Bug: chosen note duration not respected when overwriting a default rest measure with a note
Musescore 3.2.2
Platform: Windows 7 / 64b
There is a subtle (needless?) difference between the default full measure rests which populate an empty musescore score and full measure rests which are manually entered. I didn't even realize there was a difference until recently, though I'm a relatively new user so maybe everyone appreciates the difference.
The default full measure rest has a couple bear traps that I've fallen into many times. Normally, when a note is selected, the toolbar shows the duration of the note by highlighting the corresponding icon on the toolbar. But for some reason, when one of these default rests is chosen, the duration shows up as a quarter note. It would be just a minor polish annoyance if that was the end of it, but it appears to have deeper consequences.
Notably, when not in note entry mode, click on a default measure rest. Then click on, say, the whole note duration icon on the toolbar, then type "a" to enter a whole note A. Surprise, you got a quarter note A!
I've uploaded a short (2.5 minute) video to youtube which demonstrates the behavior.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka7xQnOezRU
Comments
duplicate of https://musescore.org/en/node/291690?
In reply to duplicate of https:/… by Jojo-Schmitz
No, I filed two different bug reports with two different videos with two different problems. In the other bug report, the note entry cursor is lost. In this report, cursor isn't lost, but the wrong note duration is applied. I can select a rest symbol (not the measure, as in the other bug), select a note duration, say a whole note, then hit a pitch, and instead a quarter note is entered, and the cursor is left situated after the just entered note.
Note entry page states that you must first enter note entry mode N and only afterwards choose the duration for note entry.
See also #276072: Duration of notes is not selected the first time
The full measure rest has no specific duration - it's as long as the measure itself. Consider, it could be 3/4, 6/8, or even 5/4. That in itself is the significant difference between a full measure rest and a whole rest - they ony just happen to last the same amount of time in that small handful of time signatures where numerator = denominator (e.g., 4/4, 2/2, 8/8). So that is why the duration toolbar does not show the duration of the rest.
As noted, the results if you try entering a note while not in note input mode are a bit undefined - you're not really supposed to do that. I personally think we should disable this, but I know it was added to help beginners. I think it would be more helpful if the action popped up an error message.
Anyhow, the glitch you mention happens only in the special case where you select a duration equal to the time signature. In that case, MuseScore is smart enough not to change the duration of the full measure rest. This is good because it reduces the likelihood of people doing this by accident or because they don't understand that a full measure rest is not the same as a whole rest.
I would agree there is no obvious reason we couldn't use the selected duration to enter the note. There are, however, some non-obvious reasons, as per #286360: Enter note entry mode when a note pad button is clicked.
Release 3.3 has fixed the worst of this. If you aren't in note input mode and select a default rest in a measure, then pick a duration, the specified duration is used, whereas before (in 3.2) it would still use a quarter note duration.
I'm unsure how to close this bug request, so if an expert could do that, it would be great.
In reply to Release 3.3 has fixed the… by frustum
consider it closed