Finale 2010: 2 annoying quirks (mac)

[Notatio]

Apologize if these were already covered; didn't see them on this forum.

1. Using the % tool, clicking to the left of a stave used to let you scale the staff size, "Resize staff to _%". That was the case for many years. With 2010, that always gives me "Resize page to _%". You have to keep clicking around in the staff somewhere hoping to find a blank area to get this done now.

2. When using the fancy, improved Expressions system, while in "edit categories", you can't change the measurement units. No way to do it in that mode, AND, the menu bar for preferences is "grayed out" (not true in 2009), so if you had inches set as measurement units for some reason, you're screwed. "-24" (EVPU's) is easier for me to deal with than "-0.08333" (inches).

Anyone else notice these quirks?

[michelp]

1. Using the % tool, clicking to the left of a stave used to let you scale the staff size, "Resize staff to _%". That was the case for many years. With 2010, that always gives me "Resize page to _%". You have to keep clicking around in the staff somewhere hoping to find a blank area to get this done now.

You are right, this seems to be the new method. You also have a choice (page, system, staff) in the contextual menu (right click or ctrl-click on the mac), but still, one has to click in the staff, avoiding notes.

[Peter Thomsen]

...2. When using the fancy, improved Expressions system, while in "edit categories", you can't change the measurement units. No way to do it in that mode, AND, the menu bar for preferences is "grayed out" (not true in 2009), so if you had inches set as measurement units for some reason, you're screwed. "-24" (EVPU's) is easier for me to deal with than "-0.08333" (inches)...

This is a well known issue.

The following step usually fixes the problem (at least for a while):

Quit Finale 2010, and launch it again.



By The Way:

You can change the measurement units "on the fly" by typing in a number in one of the measurement dialogs followed by e for EVPUs, pt for points, s for spaces, &c.
These are all listed in the online docs somewhere, I think in the section on the measurement menu.

For example, if I want to move an expression over by a small amount, I just type "4e" in the "Additional Horizontal Offset" box in the Category Designer, and Finale does the rest.