Hi Michael,

Thanks for responding to my post. I didn't really expect that, and especially so quickly. I'm sure my problem is that I just don't use Finale enough to be as familiar with some of the capabilities that it has. I know I can drag copy music, but it doesn't appear that I can drag copy text, lyrics, expressions, articulations, and many things that appear in a score that aren't notes. I know about meta tools, but from working a lot in graphics and text layout programs, I'm so used to just selecting something and pressing the option key while I drag the selected item to duplicate it and put the copy somewhere else. But option-drag is just one example. I think the most frustrating thing for me is not being able to use Command/spacebar to get a magnifying glass to drag over an area of the score to zoom in on that area, or to just click and zoom and have it zoom in where I clicked. I understand that the spacebar operates playback, but I sure wish I could have some easy way to marquee-drag to zoom into a specific area. That doesn't seem to be possible even with the zoom tool, or have I just not found the key combination that allows that? Anyway, my comment was sort of generalized about what I think are common key combinations for various functions that in my experience are pretty standard across a lot of software. I could be wrong, and probably am. I work a lot with Adobe graphics software, and they are common across all of those programs that I use, but seem to be common to other software as well. Thanks again for a quick response to my original post. 

Hi Fritz:

I sympathize with the unique keyboard shortcuts of Finale. We strive to follow OS standards (CMD + P, CMD+O, etc) but also try to follow music notation industry standards where appropriate. There is room for improvement. Music notation is an interesting intersection of graphics and object processing. While it looks like shapes similar to graphic on the screen, there is context to the objects which complicates the model. It is a fascinating problem for software development. It has been noted the English language has 26 characters and music has over 600 characters. The SMuFL font would claim over 2,400 symbols. Does the "." mean a staccato articulation, a repeat dot, a period in the lyric, a part of a "rit..." tempo marking, etc. The metadata associated with an object radically defines context. 

Finale has a concept of filters (under the edit menu) which allows you to copy and paste objects such as articulations, expressions, lyrics, etc. across the document. Again, there is room for improvement in this area.

You can use Cmd+1, Cmd+2, and Cmd+3 to zoom to 3 different views. These are user definable in Preferences - View. You can also Cmd + Shift lasso an area to zoom in on it. This is equal to your Command/space request.

Thank you for your feedback and thoughts.

Cheers,

Michael Johnson

VP, Professional Notation

MakeMusic

Fritz, Michael Johnson mentioned filters only in passing, but it is absolutely filters that you want. Filters allow you to copy ONLY the items you want to copy. Under the Edit menu>Edit Filter (you can see the keystroke for that, different according to your platform.) When you are copying, alt-shift-click automatically opens the Filter dialogue box so you can choose what you want to copy.

The main flaw in the copy procedure that I find regularly is that I can't separate out the different kinds of measure-attached Smart Shapes (like hairpins as opposed to other kinds of lines) nor different kinds of expressions (like only dynamics, or only certain categories of expressions.) We are stuck with the two subdivisions that MakeMusic decided on.

Also, the way certain measure-stack-specific items need the entire stack selected in order to copy is rather counterintuitive. I know how to work around it now, but it certainly could be made MUCH easier.

Christopher, I agree that a separation of different measure-attached smart shapes would be very useful when copying with a filter. To be realistic, perhaps hairpins and dashed extension lines (just lines and the ones belonging to octava signs)? Or even other shapes?

On the other hand, wouldn't it be nice to be able to just select the individual smart shape and option-drag it somewhere else in the score, perhaps repeatedly, thereby copying it to a series of different places without going through the extra steps of opening a filter and selecting or deselecting various items before copying? I understand why that probably isn't possible, given the much greater complexity of music notation software vs. graphic or word processing software, but if any of you are familiar with page layout software, this reminds me of Quark Xpress, which had (and probably still does, if anyone still uses it) a similar workflow design, where some simple edits involved going deeper and deeper into dialog boxes and palettes (and then back out) just to make one little change, but somehow Adobe was able to put most of those cumbersome multi-dialog tasks into a single palette in InDesign where all the various elements could be changed in one place (and usually with a "preview" button to see how it would change things before committing to the change). I know it's not the same thing as music software, but it makes me wonder whether it really might be possible to simplify some of the editing procedures in Finale. But I appreciate all the comments and help in response to my post. I definitely do not use Finale enough to have developed a smooth workflow, and I can use all the help and advice I can get.

And speaking of measure-stack-specific items, shouldn't a caesura attached to one staff show up in all the parts? Or are some people writing music where one part stops while other parts go on? Anyway, I was surprised to see the caesura show up only in the part where I had attached it in the score, unlike other time-related marks, such as fermata and tempo indications. 

Fritz, the usefulness of copying f.ex. hairpins with a filter is that you could get exactly the same extension and placement of these on a number of staves vertically.

To get a caesura that will show on the top staff in the score as well as in every part you could create it as a tempo alteration expression. 

Hi all:

Great conversation! We have much work to do in copy / paste / insert. I really appreciate all your thoughts and feedback on what you like about Finale, what needs to change, and most importantly what you're trying to accomplish. I've added your thoughts to FIN-4136 for future consideration.

Cheers,

Michael Johnson

VP, Professional Notation

MakeMusic