MuseScore 3.0 Idea
So in Musescore when ever you create a new score with, lets say 25 instruments because that's usually how many I work with, the score doesn't exactly fit on the page and then you have to go to page layout and find the spacing for in between the staves so they fit on the page. In Musescore 3.0 I would like to see it to where it automatically sets up the page for you so you don't have to change the settings for the page staves manually.
Of course manual is fine but it becomes a pain that you have to do this each time you want to make a new score. But I don't know if this happens to anyone else. Yes I did update to the latest version and it still happened. It would be nice to see this kind a change in Musescore 3.0
Thanks for reading this!
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Comments
Good idea. Would you mind filing it in the issue tracker (https://musescore.org/en/project/issues/musescore), to improve the odds of this not slipping through the cracks?
The thing is, MuseScore would have no idea *how* you want to do this - by decreasing staff size, increasing page size, decreasing margins, decreasing staff distance, or - most likely - some combination of these.
In reply to The thing is, MuseScore would by Marc Sabatella
Changing the staff space measure, I assume—that's how all the templates manage to fit on the same size page already. And that's essentially what Finny said (with slightly incorrect terminology, but still).
In reply to Changing the staff space by Isaac Weiss
Sounds to like he said he wanted to reduce staff distance, which actually demonstrates my point - the two of you have two different ways you think of doing this.
I could imagine an "optimize layout" tool you could run that pops up a dialog asking you some questions about how you would like this done and *then* does the operation based on your stated preferences.
In reply to Sounds to like he said he by Marc Sabatella
He or she did say "you have to go into page layout," though, which is pretty clear. But we're talking like Finny's not in the room—can you give us more details on what you were thinking of, please?
In reply to Sounds to like he said he by Marc Sabatella
Whether it is what he said or not, the fact remains that all of those methods I mentioned *are* commonly used, alone or in combination. There is also the question of whether or not someone would want landscape mode.
So there are multiple ways of getting the job done, and hence multiple expectations that people might have, and hence not a good idea for MuseScore to just automatically guess what you want. Better to have the user to give input on this. We could automtically pop up the dialog I described any time it is determined that a system won't fit on the page as specified. Although note that the user is planning on taking advantage of "Hide empty staves" or might be makring staves invisible and there might not actually be an issue at all, or at least not to the extent that it might at first appear. Another strike against automatically doing something that might not at all be what the user wants.
In reply to Whether it is what he said or by Marc Sabatella
I'd envision a cost-based system, where MuseScore plays around with different variables (stave space, stave separation, system separation, etc.) within predefined safe limits (e.g. +/- 10% from the default) until it finds something that fits. Each adjustment has an associated cost, and MuseScore selects the solution that is least costly.
In reply to I'd envision a cost-based by shoogle
Guess I need to keep up with this. XD
So I said going through "Layout" then continue to "Page Settings..." After word you would find "Staff Spacing" under scaling and you would reduce that until every staff fit on the first page as usual.
Is what I was thinking is that there is an automatic system that sets the spacing when first loading the score. Ex: 20 Staves = Spacing of 1.4 mm (just hypothetical, I don't know if that's the right size or not.) then all staves would fit on the page and start on the first page(unless like some people wont a whole extra page for a picture or a big title page). Stuff like that could really make things easier so we don't have to do it manually. There would be presets of what spacing and sizing of the scales would be for how many staves you want and whether you want it to start on the first or second page. That make more sense now?
This is most likely how other softwares do this but I wouldn't know. This is just an idea to see if we can make Musescore more efficient for making scores.
In reply to Guess I need to keep up with by Finny570
Issue filed: #115146: Automatically adjust staff space to fit instruments on page
In reply to Whether it is what he said or by Marc Sabatella
I don't think it is really as complicated as all that. I'd just have MS lower the scale factor to fit the page (with "hide empty staves" not considered). After all the default relation between staff size and distance was once adopted to accommodate the majority of situations without wasting more paper than necessary. The user can then still adjust if his case is outside this area. It is not as if that possibility were taken away . I'd bet though that the vast majority of users would be quite happy to just accept the automatic solution and get on with it.
BTW it takes way less than 25 instruments (or rather staves, people often have flute 1 and 2 etc. on one staff) before the problem occurs. The manual adjustment can be quite slow. I had to try a series of guesses for the correct scale factor (I didn't adjust any of the other parameters) before I got it right.
In reply to I don't think it is really as by azumbrunn
Without adjusting anything before making the score(adding instruments and setting key and time etc.) I counted about 16 staves before the problem occurred and I had only 21 staves total. I just used 25 as a basis cause that's what most full orchestra's have. (some do stick flute 1 and 2 on the same staves though. same with other instruments.)
In reply to Without adjusting anything by Finny570
This is another good example of the issue with doing this automatically, thoughL orchesatra score are virtually never printed on standard Letter or A4 paper sizes, because making everything small enough to fit would render it too hard to read. So instead much larger paper is normally used. But MuseScore cannot know what paper sizes you have access to, or whether you will realize you need to print on larger paper. Which is why, again, I think it better to at most put up a dialog and *ask* the user how they want to deal with the situation. Simply changing the staff size is *not* necessarily a very good solution, and this is one specific case where it definitely is *not*.
In reply to This is another good example by Marc Sabatella
The dialogue is a good idea (especially: choice between making the print smaller and the paper format larger). But I still think one may overthink this issue. I have often printed scores from IMSLP booklet style on A4 (in effect A5 pages) with no discernible readability problems. If I am not mistaken reducing the scale factor in MS does exactly what the printer does when reducing from A4 to A5.
In reply to This is another good example by Marc Sabatella
All right, let's say it's a warning dialog (exclamation point in triangle), with a button to open Page Settings. Suggested text:
"You have selected too many instruments to fit on the page with the default settings.
"In this score's Page Settings, either make the Scaling/Staff space (sp) value smaller, or change the Page Size to a larger sheet.
"[Open Page Settings] [Cancel]"
Thoughts?
In reply to All right, let's say it's a by Isaac Weiss
That's not a bad idea. I'm usually against such dialogs because I find them annoying, but in this case it would actually be quite useful because it offers to take you straight to the Page Settings.
In reply to All right, let's say it's a by Isaac Weiss
If scaling and page size are the two alternatives, and computation is fast enough, we could even add two more buttons "change page size to ***" (with *** depending on user locale...) and "change scaling to X"
In reply to If scaling and page size are by [DELETED] 5
I would welcome a function to automatically optimize the staff space measurement.
In reply to If scaling and page size are by [DELETED] 5
Scaling and page size are not the only alternatives, just perhaps the two most common. But there are also margins and staff distance.
Also, an issue with any attempt to do this automatically is that we don't necessarily know at this point what the maximum system size will be. I mean, we can see what is it right now based on all instruments always being invisible, but we don't know if "Hide empty staves" will be used, or if some instruments will be marked invisible permanently, or if there will be lyrics or spacers that add more space.
Still, just directing people to information about what they need to do would be a huge win, and if the automatic calculation ends up not being perfect, it will at least be a better starting point than what we do now.
In reply to Scaling and page size are not by Marc Sabatella
Seems the way to go.