manual/include/backup-and-sharing-of-sessions.html

<p>
  An Ardour session is stored in a single folder on the computer's filesystem.
  This makes <dfn>backup</dfn> very easy: any tool capable of backing up a
  folder can be used to backup a session. The location of a session is picked when
  it is created &mdash;by default it will be in the default session location,
  which can be altered via <kbd class="menu">Edit &gt; Preferences &gt; General &gt;
  Session</kbd>.
</p>
<p>
  The single folder approach also makes sharing a project easy. Simply copy the
  session folder (onto a storage device, or across a network) and another Ardour
  user (on any platform) will be able to use it.
</p>
<p>
  There is one complication in both cases: a session may reference media files that are stored
  outside of the session folder, if the user has opted not to select
  <kbd class="optoff">Session &gt; Import &gt; Copy to Session</kbd> during import.
  Backing up a session with embedded files will not create a copy of the session
  containing those files. To bring those external files to the session folder,
  the <a href="@@cleaning-up-sessions"><kbd class="menu">Session &gt; Clean-up &gt;
  Bring all media into session folder</kbd> menu</a> can be used.
</p>

<h2>Using the dedicated Zip/Archive Current Session tool</h2>

<figure>
  <img src="/images/archive-session.png" alt="The Zip/Archive Current Session window">
  <figcaption>
    The Zip/Archive Current Session window
  </figcaption>
</figure>

<p>
  The <kbd class="menu">Zip/Archive Current Session</kbd> tool is located in the
  <kbd class="menu"> File &gt; Archive&hellip;</kbd> menu.
</p>
<p>
  It allows to create a single file containing everything useful in the session,
  to share it or back it up, conveniently compressed to a session-archive which
  is a zip-file (tar.xz to be specific) containing all the audio, MIDI,
  plugin-settings,... and the currently active session. Ardour can also extract
  those bundles (<kbd class="menu">Session > Open&hellip;</kbd>).
</p>
<p>
  As opposed to zipping the entire session-folder manually,
</p>
<ol>
  <li>the session-archive only contains the current session-snapshot and only
    files which are used</li>
  <li>externally referenced files are included in the archive.</li>
</ol>

</p>

<p>
  The window shows the following options:
</p>
<table class="dl">
  <tr><th><dfn>Archive Name</dfn></th><td>The name of the archive file, defaulting to
  the name of the session followed by the date and time</td></tr>
  <tr><th>a dropdown extension selector</th><td>allowing to choose between different kind or
  compressed archive file types</td></tr>
  <tr><th><dfn>Target directory/folder</dfn></th><td>defining where in the filesystem
  the archive file will be generated</td></tr>
  <tr><th><dfn>Audio Compression</dfn></th><td>a dropdown menu allowing to compress
  the audio files themselves by using an audio-tailored compression format, more
  on that below</td></tr>
  <tr><th><dfn>Exclude unused audio sources</dfn></th><td>a checkbox to drop every
  audio that is in the session, but not actually used in the editor</td></tr>
</table>

<p>
  The <kbd class="menu">Audio Compression</kbd> selection accepts any of:
</p>
<ul>
  <li>None</li>
  <li>FLAC 16bit</li>
  <li>FLAC 24bit</li>
</ul>
<p>
  Encoding the audio sources to <abbr title="Free Lossless Audio Codec">FLAC</abbr> allows for a good size reduction of the session.
  It should be noted though that FLAC is a fixed-point format, meaning that if the
  audio in the session is in a floating-point format, this conversion will loose
  some information on the samples values that are rounded, though usually, this
  lost information cannot be perceived. Choosing "<em>None</em>" for Audio
  Compression does not compress the audio to FLAC, hence preserving the floating-point
  data at the cost of a bigger file size. Notice also that converting to FLAC
  automatically normalizes the audio.
</p>
<p>
  Using the <kbd class="option">Exclude unused audio sources</kbd> option allows
  to only keep the files actually used in the session, which can be useful to leave
  any unused take or reference material out of the backup, reducing the archive's
  global file size.
</p>