My feature request list

• May 29, 2015 - 03:37

Rather than doing a whole batch of separate posts, here's a list of features that ought to be considered to speed up creating MuseScore files. In no particular order:

* Beaming across staves/systems. I know this has been brought up before, but I'm adding my voice.

* Cross-beaming of grace notes. I had to jump through a lot of hoops in my last score because I couldn't cross-beam grace notes.

* The symbol for una corda, |_|_| , needs to be added to one of the palettes. Also, a Ped. line that starts with "Ped." and ends with a 45-degree hook would be usefule.

* Custom synthesizer setups, when saved to the score, should load automatically when opening .mscz files.

* An Inspector item to make beams and brackets over tuplets horizontal. Having to adjust these guys by hand is a real PITA.

* Text formatting is so basic it's practically brain-dead, but I can live with that if at least an option for changing the linespacing is added to text-formatting. I can't believe it isn't there already. It wouldn't hurt to give some thought to easing the creation of title pages, either.

* You can add text to a line (say, Ritardando), but you can't format the text or adjust the position of the text in relation to the line. To overcome the restriction, you have to create staff text and format it appropriately, then create a line, then align the two horizontally and vertically. That's an awful lot of work.

* There needs to be a way to lock objects that must always stay together so they can be moved as a group. Shift-drag sometimes highlights more than just the desired objects, meaning you to de-select afterwards, adding steps to what should be a single click operation.

* A way to select objects that are underneath other objects. I feel one shouldn't have to move the topmost object out of place in order to get to the object underneath.

* A better algorithm for determining what constitutes a note stem. Very often, I can't highlight the stem; the flag gets highlighted instead. I have to blow my scores up to some ridiculous percent and the hunt around with the mouse for a place that highlights the stem and not the flag.

* Have lines and pedal marks work like hairpins, i.e. if two notes are selected, the line or pedal mark gets drawn between the notes only.

* Add the ability to hide staves that contain only invisibles, the way empty staves can be hidden. In my last score, I had to resort to trickery to get the playback to match the notation. It would have been very nice--and much easier to make sense of, later--if all the trickery could have gone into a staff that could be hidden.


Comments

Indont recognize the una corda symbol you mention. Can you post a picture? If ere shmbol to be found in the Symbols section of the Master Paletter? You can add customized lines to the palette, so if there are particular variations you, you can have them.

My understanding is that there was a conscious choice *not* to load synth state with each score automatically, because it could be an expensive (slow) operation, and you might not always want to pay that price. Also it wouldn't be clear if that should affect the overall state of MuseScore or if it should be loading and unloading soundfonts each time you change tabs. It's a decision that could certainly be revisited, but be aware that these are the issues.

Line text uses a text style, so you can affect the position and formatting that way. Also in Line Properties, you can override the text style with properties for just that line.

Regarding hiding staves with invisible notes, is there a reason you didn't simply make the staff itself insivible in Edit / Instruments?

As for the other suggestions, there are good ones here, but they will get lost in a list in a forum post. You submit them individually to the Issue Tracker. Do check to see if there are existing reports - difficulty selecting stem in particular is definitley something submitted already.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

Marc--

The una corda symbol is identical to the "mute on" and "mute off" symbols for string players: three short vertical lines joined by a horizontal line at the top (una corda on) or the bottom (una corda off). This isn't a universal convention, but it occurs often enough in contemporary notation to consider adding it to a palette.

I had a feeling there was a programming reason for not automatically loading the correct synth setup with a score. Multiple tabs with different synths would definitely affect performance, so I can see that auto-loading wouldn't be a good idea. Just the same, I lost quite a lot of time at one point in my last score adjusting note velocities only to discover that the wrong piano font was loaded (because I forgot to "Load from Score"--and I'm not the only person ever likely to make that mistake.)

Perhaps this issue can be dealt with by checking a file when it's opened. If it contains a "Save to Score" synth setup, MuseScore presents a dialogue asking whether the user wants to load the setup. Additionally, some sort of indication or tooltip in the Sythesizer window alerting users to the need to manually load saved synth setups could be helpful.

As for lines with preceding text, thanks for the tip. Somehow I missed the horizontal/vertical offset options for the line's text: I'd been looking for a way to change the position of the line itself (in relation to the text). A conceptual misunderstanding. Also thanks for the "Hide staff" tip. I missed seeing it in the Instruments dialogue; still used to thinking MuseScore 1.x.

I'll try to find the time to put the other suggestions in separate posts.

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