Automatic scale reduction when you create a score
When you create a score with more than 12 or 10 instruments usually some staves are placed outside the paper. You can easily change this with the page scaling option, but it would be good that when you create the score at first, the page scaling is settled to the maximum possible that permit all the staves inside the margins. I know there are more important bugs to solve but improving that would make Musescore looks more professional.
Comments
I agree it seems like a good idea at first glance, but it's actually rather more complicated than that, when you consider the size of a system isn't fixed, it depends on the number of staves and the spacing between them both of which may vary from system to system, also the presence of frames, etc. So it's trickier than you might think come up with a good strategy here. Further discussion is certainly welcome, though! I know issues like this are being looked at for MuseScore 4.
In reply to I agree it seems like a good… by Marc Sabatella
Well, I'm not an expert in computer science, just studied two years at the university. So, I understand why is complicated to make an automatic scaling process or centering staves in the pages (as other music notation programs). But, for what I think, the idea I come up with is not too troublesome. I mean, you can add a checkbox in the instrument select of the New Score Wizard that says something as "Adapt the score scaling to fit the page when the score is created." Or something like that (well, my english sucks...), that when is activated, when the score is created the scale (the page scale that is normally in 1.764) is changed to fit all the staves in the page. Because is the very empty score (just created), and the title frame is located in the page before (as usual when the system don't fit the page), it should not be difficult to make an algorithm knowing the numbers of staves and the page measures. In the photo I attached it should be well explained. Just because this is only a process that is done when the score is created, future changes of instrument or frames would not bother anything. I don't know if you understand what I think. I know it would be better to have an automatic algorithm that can scale and center even when the score is edited, I know this need more work and is no feasible right now. Well, hope you like it!
In reply to Well, I'm not an expert in… by [DELETED] 164193
The problem isn't with the programming, it's the issues I already described - describing, in plain English, what it means to adapt the scaling to fit, given that each system might be a different size. We could come up with an algorithm that made the first page fit while empty - which of course it is to start - but chances are it would not still fit once full of content, and chances are also the scaling would be smaller for other pages that don't have as many staves. Plus, of course orchestras scores would almost never be printed on A4 or Letter paper, you'd end up with scores that were unreadably tiny. So you really need to customize page size, not (just) staff size. It's a very complex problem, and again, the complexities have nothing to do with programming, just with even understanding what exactly is the right thing to do. So far, we try to steer people toward using the templates that are already provided - these are optimized for a variety of specific common situations.
So again, it's not that we wouldn't want to figure out a way to do something here, but it's just not clear how exactly this should work. That's why I say further discussion is needed before one can even start thinking about an algorithm to implement it. Meaning, to start with, we'd want to get feedback from many users about all the specific questions I raised here.
In reply to The problem isn't with the… by Marc Sabatella
Ok, my apologies.