Moving measures

[jdpmus]

Until recently I have been able to move a blank measure, caused by a 2-bar repeat (staff style) up or down to the adjacent system, Now, however, this seems to have quit working. My work method was to select the measure with the selection tool and then pushing the up or down cursor keys.

Is something set wrong in preferences?

[miker]

No, I don’t think there is a setting for that. First thing to try is restart the computer. If that doesn’t help, you might have to trash the preference files.

[motet]

Every time you change your preferences, make a copy of finale.ini--this is a "good" copy. Then, if Finale mucks about in finale.ini for whatever reason and the program goes wonky, quit Finale and restore finale.ini from the most recent good copy and you won't have to reset all the preferences one by one (if you can remember them all).

For some reason I've never had to do this. I guess the bugs are in parts of Finale I don't use.

[Christopher Smith]

Sorry to ask the obvious question, but are you sure you're in the Selection Tool when you hit the arrow? I've certainly made that mistake many times myself. It only works in the Selection Tool.

[jdpmus]

Yes, I'm in the correct tool. Will try Mike's solution today.

Thanks

[jdpmus]

Found it!

Unchecking "automatic update layout" in edit menu under preferences solved the problem.

[motet]

I'm afraid that makes no sense. You want "automatic update layout" for sure. So I suspect your preferences file is somehow corrupt.

[Vaughan]

Indeed, NEVER deselect Automatic Update Layout unless you really know what you're doing and are meticulous in your Finale habits. If you don't update your layout, you cannot see what the final results of formatting will be. Besides, Finale always updates the layout, whether you want it to or not, at certain moments, like opening or saving a file, so you're only postponing the inevitable and are setting yourself up for unexpected results.

[N Grossingink]

It's likely the original problem was caused because Finale needed a manual update. Even with Auto Update on, the software sometimes needs a manual update to get things straight again. Of course, I agree strongly that Auto Update should be active at all times.

The shortcut for an manual update is Command/U (Mac) or CTRL/U (windows).

N.

[motet]

Indeed, NEVER deselect Automatic Update Layout unless you really know what you're doing and are meticulous in your Finale habits.

Even if you know what you're doing, is there ever any reason to deselect it? As I understand it, it's basically just a matter of updating the display, and the ability to deselect it comes from the days when computers were slow. Correct me if I'm wrong, though.

[Vaughan]

AFAIK, that's exactly why it was an option in the 90s, when formatting files and redrawing the screen were slow, laborious processes. We even set Finale to work overnight extracting parts. If you ask me, it's a big mistake on MM's part to keep it as a program option. Puzzled and angry complaints from users who have turned this off have prompted many a discussion on the forums over the years.

[motet]

I've seen people suggest it in response to "how do I keep my manually edited notes/measure widths/etc from moving?", but if Finale does it anyway when you print, I don't think it helps with that.