In Note Entry mode, "6" shortcut to switch to half note entry does not work with french keyboard

• Jan 20, 2011 - 02:55
Type
Functional
Severity
S4 - Minor
Status
closed
Project

In a new or existing score, switch to note entry mode.

Press 5 : MS correctly switches to quarter note entry.
Press 7 : MS correctly switches to whole note entry.
Press 6 : MS should switch to half note entry, but pressing 6 has no effect.

This is on Windows XP Pro SP2, on MS 0.9.6.2, 0.9.6.3, and build 3910


Comments

Go to Edit > Preferences, then to the "Shortcuts" tab and see what shortcut is listed for "Pad note 1/2". It is likely the shortcut has been customized (changed from the default).

This is after a fresh install and the shortcut was not customized (I checked the options dialog as you suggested).
However this led me to notice that those shortcuts are intended for the *numeric* keypad.

I was using 1, 2, 3 etc from the "normal" keyboard - these all work except 6.
All keys from the numeric keypad, *including 6*, do work correctly.

So, I don't know if this is a bug or not... it would be nice if the "normal" 6 did work, but the priority of this is pretty low, right?

Anyway.. thanks for replying and sorry for the confusion.

bigjack2, what keyboard layout are you using? Because of the variety of keyboard layouts around the world it is possible for some shortcuts to conflict on some keyboards but not others. We try to avoid the conflicts when possible.

What combination of keys do you have to press to get 6 on the "normal keyboard"?

I'm using a French keyboard. French keyboards have the characteristic that to get numbers you have to press the shift key.
For instance the key for "1" is really for "&" and "1":
- pressing that key alone gives you "&"
- pressing it with shift gets you "1".

But with MS, to change the note duration, you have to NOT press the shift key.

To be clear : if you're in note entry mode and you want to switch to quarter notes, the shortcut is 5, so if you're using the "normal" keyboard :
- I SHOULD press 5, i.e. on a French keyboard, shift + the key that's for "(" and "5"
- BUT that doesn't work:
- BUT pressing that same key without shift works, which means I'm really pressing "("

If I want to switch to half notes, pressing the "-" and "6" key, with or without shift, doesn't work.

MS is not alone- many apps tell you to press a number key as a shortcut, and I've noticed that very often you have to leave out the shift key. Probably a Windows thing?

Well it sounds like it is a conflict between two keyboard shortcuts, since "-" is already defined for flat. Clearing the key stroke for "flat" in the preference would work around this problem.

This is the first I have heard of have to not press shift to get the number shortcuts (when shift is normally required by the keyboard layout). It sounds like a bug (and the bug may or may not be in the MuseScore code). Perhaps Lasconic will have some information (he is one of developers who lives in France).

Clearing the flat keystroke does not solve the problem.

Furthermore, for me the "-" that does flats is the numeric keypad "-". The "-" from the "normal" keyboard has no action as far as I can tell.

I confirm that I've seen many apps having issues with this shift-for-numbers thing.

Umm... something else is going on here. I deactivated the shortcut, it's not in the options list anymore, yet pressing the key still works ? This is on build 3935 on Windows.

Hello,

I have exactly the same problem described by Bigjack2 on Windows 7 with french keyboard.
The workaround is to clear the shortcut for "flat" (just clear, no need to remove) and modifiy the shortcut for half note by pressing key "6-|" : "-" appears as shortcut and now a key stroke on "6" selects half note. Hope it helps.

Title In note entry mode, "6" shortcut to switch to half note entry does not work In Note Entry mode, "6" shortcut to switch to half note entry does not work

Is this still a problem in the nightly builds?

This is most likely a problem in the nightly build. However, in nighlies, the shorcuts are stored in an external XML file. I would encourage the french users to join the french forum and try to collectively create a shorcuts.xml file for the french language.
Si nécessaire, je peux aider.

The workaround suggested by David Bolton is working. Go to Edit -> Preferences -> Shortcuts and change the shortcuts for "Bémol" (Flat) to P for example, the 6 in the top row will now work.
Unfortunately, there is no way to define the - from the numpad as a shortcut and persist it between sessions in MuseScore 1.3.

In MuseScore 2.0, the problem is still present and amplified by the guitar tabs shortcuts. It's currently being work on... See #20826: Note duration shortcuts don't work.

Problems with TAB shortcuts should be solved now. My recent developments on this should also allow to define '-' as a NumPad shortcut, freeing the '6' key for durations.

Want anyobdy with a French keyboard try it?

M.

Title In Note Entry mode, "6" shortcut to switch to half note entry does not work In Note Entry mode, "6" shortcut to switch to half note entry does not work with french keyboard
Status (old) active fixed

Replacing - (from the 6 key) by - (from the numpad) works like a charm.
I removed the shortcut for flat (there is no shortcut for sharp, so...) and replace the shortcut for tenuto by Ctrl + Alt + N (like teNuto). Ctrl+Alt+T is already taken by tempo text and Ctrl+Alt+O is marcato.
MuseScore 63c01448cd