Finale Forum

Hello, I'm having a silly problem.

The 8th note has suddenly disappeared from the palette. I have been using Finale for years and this has never happened before, I'm really puzzled as to why it did just now.



Thank you for your help.

The culprit is probably the Preferences file.

From your post I can not see the version of neither your operating system nor your copy of Finale.
Hence I can not give you detailed instructions.

Also, I can not see which steps you have already taken.
The following is a “shot in the dark”:

Have you tried
- quitting Finale, and launching it again?
- resetting the Preferences ?
- quitting Finale, removing the Preferences file, and launching Finale again?
- rebooting the computer?

Under Window/Customize Palettes/Simple Entry Palettte, see if the 8th note got moved over to the left column. If that is the case, move it back to the right column.

Zuill

Apologies. I'm using Windows and the version of Finale is 2014. I can't find the Preferences file and there's nothing in the Palette menu of Preferences. There's no Customize Palettes/Simple Entry Palettte under Window either.

The 8th note box completely disappeared, it's not in another palette either. I can only select 8th notes via Tools/Simple Entry/Eighth note but that is way convoluted.

Rebooting Finale and the PC hasn't worked either. Any ideas? Thank you.

Window menu. Scroll the image below to get the full picture.

Finale calls this both a palette and a toolbar. No wonder people get confused.

chopin354 wrote:… I'm using Windows and the version of Finale is 2014. I can't find the Preferences file …

What version of Windows ?
Perhaps Windows 7 ?

1. Go to C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\MakeMusic\Finale 2014
The AppData directory is hidden by default.
You will have to set the option to display hidden files before you can see it in the Explorer.
2. Look for the "FINMIDI.ini" and "Finale.ini" files
3. Drag them to your desktop
4. Relaunch Finale.

The problem is that there is no menu to modify Palettes in the Window menu, that's what I meant. Is it possible to access it elsewhere? I also tried moving the .INI files to the desktop but the problem persisted when opening Finale again. It's Windows 10.

Thank you for your assistance. I guess reinstalling Finale would be the only solution then?

That is odd!

If you have Finale 2014 there is a free upgrade to Finale 2014.5 (which is what I have) you should be able to get by logging in to you account on the MakeMusic website. You might as well get that if you're going to reinstall.

I have 2014 installed and I checked it. The menu the OP showed is not the 2014 menu. Can't say why I have it and not the OP.

Zuill

The toolbar/palette information might be stored in the Windows registry (Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\MakeMusic\Finale2014.5) rather than the preferences file. I know the position of the toolbars is stored there. In that case, a reinstall should fix it.

By the way, chopin354, pressing 4 on the keypad will select the eighth note. You might want to learn those shortcuts anyway--you will go much faster than using the mouse.

chopin354 wrote:… I have been using Finale for years …

chopin354,

Are you sure you “have been using Finale for years” - and not Finale PrintMusic?

Your screen shot makes me suspect that you have PrintMusic, rather than the “full Finale”.

Ah, good guess.

If PrintMusic has a Movie Window and Plugins, I would be surprised. My guess is that this is not PrintMusic.

Zuill

Rather odd indeed. I am happy to say however that reinstalling Finale solved all issues and the eighth note is back on the palette. Thank you all very much for your help.

Glad to hear. The 8th note is one of my favorites.

Zuill