Rehearsal Marks and Measure Width "Bugs"!

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ghbmusic67
Posts: 8
Joined: Sun Jan 25, 2009 2:15 am
Finale Version: Finale 25, Logic Pro
Operating System: Mac

Post by ghbmusic67 » Sun Jul 18, 2010 8:15 am

Hi all,

Even though I've been using Finale since it first appeared on the scene (and love it), I could be proven wrong with the 2 points I'm about to make.
I'm not a computer wizard and there are many aspects of Finale that I've never had to use.
If I'm right about these 2 "bugs" it is quite possible that the Finale programming team has found them impossible to solve.

1. Rehearsal Mark (letter/number) Positioning

The only way I find, to insert rehearsal marks (RMs) into my music, with the LEAST amount of manual adjustment is to use the "Left Barline" horizontal setting in the Expression Category Designer and a small additional vertical offset (Above Staff Baseline) to make the marks appear just above the top of the (treble) clef and left aligned with the system margins.
This way the RMs that finish up at the beginning of the part system don't need to be touched and the ones that land anywhere else in the system are mostly placed OK just left aligned with its bar line.

I could be pedantic and say that the "not at the beginning of a system" RMs are placed a bit high above the staff due to the others having to be kept out of the way of the clef.

If I use any other horizontal setting (like: "Start of Time Signature" or "Start of Music" etc.), all the RMs at the beginning of the staff can be placed in my preferred position but any that finish up somewhere along the system have to be manually moved because they also have wandered to the right of their bar line.
Isn't it possible to have separate settings for RMs that are at the start of a system and any others?
The ones at the start just need a Vertical & Horizontal offset box from a base spot above the staff so I can place them anywhere I like.
Any RMs that are not at the start of the system should be centered above the double bar line they are attached to.

I know I could duplicate the RM category and have 1 for the left edge and 1 for any other place but the problem with that is that when I insert them into the score it is impossible to know where they will finish up on the parts. I try and have them on the left edge because it looks neat and makes the parts easier to overview, understand and read.
The "not knowing where they'll turn up" is probably the reason why (as far as I know) this has not been solved.
I mean some of the clever RMs "know" which measure number they are, so why is it not possible to teach them to recognize either a beginning of staff position and a center attachment to a barline?

2. Measure Widths in Systems with Music and Multi Measure Rests

This 2nd little "beef" I have concerns the unreliable way Finale decides to place measures of music in systems that also have multimeasure rests.

I don't know about you, but if I have a 2 multimeasure rest and 2 bars of music in one system, the music bars, with very few exceptions, come out too wide. This happens with many other combinations of music bars and multirest bars.
Because there are 100's of possible combinations this may be too difficult to tackle for the Finale designers (Why can't the 2 multirest bars take up the same width as the 2 music bars and split the system in half?) I admit, this seems impossible with so many variables.

But what I think is possible is this:


If I have to manually shorten (or widen) measures in these situations could it not include the following time savers:
  • a) Any measure width changes I make while formatting say trumpet 1 (of 4) (they all play at the same time and place and I have the 4 parts selected in the "Fit Measures" "Change Selected Parts/Score") should automatically be reflected in the other 3 parts.
  • b) Once I've made measure width changes in one or more parts, it should be possible to "lock" them. Too many times I've made a thoughtless music spacing and destroyed minutes of fiddly work.
These 2 changes would save a lot of part formatting time.

Well, like I said at the beginning, I might be shot down by somebody who will have a way out of all these admittedly minor problems and then I'll have to eat humble pie.

But if you agree, then add your comments and we might help to make a pretty cool piece of software even better.

George B :) [/b]


User avatar
Peter Thomsen
Posts: 6603
Joined: Fri Jul 25, 2003 6:47 pm
Finale Version: Finale v27.4
Operating System: Mac

Post by Peter Thomsen » Sun Jul 18, 2010 2:43 pm

Good ideas!


You should definitely go to MakeMusic's web site, and submit a feature request.
You must have your serial number ready when making the request, since feature requests are prioritized by the number of registered users who want that feature.
The more users that request a specific feature, the higher priority the feature will get.

Posting your request here doesn't count, since MakeMusic isn't monitoring this forum.



Some additional thoughts:


1) Do all your staves use the treble clef?
When the Rehearsal Marks are set to appear just above the top of the treble clef, they appear quite high above the bass clef.
An option to specify different heights over different clefs would be nice.


2) If I understand you correctly - (Why can't a 2 multimeasure rest take up the same width as 2 music bars, and split the system in half?) - you want the width of a multimeasure rest to be the same as the width of the number of music measures it replaces, so that the width of
a 1-measure multimeasure rest = the width of 1 measure
a 2-measure multimeasure rest = the width of 2 measures
a 3-measure multimeasure rest = the width of 3 measures
a 4-measure multimeasure rest = the width of 4 measures
a 5-measure multimeasure rest = the width of 5 measures
&c.

I understand the idea, and I don't think that it's impossible to tackle for the Finale designers, but I don't think that many users will request a such option.
The general idea of a multimeasure rest is to save horizontal space so that the multimeasure rest takes up much less width than the measures it replaces.


Nevertheless, by all means, make the request.
You might get what you want some day, but don't hold your breath.


It doesn't matter that only few other users want the same as you.
Finale has a reputation of having at least two solutions to any (obscure) problem you might throw at it.
It's difficult to find something Finale can't do.
If somebody wants a special layout, Finale should offer a way to get there.


By The Way:
If I understand you correctly, your wishes for time savers (1. Measure width changes in one part are reflected in other parts; 2. An option to "lock" measure widths) are not solely about multimeasure rest widths, but also about widths in music measures?

Could you specify your ideas for music measure widths?
They are a bit unclear for me.
I'm going away for my holiday now, and I won't be back until Tuesday July 27th.
Mac OS X 12.6.9 (Monterey), Finale user since 1996

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