Confusing behavior importing tracks with drag and drop

Submitted by G3N-es on
Forums
Qtractor

I'd never done this before, so I didn't notice it.

If you drag a file (MIDI, audio) to the track header, it imports it wherever you want (which is great)... However, a window pops up asking you to save. If you save, it imports the file, closes the session, and opens a new one with the file. What?! ?¿?¿?

If I wanted to import, why does it close the session?
If I wanted to open the file, why does it save it in the previous session?
The window is completely unnecessary and causes unwanted behavior.

If the idea was to be able to open or import, the window should be:

What do you want to do?

[Open the file as a new session] (Simply rename the current "Discard")
[Import] (Rename the current "Cancel", and set it as the default)
Remove the "Save" option, which is what causes the confusing behavior.

However, I believe that dragging and dropping files shouldn't open new sessions, only import them. If I want to create a new session, the logical thing to do is to create it first and then import.

In other words, the window isn't necessary.

Submitted by rncbc on Thu, 14 May 2026 - 16:00

Permalink

good finding!

this is the expected behavior in general is the following for drag-n-dropping an audio or MIDI file:

  • over the tracks-view, functions as importing as new track and/or clip into the current session--this is working as advertised, right?
  • over anywhere else on the main-window should work as importing a new track and clip into a brand new session! if the current session is dirty or modified somehow, it gives you the chance to save the old session before opening the brand new with the imported file--your finding goes like that when dropping over the tracks-header specifically, it does actually import the file into the current session as a new track, marking it dirty/modified obviously before closing and opening the said brand new session with the imported file alone.

will see whether this minor bug gets squashed soon.

until then... thanks a lot.

There's another discovery: it allows you to choose the exact point (track order) of the newly imported track, something that doesn't happen in the Tracks view, where you can only import as the last track.

So I propose that dragging to the track header or the empty area of ​​the Tracks view should only import the track. If it's anywhere else in Qtractor, it should open as a new session. And if it's in an existing track view, it should import the clip as it does now.

Ultimately, as I mentioned before, it almost works this way already, and I think it's the most expected behavior.
You just need to prevent the warning window from appearing in that case.

Add new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
About text formats

Markdown

  • Parses markdown and converts it to HTML.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a href hreflang> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote cite> <code> <ul type> <ol start type='1 A I'> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <h2 id='jump-*'> <h3 id> <h4 id> <h5 id> <h6 id> <img src alt height width> <strike> <pre> <p> <br>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

Filtered HTML

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a href hreflang> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul type> <ol start type> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <b> <i> <pre> <img src alt height width> <strike>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.
File attachments
Unlimited number of files can be uploaded to this field.
2 MB limit.
Allowed types: jpg jpeg gif png txt doc docx xls xlsx pdf ppt pps odt ods odp zip gz bz2 xz patch diff wav ogg flac ogv mp4 qtz.