Hi David

I take it you're using Simple entry?

Just trying to replace a quarter with a dotted quarter will not work if the measure is 'full'.
To get that to work, you would need to go to Simple->Simple Entry Options... and turn off "Check for extra notes"

Be aware, however, that doing so will only replace the tied quarter with a tied dotted quarter. It will *not* replace the tied quarter and eight with a single dotted quarter.

The only option that I can think of to fix the problem in one swell foop is to with a plugin/script. JW Change, or JW Pattern Copy. (www.finaletips.nu)

Cheers...

Daz :o)

Darrin, thanks.  I've lots to learn...  I downloaded the jw change and jw pattern plugins, and placed them in the Finale plugin library, restarted Finale, but they aren't visible on the plugins menu.  I clearly need to read up on Finale plugins and scripting.

Blast...

Hi David. I've just noticed that you're using Finale 25.

Unfortunately we're in a state of flux as far as plugins are concerned.

Since Finale moved to 64 bit, all of the 3rd party plugins have had to be re-written and re-compiled.
Jari is still in the process of doing that now. What that means if that even though you've installed the plugins correctly, Finale 25 will not 'see' them at all.

Sorry to mis-direct you.

Keep an eye out on his site though, for when he has completed the (rather large) task of updating his plugins.

Cheers...

Daz :o)

Hi Darrin,

I'm a retired software engineer, so I understand the task, although most of the 32-64bit conversions I dealt with were over a decade ago.  I think Jari's work to update the plugins implies that there is a new pdk also, one that uses 64bit apis.  I hope Finale makes it available, I would like to work with it.

-Dave

Try this:

In the MIDI/AUDIO > Quantizations > More Settings, select to allow dotted rests in simple meters.

Then (on a copy of your file) select the measures you want (perhaps a few at first to experiment) and use the MIDI/AUDIO > Retranscribe option.

You may have to fiddle some more with the quantization settings (like "minimize rests") to get what you want, but it should be easier than manually changing each one; and if it doesn't work, at least you are experimenting on a copy of your file.

Adrian, thanks for the suggestion.  It replaced the tied notes with the dotted note, but it also deleted all slurs, i.e. it converted this:

to this:

Which is still an improvement over what I had, since the slurs were added in last and I could have fixed the problem first if I had known about the MIDI re-transcribe command.

-Dave

Below, "Daz :o)" says "It will *not* replace the tied quarter and eight with a single dotted quarter."  I'm having something of an opposite problem; I enter dotted quarter notes, and Finale keeps converting them to quarter notes tied to eighth notes!  I don't think I've changed any settings, but somehow this keeps happening.  Three days ago, I went into a file and spent over an hour manually changing all of those quarter-tied-to-eighths to the regular dotted quarters that I wanted- and today, they have changed themselves back again!  Please help; I'm quite exasperated and don't have any more time to waste on this!  (If this was someone's idea of a program upgrade, it was a dumb one!) 

Have you tried going to the Quantization screen and unchecking all the "allow dotted rests" boxes?

You might then have to run Retranscribe.

(I'd suggest trying this on a copy of your file just in case you are not happy with the result.)