Finale Forum

I'm writing a group of fingering exercises in different keys and can disable automatic courtesy times signatures, but the Finale manual does not show how to remove existing courtesy times signatures. Is there a way to remove the existing ones?

I'm not sure why changing the option doesn't turn them all off--you haven't turned off Automatic Update Layout have you (don't)? But there's a measure-tool option to do it on a per-measure basis.

I just spent 20 minutes looking for "Automatic Update Layout," and could not find it to check. A search of the near-useless manual yields no information. The setting is not in any of the drop-down menus. Can you direct me to where the setting is hidden?

It's a program preference, but if you can't find it then presumably you didn't turn it off so I may be wrong that that's an issue. It was just a guess, since it can cause mysterious things to happen. Just typing Ctrl-U (update layout) will tell you if that's it, though.

I unchecked the "courtesy time signature" document options and the existing ones went away, so I'm not sure what's going on. Maybe you should post a picture or a file so we're sure we're talking about the same thing.

I reread your initial post and I suspect you are confusing key signatures and time signatures. Document options/key signatures. It will affect existing ones.

Oh my! That is scary. I did mix the two up as I wanted to hide both. I need more coffee.

Thanks for your patience.

I suspect you'll want to turn off Barlines/Double Barlines at Key Changes as well.

Select all the measures you do not want to show a courtesy time signature.
Right-click.
Select Measure Attributes.
At the bottom, check "Hide cautionary clefs . . ."

mebmus, your option works nicely. I always referred to these indications as "courtesy" key or time signatures. MakeMusic calls them "cautionary." For working with regions, the "Shift" key works OK. For select areas, I tried use of the "Ctrl" key, but MakeMusic decided not to follow the convention. But at least now I have more control. Thank you.