And many of us are demoing both. I've been working with MuseScore for about a month, and got very frustrated with (what I think should be) simple things. So, I though I'd try out Dorico.
I'm sorry to see Finale go. I know a lot of people who much prefer it to anything else.
So I watched Tantacrul's video about Sibelius. I have to say that I lost a lot of respect for him. Not because he doesn't like Sebelius. There's plenty to not like. But as a programmer, he should know better. Different programmers do things differently. He pretends to be a first time user and can't find things. How many complaints do we see about MuseScore not being intuitive? Plenty. And he also intentionally looks in the wrong place for things. A new user to any program needs to spend time in the manual. He uses Sibelius 8 in the video, which is very old (2015). I have 7.5.1(2014) My version doesn't have a Quit button in the lower right. I'm using MU4 because someday Sibelius won't run on some future version of Windows. The only thing I like better about MU4 is Muse Sounds. I wish MU4 did a tenth of the things that Sibelius did ten years ago. Note input with a mouse is very easy. No completely ridiculous drum palette. The setup a new score in MU$ is not that much better. Just different. I go back all the way to Sibelius 4.1 and actually spoke to one of the Finn brothers when they answered support phone calls.
Sure, hate Sibelius. I don't care one way or the other. We all get to choose. But he needs to spend some time in the forums and see all the problems (real and imagined) that MuseScore has. Crashes, can't save, Scores getting corrupted, and on and on.
It does. The fact the video was published in 2018 means that Sibelius 8 wasn't a decade old, it was the previous version.
> A new user to any program needs to spend time in the manual
IMO this hasn't been true for most applications in a while. 90% of people will never look at a manual, and the better the software does of being intuitive and naturally reinforcing good practice, the more effectively those users will be. Musescore certainly isn't perfect in this regard, but I do think it is a lot more newbie friendly than Sibelius.
You're right. I forgot that the video was made in 2018. But that just makes it worse. You would think that he would avoid some of the things that he was making fun of. But he doesn't. The reason that there are so many headings in various dropdown boxes is because Sibelius is capable of so much more. And then there are the things that seem to be borrowed directly. Shortcut "I". Common and all instruments. Questions about this are on the forum all the time. Piano at the bottom of the list of templates? Buried in sub menu in MU4. Not everyone goes to piano first anyway.
Everyone has a different idea of what is intuitive. Notation software is not like any other software. The first time you open doc type program there's a pretty good chance you will be able to type a story or letter. Notation software, even if you know music theory, isn't intuitive. How many time do we see someone ask a question and the first answer is a link to the manual. Of course we need to spend time in the manual. If only to learn more efficient methods than we may have discovered by just clicking around.
Put all the Plugins in one place? Easy in MU4. What are there,10 or so? There are lots in Sibelius. They are divided into the category that suits them.
Again plenty of folks hate Sibelius. And with good reason. Then make better software.
geez i left Musescore for a while because of the 4.0 release, which to my reasoning is just not stable enough. I just kept on using 3.6.2. I'm checking out 4.4 to see if that has changed.
But, I finally decided to go with Finaler a few months ago and I like it. Too a few weeks to get to be comfy with it since I only knew Musescore for a few years. Now it's a dead product.
But, I'm not a professional so Finale could last me a lifetime. VST mapping was great. Looking at Musescore, now i have a questions on how a snare drum is interpreted as a rim shot, ghost note, crosstick, but only has 1 midi note assignment. I thought by looking at the articulation (accents, and ghost notes), and cross-stick note would be the answer. Finale has each category for snare, cymbals, etc with dedicated midi values.
But anyway, I'm with you, notation software is a different beast.
"Notation software, even if you know music theory, isn't intuitive".
That certainly matches my experience with MuseScore, Guitar Pro and TablEdit. I also learned a lot of useful things that I would otherwise have missed and would've under utilised the software, (and probably bombarded the forum with questions that the documentation already covers).
I can attest to that. It amazes me that musicians of any instrument rather post questions to a user group without even reading the supported manual. I mean even if the manual is 10 pages and the simples questions could be answered in black and white. So instead of doing that, they wait and wait for a user group answer. I just don't get it.
It doesn't help that the manual for MU4 is difficult to maneuver. I have it downloaded as a PDF so that I can search it with Acrobat. But it is still hard. The MU3 manual is better.
From the handbook main contents page try opening Appendix and then Full contents. From there I can find most things using the Find in page function in my browser. You can save the Full contents page as a favourite.
There are a couple of issues with the full contents which both relate to going against user expectations.
Firstly it is unintuitive to have to go to an appendix to find a link to the full contents; a link on the first page of the handbook would be more typical and therefore intuitive. Sometimes full contents are at the front of a handbook and this also works well, (just as in the MS3 handbook).
Secondly it is not obvious in the table of contents as to which entries are links to documentation pages and which are just headings or subheadings as there is initially no visual distinction. When you press an entry you get a clickable hash symbol if it's a link but nothing if it isn't. If it is you then click the hash to go to the documentation - an un-necessary extra navigation click.
Some of the entries show the hash on click but then navigate without waiting for the user to click it! This is a bizarre way of doing things. This particular wheel definitely didn't need to be re-invented, especially when the result resembles a square wheel rather than a circular one.
Comments
And many of us are demoing both. I've been working with MuseScore for about a month, and got very frustrated with (what I think should be) simple things. So, I though I'd try out Dorico.
I'm back…
I'm sorry to see Finale go. I know a lot of people who much prefer it to anything else.
So I watched Tantacrul's video about Sibelius. I have to say that I lost a lot of respect for him. Not because he doesn't like Sebelius. There's plenty to not like. But as a programmer, he should know better. Different programmers do things differently. He pretends to be a first time user and can't find things. How many complaints do we see about MuseScore not being intuitive? Plenty. And he also intentionally looks in the wrong place for things. A new user to any program needs to spend time in the manual. He uses Sibelius 8 in the video, which is very old (2015). I have 7.5.1(2014) My version doesn't have a Quit button in the lower right. I'm using MU4 because someday Sibelius won't run on some future version of Windows. The only thing I like better about MU4 is Muse Sounds. I wish MU4 did a tenth of the things that Sibelius did ten years ago. Note input with a mouse is very easy. No completely ridiculous drum palette. The setup a new score in MU$ is not that much better. Just different. I go back all the way to Sibelius 4.1 and actually spoke to one of the Finn brothers when they answered support phone calls.
Sure, hate Sibelius. I don't care one way or the other. We all get to choose. But he needs to spend some time in the forums and see all the problems (real and imagined) that MuseScore has. Crashes, can't save, Scores getting corrupted, and on and on.
In reply to I'm sorry to see Finale go… by bobjp
For some important context, the Sibelius video is from before Tantcrul was working on MuseScore.
In reply to For some important context,… by oscardssmith
Which doesn't really help.
In reply to Which doesn't really help. by bobjp
It does. The fact the video was published in 2018 means that Sibelius 8 wasn't a decade old, it was the previous version.
> A new user to any program needs to spend time in the manual
IMO this hasn't been true for most applications in a while. 90% of people will never look at a manual, and the better the software does of being intuitive and naturally reinforcing good practice, the more effectively those users will be. Musescore certainly isn't perfect in this regard, but I do think it is a lot more newbie friendly than Sibelius.
In reply to It does. The fact the video… by oscardssmith
You're right. I forgot that the video was made in 2018. But that just makes it worse. You would think that he would avoid some of the things that he was making fun of. But he doesn't. The reason that there are so many headings in various dropdown boxes is because Sibelius is capable of so much more. And then there are the things that seem to be borrowed directly. Shortcut "I". Common and all instruments. Questions about this are on the forum all the time. Piano at the bottom of the list of templates? Buried in sub menu in MU4. Not everyone goes to piano first anyway.
Everyone has a different idea of what is intuitive. Notation software is not like any other software. The first time you open doc type program there's a pretty good chance you will be able to type a story or letter. Notation software, even if you know music theory, isn't intuitive. How many time do we see someone ask a question and the first answer is a link to the manual. Of course we need to spend time in the manual. If only to learn more efficient methods than we may have discovered by just clicking around.
Put all the Plugins in one place? Easy in MU4. What are there,10 or so? There are lots in Sibelius. They are divided into the category that suits them.
Again plenty of folks hate Sibelius. And with good reason. Then make better software.
In reply to You're right. I forgot that… by bobjp
geez i left Musescore for a while because of the 4.0 release, which to my reasoning is just not stable enough. I just kept on using 3.6.2. I'm checking out 4.4 to see if that has changed.
But, I finally decided to go with Finaler a few months ago and I like it. Too a few weeks to get to be comfy with it since I only knew Musescore for a few years. Now it's a dead product.
But, I'm not a professional so Finale could last me a lifetime. VST mapping was great. Looking at Musescore, now i have a questions on how a snare drum is interpreted as a rim shot, ghost note, crosstick, but only has 1 midi note assignment. I thought by looking at the articulation (accents, and ghost notes), and cross-stick note would be the answer. Finale has each category for snare, cymbals, etc with dedicated midi values.
But anyway, I'm with you, notation software is a different beast.
In reply to You're right. I forgot that… by bobjp
"Notation software, even if you know music theory, isn't intuitive".
That certainly matches my experience with MuseScore, Guitar Pro and TablEdit. I also learned a lot of useful things that I would otherwise have missed and would've under utilised the software, (and probably bombarded the forum with questions that the documentation already covers).
In reply to It does. The fact the video… by oscardssmith
I can attest to that. It amazes me that musicians of any instrument rather post questions to a user group without even reading the supported manual. I mean even if the manual is 10 pages and the simples questions could be answered in black and white. So instead of doing that, they wait and wait for a user group answer. I just don't get it.
In reply to I can attest to that. It… by drummerMan
I think that it's a case of laziness.
In reply to I can attest to that. It… by drummerMan
It doesn't help that the manual for MU4 is difficult to maneuver. I have it downloaded as a PDF so that I can search it with Acrobat. But it is still hard. The MU3 manual is better.
In reply to It doesn't help that the… by bobjp
The MS3 handbook is spot on with excellent front contents links. The MS4 handbook is unhelpfully sparse in this respect.
In reply to The MS3 handbook is spot on… by yonah_ag
And this is why I’ve had more success on Google, searching for MuseScore 4 (your question here)
In reply to And this is why I’ve had… by mikey12045
From the handbook main contents page try opening Appendix and then Full contents. From there I can find most things using the Find in page function in my browser. You can save the Full contents page as a favourite.
In reply to From the handbook main… by SteveBlower
Thanks, Steve, I'll try that.
In reply to From the handbook main… by SteveBlower
There are a couple of issues with the full contents which both relate to going against user expectations.
Firstly it is unintuitive to have to go to an appendix to find a link to the full contents; a link on the first page of the handbook would be more typical and therefore intuitive. Sometimes full contents are at the front of a handbook and this also works well, (just as in the MS3 handbook).
Secondly it is not obvious in the table of contents as to which entries are links to documentation pages and which are just headings or subheadings as there is initially no visual distinction. When you press an entry you get a clickable hash symbol if it's a link but nothing if it isn't. If it is you then click the hash to go to the documentation - an un-necessary extra navigation click.
Some of the entries show the hash on click but then navigate without waiting for the user to click it! This is a bizarre way of doing things. This particular wheel definitely didn't need to be re-invented, especially when the result resembles a square wheel rather than a circular one.