Finer control of repeats with play panel loop

I don't really see how we could provide an interface to do that. Do you have any suggestion?

I would suggest a check box that says something like "Skip voltas before repeats." This is different than deselecting ignore repeats, which plays every measure without honoring repeats.

Another possibility is to make a dropdown that says something along the lines of "Play the n time through" where the n is the dropdown that can be set to a number that will tell MS to play it as if it were the nth time through. If n is greater than the max number of repeats, it would simply play it as though it were the last time through. It would honor repeats and voltas as needed if less than the number of "times played" honoring repeats as appropriate.

Maybe if https://musescore.org/en/developers-handbook/google-summer-code/ideas-2… ever gets implemented, then I would think great if user could place the start and stop directly on the *timeline* instead of the *score*. That way could handle any arbitrary setup, including practicing going to coda, for instance.

EDIT: It is not clear from reading that GSoC project whether the "Timeline" would expand out repeats. I would think it should have an option to do that at least.

The time line as I imagined it will NOT extend repeat. It will just be a minimap of the score.

However, I believe having an unrolled representation of the score would be beneficial because the option proposed by mike and raza are too simplistic. "Skip voltas before repeats" which voltas if there are more than 2?

Well I think we should add a feature to the Timeline GSoC project to be able to represent in both unrolled and rolled representations. I think having an unrolled representation would also help being able to debug errors in the score's repeat playback.

My thinking on skip voltas before repeat had to do with having a complex volta system such as having a section played 4 times and a volta is set for 1&3, another is is for 2 and finally 4 starts after the repeat. Skip voltas would jump to 4. I realize the words are wrong, and part of the reason I suggested the play nth time through option.

FWIW, complicated repeats would be a reason the user would want to practice and use the play panel in the first case, so would have to handle anything that musescore loop unroll can handle (so would have to be aware of things such as DSes and to Coda from inside repeats). Maybe a dropdown is a way to go. Although I would also like to be able to see an unrolled representation of the score, such as a unrolled timeline, and be able to put [ and ] directly on that.

That would be great. Kind of a playback navigator?

yeah. I think I remember such a thing being talked in the fourms a while back. Anyway if the GSoC project is called "Timeline" think that name means that it should be able to produce a timeline of the score.

I disagree. I'm happy to give another name to timeline but I don't think it should have a feature for unrolled version of the score. 2 reasons, the first goal is to be able to navigate the score, and the second, it doesn't serve the purpose of loop correctly since it would be impossible to start or end a loop in the middle of a measure.

Also, if one wants to use MuseScore as a rehearsal tool, there is no need to print, so there is no need to use voltas, coda etc... which are construct from the paper age.

"Timeline" will have to be renamed to something else, probably "Minimap" since that is what it really is, if it doesn't actually support a timeline.

It seems to me the play panel is a practice tool. At least that is the only manner in which how I use the play panel. And I don't see any problem with using musescore on a computer to practice, even though it is a notation program. Maybe there could be an actual (i.e. unrolled) timeline (maybe optionally in play panel or somewhere else) that has labels for section names and voltas, which you can place brackets on.

I did a quick search and I believe this is what I remembered reading: http://dev-list.musescore.org/GSoC-2016-Timeline-dockable-dialog-td7579…

"...I was drawn to the suggestion of a timeline dialog, which provides a chronological overview of the score, and a means for navigation. One useful addition could be a persistent playback head displayed on the timeline, which may be dragged around by the user..."

There is an expectation from the average user that MS will play a score correctly if notated correctly, so someone less familiar with writing music will use MS as a tool to check their notation. Amateur musicians can read a score, but writing is a different skill. If the score doesn't play back correctly they adjust it, or they post in the forums that they can't get MS to play it the way they want it to. There are probably a couple posts like this each week. Theoretically, everyone who writes a song has the ultimate goal that someone else will eventually play it so the writer wants it written properly. I think proper playback is valuable for keeping the amateurs, who outnumber the professionals, using MS from becoming frustrated and going somewhere else.

BTW, I'm not making any suggestion about how to implement timeline, but reusing some of the same code for both features is not out of the question.

On using MS as a rehearsal tool, people do want to use MS as a rehearsal tool. The either follow MS on their computer and playback with it, or the put it into PDF so they can display it in a viewer to display it. People don't want to rewrite long sections of scores so they use DCs DSs repeats and voltas. This is because people want to get results from as little work as possible and has nothing to do with the paper age.

Excellent points mike320.

(As an aside, considering that tablets are being used more and more than papers, I'm thinking there might be use for an export "unrolled" pdf option, which outputs the score without any repeats or DC/DSes/alCodas, which may be easier for the musicians to navigate on tablets...but I'm just making a note of that now...I don't want to get too off-topic)

Yes, I feel you raza. In my personal experience at rehearsal or reading new music at gigs, most of the errors which cause the ensemble to fall apart are due to musicians failing to understand the repeat structure. I wish I could have back all the time I've lost from that. Which is why I think improving the functionality of the play panel to allow finer control of where to set the loop is important so people can better practice (for instance, taking the nth time through a repeats and then continuing on to coda). So I've changed the title to reflect that. As I said, I personally would like the play panel slider to be enhanced such that it would represent an unrolled timeline of the score, with sections labeled every-time they occur.

And I notice how in that image you have "unrolled" the score...I've done that too myself, and think "export unrolled" would be a useful feature, so I've made a post in the feature request forum for it: https://musescore.org/en/node/183966