MakeMusic to support select JW plug-ins

[motet]

On the MakeMusic blog they've announced that, with the next version of Finale, they will be including and supporting 10 of the JW plug-ins. Seems like very good news.

[Bill Stevens]

That's great news. JW Change (I hope) plus what nine others?

::: Bill

[N Grossingink]

Maybe the future of these plugins is more secure - I've always been worried about that. I hope Jari receives a nice fee - he certainly deserves it.

[miker]

What N said!

[motet]

Sorry--8, not 10:

JW Accidentals
JW Change
JW Copy Part Layout
JW Note Spacing
JW Pattern
JW Rhythm Copy
JW Space Empty Rests
JW Staff Polyphony

[michelp]

Great news indeed. Some bug fixes, SMuFL compliant, documentation. Adapted to the latest versions of Finale, OS, hardware. Native for Mac M1.
Thanks to Jari and to MM, who listened to its customers.
From 27.3.

[ebiggs1]

Some bug fixes, SMuFL compliant, documentation.

All in for that!
Great move from MM. Why reinvent the wheel when the pathway is already there and tested?

[ebiggs1]

BTW, seems logical since they have done so in the past with T G Tools and Patterson.

[miker]

The ones most important to me are Change and Staff Polyphony, so I'm happy!

[David Ward]

One I've been using quite a lot recently which isn't included is JW Start New Piece, but otherwise this may tempt me to up-date everything sooner rather than later (Finale and Mac OS with new Mac hardware x 2).

[motet]

They've said it will work on the new Mac hardware in native mode. I wonder if you run in native mode you then have to forsake all the other plug-ins besides those 8.

JW Start New Piece is not that difficult to do "by hand" instead, considering how often one would use it, but it is indeed handy.

[gogreen]

Good news, indeed! JW Copy Part Layout saves me SO much time!

[mmike]

Yes, great, using all of them already, of course, but especially Change.
And apropos that ... I think for most people it's kind of diffict to figure out how to use it. Therefore

We will be compiling documentation from Jari’s website and other online sources, as well as our own understanding of how these plug-ins work, into our Finale User Manual

would certainly be something to look forward to.
The are some features I have never understood in Change. For instance, in the "Filters" feature - what do the "Opposite" buttons do? How/why/when would that be useful?

[miker]

As I understand it, the Opposite is just that: Lets you say "apply to everything except what I've specified."

[ebiggs1]

...what do the "Opposite" buttons do? How/why/when would that be useful?

Let's say you have a large piece and you want a lot of stuff changed but not everything. It might be easier and quicker to select those few not effected things instead of the many.

[ebiggs1]

J W Change is probably the most powerful plug-in Jari ever created. Lightyear's more powerful that the comparative anemic version that comes in Finale. It should replace it and not be a plug-in. But thanx for moving in the right direction MM.

[BuonTempi]

Here's the link to the blog article:

https://www.finalemusic.com/blog/sneak- ... ale-v27-3/

It's great that MM are incorporating them, but really, JW Change should be under Utilities > Change; Copy Part Layout should be under Page Layout Tool menu (or Document); Note Spacing should be under Utilities > Note Spacing; etc, etc -- rather than under a plug-ins menu.

Otherwise we're left with two or three places where things could be: under one of the application menus, like Edit, Utilities or Document; or one of the Tool's menus; or -- as it is -- just stuffed into an 'extra bits' menu.

[Bill Reed]

Then they'd actually have to do some development work, instead of just taking credit for Jari's work

[ebiggs1]

It's great that MM are incorporating them, but really, JW Change should be under Utilities > Change; Copy Part Layout should be under Page Layout Tool menu (or Document); Note Spacing should be under Utilities > Note Spacing; etc, etc -- rather than under a plug-ins menu.

I've been saying that for years ever since J W Change came out. The J W plug-ins are better than the standard functions in Finale.

[dtoub]

That is friggin awesome! Very badly needed and glad I won't be losing all those plugins, esp. Accidentals, Change and Rhythm Copy. I do use JW Ties a lot but not critical...

[motet]

I've found JW Accidentals practically worthless. Too many false positives. It also doesn't deal correctly with independent key signatures. Maybe MM will fix that.

[dtoub]

JW Accidentals isn’t that useful for me (neither is the accidentals part of TGTools, for different reasons), mainly because if I change any parameters, it crashes Finale 100% of the time. With the ability to change these parameters without crashing, it might be very useful. TBH, the way Dorico seems to provide robust accidental preferences is more robust than Finale. I’ve never used Dorico, but have seen this demonstrated on their web site. Hopefully MM will move in this direction at some point.

[motet]

Yes, Dorico adds them automatically (that feature can be turned on and off).