receiving this prompt?

I went through the process of muting certain regions across multiple tracks that I determined I didn't want as part of my final mix. As a part of my final cleanup I decided to delete every muted audio region from my Project; and there were a LOT. So under what conditions would I get a warning for only 2 of these regions that if I continue the audio would be permanently deleted? And should I be concerned that deleting the audio files associated with these regions may cause missing un-retrievable audio where it's actually needed within my Project???

[David Nahmani]

In the Tracks area, you're working with regions that refer to audio files that are on your disk. As long as you edit only the regions, and not audio the files, then that's called nondestructive editing. If you process or delete the audio files on the disk, then that's called destructive editing. 

Now in the Tracks area, you're normally doing nondestructive editing, working on the regions only. If you delete a region nondestructively, then the audio file stays untouched at the same location on the disk, and you don't get an alert. 

Exception: When you've recorded an audio file during the current working session (meaning after you last opened this Logic project file), and the region you're deleting in the Tracks area is the only one that refers to that audio file, then Logic pops up that alert that offers you to also delete the audio file (destructive editing) or keep it (nondestructive editing). 

The reason for this is, during a recording session, you may often record takes and decide right away that they're useless, and want to quickly delete them destructively as you know you'll never need them again.

On 11/29/2022 at 7:08 PM, Maestro777 said:

And should I be concerned that deleting the audio files associated with these regions may cause missing un-retrievable audio where it's actually needed within my Project???

If you're deleting the audio file, that means it'll be gone forever, so better make sure that you actually won't change your mind in the future and need that audio file. But if you delete a region in the Tracks area and you get that alert then that means:

1. That audio file was recorded during the current working session,
2. That region is the only one that refers to that audio file. 

[Maestro777]

Ah, I see. I was already aware of the non-destructive vs destructive editing concept. But I couldn't grasp why or under what circumstance I'd receive that warning. I think your explanation that the audio file was recorded during the current working session being the only one referencing the audio file is the explanation I was looking for. I wasn't aware of those 2 conditions. Thanks for clarifying.

[David Nahmani]

You're welcome! 🙂