Shortcut for Preferences?
(re MS v3.6) Is there a reason you can’t set a keyboard shortcut for the Preferences window? Most apps let you do that. It would be very handy.
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Use the mnemonics, here: Alt+E, P (Alt+B, E in German)
The main idea behind it not having any currently, is the hope that once set up you don't need to change those preferences often.
In reply to The main idea behind it not… by jeetee
I think it's nice to have choices. There are many reasons to access Preferences, and I have wished for a shortcut as well. My biggest single need is to change scrolling to or from horizontal/vertical, but I also access Shortcuts regularly. I wonder what the downside is to accessing Preferences as easily as possible whenever one wants.
In reply to I think it's nice to have… by stevebob
FWIW, I have separate workspaces defined for vertical/horizontal layout, also that allows me to optimize the toolbars accordingly.
No specific downside to adding a "command" to access the dialog (which is the technical internal name for "thing you can assign a shortcut too), it would just require someone who feels the need for this to take the time to implement it. Personally I find Alt+E P so simple it's not worth the effort.
In reply to FWIW, I have separate… by Marc Sabatella
Jojo-Schmitz> Use the mnemonics, here: Alt+E, P (Alt+B, E in German)
Those aren't mnemonics (something that makes something easier to memorize); they're just memorization. But sure, I can do that.
jeetee> The main idea behind it not having any currently, is the hope that once set up you don't need to change those preferences often.
LOL—you sound like my wife, telling me what I "shouldn't need" to do! (What she actually means is, "You should be like me!")
I do admire your ability to open the Preferences window so rarely. However, I don't think the rest of us should feel inadequate by comparison.
Marc Sabatella> Personally I find Alt+E P so simple it's not worth the effort.
Well, in that case, I'll be like you! Can you think of any other things you find particularly easy, that I might not? If so, just knowing how easy you find them may make them easier for me. Let's try it! 😄
In reply to Jojo-Schmitz> Use the… by Andy Fielding
They are called mnemonics though. And E for Edit, P for Preferences is pretty well memorizable, and in case it isn't, there's the underline of that letters in the menu to remind you.
Shortcuts in turn are just that, and if you don't remember them you'd have to look them up in Edit > Prerferences > Shortuts, the key combo doesn't need to have to do anything with the actualy finction.
In reply to Jojo-Schmitz> Use the… by Andy Fielding
> "jeetee> The main idea behind it not having any currently, is the hope that once set up you don't need to change those preferences often.
LOL—you sound like my wife, telling me what I "shouldn't need" to do! (What she actually means is, "You should be like me!")"
Context is everything as well. In this case the context being the basic (universal across all programs) way to access menu items through keystrokes was mentioned already and the OP asked for a rationale. Nothing about providing that rationale screams "you should be like me", don't read things into answering a question to point that aren't there.
> "I do admire your ability to open the Preferences window so rarely. However, I don't think the rest of us should feel inadequate by comparison."
Again, there is nothing about how you should feel implied. But I was wondering what about the workflow of a regular user would make them have a necessity to open up the Preferences window that often. The intent for program wide settings indeed is "change a few times during setup" and then the program is configured as you want it to be.
A possible and valid use case for that (changing orientations) was given as a reply to that. And the follow up question then becomes (again in the context where the mnemonic approach was already pointed out): does this action then still need to have a shorter shortcut than the current keystrokes already give it.
In reply to Jojo-Schmitz> Use the… by Andy Fielding
I said personally the two clicks it takes to open the Preferences dialog is simple enough that I haven't found it worth my own time to spend it volunteering to implement a shortcut to reduce it to one click instead. If someone else finds it worth their time, I certainly won't stand in their way. We all need to make decisions about how we spend our time. In the open source world, many of us volunteers are mostly "scratching our own itches" - fixing the things that bother us personally.
As for preferences, I suspect most users will never see the need to open it ever. Users who love to tinker will probably open it a whole ton during their first few weeks or months of using the program, and seldom after that. But this is the sort of thing it would be good to have data on. Unfortunately I don't think the telemetry thing really panned out.
In reply to I said personally the two… by Marc Sabatella
The way MS MuseScore works seems consistent with MS HID to get to Preferences on any application (although it can depend on the app, but it's usually a 2 x key combo to get to Preferences (sometimes called 'Options' on a separate tab, with a dropdown to narrow down). I'm assuming this is the same thing you can achieve via single keyboard shortcut on OSX with 'Cmd-,' but that's an OSX thing. The MS version looks like it follows the MS standard, and if a single combined keystroke were used to provide the feature, wouldn't it require a much larger key re-mapping module that would let you break much of the MS HID i.e. dangerous?
(btw the Shortcut tab in Preferences looks like it's been (correctly) designed in MuseScore to work within a score, not at the app level, so that's not the place IMHO).
One combo keystroke to 'Preferences' sounds like a pretty trivial feature to me given the work to create it and how (in) frequently it would be used for things like Preferences. A more important discussion on features might be about which parts of MuseScore app preferences could be embedded in the score file itself (e.g score background colour), but that's a huge topic on its own. That's my take, happy to be refuted by those with more knowledge about it than me!
In reply to The way MS MuseScore works… by Lofo
> "and if a single combined keystroke were used to provide the feature, wouldn't it require a much larger key re-mapping module that would let you break much of the MS HID i.e. dangerous"
Not at all. There are plenty of programs that have a preferences shortcut as well; and again, MuseScore can get one too when a contributor feels this addition worthy of their time. My browser for example has Ctrl/Cmd+F12 as the default shortcut for it.
The only thing standing in the way of having a shortcut for the preferences window is someone volunteering their time to implement it and open up a Pull Request.
In reply to Jojo-Schmitz> Use the… by Andy Fielding
Jojo-Schmitz> Use the mnemonics, here: Alt+E, P...
Andy Fielding> ...sure, I can do that.
OK then, all's well... ;-)