Why Cakewalk ignores compound times?

[Bronxio]

If I set the time signature as 9/8, the program doesn’t treat the project as 3 beats per bar with 3 eighth notes each beat (compound time), but counts each eighth note as a part of a simple time instead (2 eighth notes each beat). So, the created bars are wrong in the grid, and the only way I could manage to fix it was setting the time signature as its simple equivalent (3/4) and set the grid to triplets.

I’ve seen this happens as well on Cubase, Bitwig and Audacity. So perhaps all DAW’s and audio editors do this.

I would like to know: could anyone explain why they decided to ignore compound times when setting the time signature? I've posted this in the Q&A section because I guess there is an answer kind of "because of a technical problem" or something like that.

[Glenn Stanton]

it is interesting. there are 9 beats but the thick marker lines do show every 2 beats instead of 3... 

 

[David Baay]

On 7/9/2024 at 5:32 AM, Bronxio said:

the program doesn’t treat the project as 3 beats per bar with 3 eighth notes each beat (compound time)

The last time I looked only Pro Tools and Reaper support this (i.e. defining the value of a beat to be a dotted quarter with three eighths per beat), and it's optional because not all 6/8 and 9/8 compositions have a triplet feel. In CW and every other DAW, a "beat" is always a quarter note and has two 8ths. This also affects how tempo is defined - bpm is always quarters per minute (not the dotted quarters per minute of compound time).

[Glenn Stanton]

actually (based on David's comment), i tried and if you select the "dotted" w/ the meter set to 9/8 you get the 3 main subdivisions - still quarter w/ 8th but as expected...

[pwal³]

I guess compound time is more complicated to code, with a bunch of knock on effects in other code 🤷‍♂️

[Glenn Stanton]

1.25 or 0.8888888888888888888888888888888888... take your pick...