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There are many options for moving, copying, pasting, inserting, and deleting selected edits, more commonly referred to by the user as clips, when in the Drag and Drop (arrow) editing mode. This makes it easier to avoid constantly having to disarm/arm tracks. To create a selection move the cursor over the clip and just click the left mouse button; remove a selection by left mouse button click again. This will mark your selection with a colored border which contains some red. The easiest way to initially use the various modes is to click on the middle mouse button when your cursor is over a track and a popup displays the modes and shortcuts. However, for those users who prefer the addition of the Ctrl key to add multiple selections as is commonly done for listbox operations, there is a preference in Settings → Preferences → Appearance tab, called Clears before toggle that changes the behavior.
When an edit is marked as selected, it can be cut/copied into the paste clip buffer. The constructed clip buffer will begin with the leftmost edit and end with the rightmost edit. The edits may contain media, or be silence, or skipped if they are not selected. The clip tracks are copied from the first track with an active edit selection to the last track with an active edit selection. A clip track can be completely empty if no selection was made on the track. The word packed means that the silent edits and empty tracks are not included in the copy to the clip buffer, and all of the elements are packed together, no gaps. Packing a clip buffer makes it easier to move blobs of data around. Once the edits have moved and have a relative relationship applied, an unpacked clip buffer allows the media to be copied with the relative positions of the edits preserved.
The edits popup is activated on a track and a red and yellow colored reticle appears to temporarily mark the location when you click on the middle mouse button. An expanded explanation is provided below.
| Key | Operations |
|---|---|
| Drag | Hold down the Ctrl key while dragging to move a single edit elsewhere. |
| Left mouse button | Selects and highlights the edit under the cursor with a red selection box. Left mouse button also will toggle that clip selection off if it is on. |
| Popup Label | Key | Operation |
|---|---|---|
| Clear Select | Ctrl-Shift-A | Deselect all selected edits – ones that have the red lines around them. |
| Select Edits | Ctrl-Alt-' | Select all edits within a highlighted area of the timeline * (see note below) |
| Deselect Edits | Deselect all edits within a highlighted area of the timeline * (see note below) | |
| Copy | Ctrl-c | Copy the selected edits into the copy buffer. |
| Cut | Ctrl-x | Delete the selected edits after copying them into the buffer. The edits |
| Mute | Ctrl-m | Delete the selected edits after copying them into the buffer. The space previously occupied by the edits will be replaced with silence. |
| Copy Pack | Ctrl-Shift-C | Copy the selected edits into the buffer and remove any silent sections. |
| Cut Pack | Ctrl-z | Delete the selected edits after copying them into the buffer. The edits after the election will move left to occupy the vacated space. The edits in the copy buffer will be packed together within each track. |
| Mute Pack | Ctrl-Shift-M | Delete the selected edits after copying them into the buffer. The deleted edits will be replaced with silence. The edits in the copy buffer will be packed together within each track. |
| Paste | Ctrl-v | Paste contents of the copy buffer at the insertion point marked by the red & yellow reticle of the popup menu or the position of the hairline cursor. This is a splice operation which creates space for the edits. |
| Overwrite | Ctrl-b | Paste contents of the copy buffer at the insertion point marked by the red & yellow reticle of the popup menu or the position of the hairline cursor. This destroys the current edits in that space. |
| Overwrite plugins | Ctrl-Shift-P | Pastes plugins that are in the Copy buffer to current location but no clip. Plugins. |
* If the selection area created is larger than the edits we want to act on and includes additional edits, those edits will be involved if "Select Edits" or "Deselect Edits" is used. Indeed, these options act on both the selected edits and those that are not selected but are included in the selection area created. In practice, edits that were selected are deselected, while unselected edits are selected.
The copy/paste behavior respects the armed/disarmed tracks state. A paste of audio on a video track will fail and vice versa. In addition if you attempt to paste edits consisting of more tracks than what is available at that location it will not allowed.
Attaching transitions to multiple selected edits via the Video or Audio pulldowns is also available. The new transitions are attached at the start of the edits, and will replace any existing attached transitions. As a side note, when in drag and drop mode the end transition does not drag.