Finale crashes upon inserting measure stack

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maennis1112
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Finale Version: 26.3.1
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Post by maennis1112 » Thu Aug 01, 2019 3:07 pm

Dear all,

I'm encountering what appears to be an old problem that I can nevertheless not find a viable solution for in the older threats. When trying to insert a new measure stack at the beginning of a 40 poages orchestral score, Finale always crashes. It's the first time I experience this. The solution to delete linked parts and try again doesn't work for me, I've tried it several times. I hear this is a problem with lengthy scores, but that's still doesn't solve the problem for me, since I don't want to split the score, neither c/p it into a new file.

Is there any other advice on this? I'm one day before a deadline, so this is a real pain in the ass (would be the first time though that Finale doesn't surprise me with an unknown bug right when you least need it :x :x :x :x

Thanks a bunch in advance, and best regards!
Mac (Mid 2015)
OS X 10.13 (High Sierra)
Finale 26.0.1.706


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David Ward
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Post by David Ward » Thu Aug 01, 2019 3:43 pm

I don't have a real answer, but I did encounter a problem 2 or 3 days ago when entering a measure stack at the beginning of a ‘New Piece’ as created by the JW plug-in within a larger piece. It didn't crash Finale, but it refused to behave correctly in several annoying ways. When I went back to a previously saved copy and tried to add the measure stack while in scroll view it worked OK.
Finale 25.5 & 26.3
Mac 10.13.6 & 10.14.6

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ebiggs1
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Post by ebiggs1 » Thu Aug 01, 2019 3:51 pm

... I don't want to split the score,...

Sorry for this answer, but splitting may be the only answer. I don't know if I have ever had a 40+ page score but I have several football half-time scores that are fairly long. I know this year's Phoenix has 17 pages in the just the 1st part. All of mine are split into 3 parts. I am on Win 10 and don't know if a Mac is the problem but my longer scores seem to do OK.

I suggest you split it into 3 new Finale files. I come from a time when Finale locked up a lot. So I also save a lot, too, probably more often than need be.
Finale 27.4.1 - Perfect Layout Silver - Note Performer 4.4 - SmartScore Pro 64 - Windows 11
President, The Shawnee Concert Band, Composer/Arranger, retired Music Teacher.

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ebiggs1
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Post by ebiggs1 » Thu Aug 01, 2019 3:55 pm

... entering a measure stack at the beginning of a ‘New Piece’ as created by the JW plug-in within a larger piece. It didn't crash Finale, but it refused to behave correctly..."
I, also, have seen this with certain plug-ins. In my case a Ctrl+U fixed it wiht out issue thereafter.
Finale 27.4.1 - Perfect Layout Silver - Note Performer 4.4 - SmartScore Pro 64 - Windows 11
President, The Shawnee Concert Band, Composer/Arranger, retired Music Teacher.

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motet
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Post by motet » Thu Aug 01, 2019 4:23 pm

ebiggs1 wrote:
... I don't want to split the score,...

Sorry for this answer, but splitting may be the only answer. I don't know if I have ever had a 40+ page score but I have several football half-time scores that are fairly long. I know this year's Phoenix has 17 pages in the just the 1st part. All of mine are split into 3 parts. I am on Win 10 and don't know if a Mac is the problem but my longer scores seem to do OK.

I suggest you split it into 3 new Finale files. I come from a time when Finale locked up a lot. So I also save a lot, too, probably more often than need be.
I've got scores that are 300 pages and over an hour's worth of music, so length is probably not the issue. 40 pages is not that long.

The usual advice when Finale crashes repeatedly is to recreate the Preferences file:

https://makemusic.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/ ... inale-etc-

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ebiggs1
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Post by ebiggs1 » Thu Aug 01, 2019 4:49 pm

Yeah I know that is the "stock" answer for any and all Finale problems. Even if it isn't the problem! It might fix it who knows? Try it.

I would never do a 300 page score in Finale all in one file. I have to much history with Finale to ever, ever do that. Curiosity caused me to check my recent "Phoenix" show and it is 30 pages. In three separate Finale files.

If for no other reason, 300 pages has got to be very slow, YMMV.
Finale 27.4.1 - Perfect Layout Silver - Note Performer 4.4 - SmartScore Pro 64 - Windows 11
President, The Shawnee Concert Band, Composer/Arranger, retired Music Teacher.

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motet
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Post by motet » Thu Aug 01, 2019 5:06 pm

I do operas. While I do put each act into a separate file, it is usually not possible to break them down further, as there may be 1,500 measures of continuous music. I don't know how you would break up a file with parts in the middle of a movement or act.

I have been doing this since Finale 2003. Slowness doesn't seem to be an issue. Long ago, I found that the repitch tool was sometimes slow near the end of a long file. It seems to have been revisiting the entire file for each repitched note. I found that turning off Automatic Update Layout fixed that (this was in scroll view, where Automatic Update Layout makes no sense anyway) but I haven't bothered with that for a long time. Either they fixed something or it's the result of computers getting faster.

In any case, 40 pages is nothing, as I said, and breaking up the file is likely not good advice. If resetting the Preferences file doesn't help, try turning off Automatic Update Layout long enough to add the measures (then turn it back on!), or try adding the measures at the end and them moving them to the beginning.

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N Grossingink
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Post by N Grossingink » Thu Aug 01, 2019 6:09 pm

Try inserting the measure before measure 2. If that works, copy the contents of measure 1 into measure 2 and clear the duplicate entries in measure 1.
N. Grossingink
Educational Band, Orchestra and Jazz Ensemble a specialty
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maennis1112
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Finale Version: 26.3.1
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Post by maennis1112 » Thu Aug 01, 2019 6:17 pm

Thanks everyone for their replies. Here's the update:

So it turns out that it DOES work, I tried it out at different spots in the score, in page and in scroll view, inserting measure stacks or inserting a new staff system with x measures.

BUT: It takes about a minute each time. For about 50 seconds, it will look like it crashes (force quit applications window saying Finale doesn't respond), then after 50 seconds there comes an error chime, still nothing happening, and then 10 seconds later the measure stack appears and I can go on working. I don't know if that would have worked before already as well, since I never waited for a minute (my year-2019-bad) and believed my computer when it said "doesn't respond". But obviously I'm happy and relieved I don't have to split the score. I've now added enough measures to wrap up the score, hoping that I won't have to do this ever again on this piece.

This is still odd though and feels like we're back in the 80's (costing me furthermore about 2 hours of work time), I find this pretty outrageous for a software of that price level, but who am I complaining to, you've probably been tackling issues like this one or worse as well for years.

Anyhow, thanks an enormous bunch for your quick reactions, this has been amazing! Hopefully my post can also help others to not give up hope to easily but to first wait for 50 seconds and then 10 seconds more ;)

Have a nice rest of the day,

all the best!!!
Mac (Mid 2015)
OS X 10.13 (High Sierra)
Finale 26.0.1.706

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motet
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Post by motet » Thu Aug 01, 2019 6:33 pm

The Mac version of Finale has been known to have performance issues. On my Windows system it takes about 6 seconds to insert a measure stack at the beginning of a 20-staff, 1200-measure file full of music.
Last edited by motet on Thu Aug 01, 2019 6:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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David Ward
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Post by David Ward » Thu Aug 01, 2019 6:42 pm

Just on the subject of file size, this is the last page of a 315 page score in a single Finale file, originally created in Finale 2009 and 2010 and since opened and edited in later versions up to F 25 (I haven't yet tried opening it in F 26 because of possible articulation incompatibility). I have never had any problems with this file in any Finale version in which it has been opened and edited, despite its size.

Nor is this the only large Finale file of mine that has successfully been through a similar process.
Finale 25.5 & 26.3
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ebiggs1
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Post by ebiggs1 » Thu Aug 01, 2019 7:30 pm

My hat is off to you guys. 300+ pages is way beyond my ability and talent level. A 15 minute half-time show is about all I want and I will continue to break it into three parts.

I really don't know why you 300+ page guys don't see any slowness or slow down because 15 to 20 page does for me. It seems to for the OP person too! And I have a reasonably fast computer with 16GB of RAM.
Phoenix Part 1 parts1.jpg
Finale 27.4.1 - Perfect Layout Silver - Note Performer 4.4 - SmartScore Pro 64 - Windows 11
President, The Shawnee Concert Band, Composer/Arranger, retired Music Teacher.

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motet
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Post by motet » Thu Aug 01, 2019 8:02 pm

OP person has a Mac.

Where is it slowing down? Page view or scroll view? When does it happen--entering notes, copying, ...? How does the slowness manifest itself? Could it be audio-related?

I had no problems on my previous, 10-year-old computer, either.

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