Muting top staff causes tempo marking to be ignored

[motet]

Using a tempo mark in the Tempo Marks category with the score list set to Top Staff, if I mute the top staff or solo one of the other staves in the Score Manager, the tempo mark then seems to be ignored. I can work around this, but is this really the way it works?

[Vaughan]

I remarked about this annoying and unexpected behaviour quite some time ago. It's works the same way on the Mac side. Shall we call it a 'feature'?

[motet]

I reported this to MM who said they couldn't reproduce it, and I couldn't either, trying from scratch. Perhaps it's peculiar to my file (attached)? But you say you've experienced it too, Vaughan?

[zuill]

This is just another manifestation of a very old programming error. I'm not surprised MakeMusic is not aware of it. They have been informed by me regarding this, but under slightly different circumstances. They don't seem to have a very comprehensive grasp on how their own program works.

I reported this regarding Swing Playback not being applied to all the staves. In this case, however, either soloing a staff (as you did), or muting the upper staff, it defeats the expression, which is applied to the top staff in the score and each of the parts. If you modify the Score List to also include all staves in the parts (in the right column), then muting the upper staff or soloing another staff will not interfere with the working of the tempo expression.

Again, I shake my head to thing the programmers are just not getting it. They might need to take some time to come to grips with this. I hope you report back to them about this. You can use my name, and remind them of my prior reports.

Zuill

[motet]

Thanks, Zuill.

They are telling me to run my file through MusicXML, which I'm unwilling to do since I did a fair amount of tweaking. I can of course set the playback tempo in the playback controls to match the tempo of the piece. My wish to solo was to record "part tracks" for an amateur chorus, so that's what i did. But I also like to see bugs fixed, not just get around them for myself.

Are you able to create a simple file from scratch which exhibits the problem? I was unable to do so.

[zuill]

I believe it is a design issue, which I can duplicate in a new file. The issue is revealed when you have HP set to None. If yopu set your file to HP Standard, then it should work.

However, you can modify the Score List as I have suggested, and the expression will be recognized, even with HP set to None. No need for XML.

Zuill

[motet]

Ah, Human Playback was covering up the bug! Thanks.

What seems to get MM's attention is if they can recreate it from scratch themselves, so I've given them instructions to do that. That way, they can't dismiss it as a problem with preferences file or the file itself. I'll let you know what they say.

[miker]

I’ve never understood why the swing expression only applies to the top staff, unless you edit the Staff list. That’s right up there (for me) with why the format of additional pages doesn’t follow existing pages, without changing the page layout settings.

[Vaughan]

Motet, your file exhibits this behaviour for me, too. I looked through my past cases to MM and apparently I also reported this 4 months ago. I even sent them a file which demonstrated the problem but their response, as usual, was that they couldn’t reproduce the problem and that I should reset my preferences. Apparently I gave up at the time and didn’t persue the issue any further.

[David Ward]

I've certainly encountered this in the past, but I can't remember the details.

[motet]

MM Support was able to reproduce the problem and said, "I see we do have a bug report for this problem, so I'll link this ticket to the bug report."

[Vaughan]

Gee, I'm glad I didn't reset my preferences as MM suggested.

[motet]

It sounds like they have no good way of checking for already-known bugs when someone presents a problem.

[miker]

It sounds like they have no good way of checking for already-known bugs when someone presents a problem.

They've never had one in the past. Why should now be different?

[motet]

Fortunately, I neither trashed the preferences file nor ran my piece through MusicXML.