Dorico doesn't shuffle critical details of the work behind your back. The only way making an edit in an orchestral score would affect music later in the piece would be if insert mode was enabled, which is designed to push the existing music forward by beats or half beats as you enter new music earlier. Sometimes people activate insert mode by accident/mistake.

I'm sorry, but while I understand that switching to a new notation program isn't easy (especially suddenly), Dorico IS an extremely high quality product. To make such sweeping negative statements, with no experience of the program, is to disparage the many, many professional musicians and composers who use Dorico every day.

And I, as a Finale power user of over 20 years, and who switched to Dorico in 2020, think that Dorico's output is anything but cheap looking. In fact, its crisp layout, with no collisions (very much unlike my beloved Finale), was one of the decisive factors that made me switch.

The principal weakness that Dorico would have for those who would switch from Finale is its support for aleatoric music. I wonder if the Development Team is already working to bring more of those features to the program to make users' switching from Finale more attractive.

The Dorico team is not only very talented but also very responsive (although they admit that which features come out when is not simply a matter of user polling). Their Development Team members are constantly on the user forum listening and offering support.

My bigger issue with what I’ve been seeing of Dorico since yesterday is that I have to really unlearn Finale and try to figure out ways to accomplish the same with Dorico. Yes, if you’re already very experienced with Dorico I’m sure it’s wonderful and for sure there are some nice, well thought out features. But just figuring out how to accomplish what I can do with Speedy Edit in Finale took awhile, and I’m not sure how to insert notes to a measure and not have Dorico push everything additional into the next measures. That’s an option in Speedy, but I often use Delete the Extra Notes, etc. I’m sure there is a way to do this in Dorico but would rather be spending my time composing than figuring out how to do stuff. Also will miss JW Rhythm Copy and a few other things that made my workflow faster unless there is something similar hidden in Dorico.

I’ve said for some time that Dorico is better and something newbies should learn rather than Finale, which basically ceased real development some time ago. But I really didn’t want to be forced into adopting Dorico. Investigating using Finale perpetually in a Mac VM but also just hoping I can get many years out of my M2 MBA to run Finale.

No one who is experienced with Dorico started out that way, but most who became experienced did not start out with a cynical, complaining attitude. They realized that Dorico would likely take the same learning curve they had with Finale and were willing to start with modest projects (perhaps based on XML imports from Finale), find out where everything was, ask questions, and not be afraid to experiment.

One advantage former Finale users have is that Finale has of necessity taught them to seek work-arounds, and that creativity stands Dorico users in good stead if Dorico doesn't automatically do everything--even simple things--for them automatically.

Sorry if some of us are rocking your world, JAV, but I don't think it's abnormal to take time to come to terms with what is a pretty disruptive and sudden announcement yesterday. Not all of us have the time at this point to unlearn Finale and learn the magical ways of Dorico. Yes, it is powerful and capable and no one should doubt that. But it does things very differently in many cases. Yes, there are ways to do most or all of the things one needs from Finale; sure. But that's like saying an experienced Excel user can easily just transition to using Apple Numbers; both are spreadsheet programs but both approach it differently and there are some things done much much better in Excel. 

My issue is similar to many others: we have a lot of old files that we may need to access years from now, and MusicXML is pretty good but not perfect when imported into Dorico. And it took me at least a year to learn Finale in the early 90's; I really don't have that sort of time to learn Dorico now. Calling us folks "complainers" is not going to win a lot of people over to Dorico. I'm sure you mean well, but please be more mindful of your words. This is a community that had a major earthquake yesterday-maybe read up on the stages of grief, since that's very similar here. Finale is like an old friend who got elderly, couldn't really do some things as well as before, but we didn't want him/her to pass away.

Hi. I started using Dorico in 2020 (version 3.5) because: a) there was a iPad version of Dorico; b) I saw this coming. Yes, learning a new notation software was a pain but it paid off. There are some things in comum but most of the workflow is different. Nevertheless, after that inicial period it became clear that I could write a score much faster in Dorico than in any other notation software that I know and features like insert music or flows can make your work much easier.

Dorico is a hight quality product. It does not shuffle your work behind your back and the final score is excellent, but you really need to learn the layout features if you want to control the final result in detail.

The critical thing was to export all my work from Finale to XML and then to Dorico. That took me a while but it’s basically done, although some of my earlier scores are still in XML format (I will import them to Dorico if and when needed).

I know this is a shock to everyone still using Finale but, as I tried to explain, after getting into Dorico you won’t regret it. I didn’t.

David, I am not referring to anyone upset at the demise of Finale as a complainer, but I know of people who have been bitching about Finale for years and now have just transferred their target to Dorico. Different individuals handle their stages of grief in different ways. All I am saying is that trying to wallow in cynicism only impedes one's response to the situation. I am not glad Finale is ending; I have 35 years of files to make secure. Finale has given everyone a year to deal with their situation. Not all company's do.

The competitive problems that Finale HAS had are the result of MakeMusic’s weird refusal to get going on an iOS port six years ago.

It could very well be that one of the key reasons behind the lack of an iOS port is exactly one of reasons behind this announcement we're facing now.  Porting is no small undertaking, especially if the codebase isn't well positioned for such.  The following quote in the announcement hinted at such codebase challenges:

The delivery of incremental value for our customers [became] exponentially harder over time.

J ADRIAN VERKOUTEREN

Adobe gave CS2 users offline activation so they didn't have to race an hourglass.

And they weren't even ending development.

The competitive problems that Finale HAS had are the result of MakeMusic’s weird refusal to get going on an iOS port six years ago.   Whoever decided THAT is, I think, primarily to blame for the current situation.

I'm sorry but there's no evidence to support that argument. This was tried in 2012 and the results were terrible. Notion for iOS had been out nearly two years by then and most of us who used both threw in the towel and stayed with Notion. When Finale for iOS died, we beta testers weren't even told but frankly, we barely noticed.

I believe that Fender is showing us that the iOS version of an app cannot prop up a desktop version in this market. Notion for iPadOS/iOS (now two products) are kept up to date and are pretty good. The announcement that the desktop version, Notion 7 was "coming soon" was made in 2021 and that's the last that most of us ever heard about it. Though Notion 6 (2016) still works, it does not support 64bit only VIs and most users I know have given up on it, myself included. 

totally agree-whether or not there is an iOS app is not relevant here. The previous attempt by MM towards an iPad app was pretty unimpressive-it just was a PDF reader, for all intents and purposes. The real "blame" may be the lack of keeping Finale innovative and current and very importantly, not being responsive to the user base. I literally once wrote a business school paper on how Finale 3.5 was an elegant application. And it was, for that time. I would never say that for any version of Finale over the past several years. I thought when they did an OS X recompiling that they had done a lot of updating of the code; I'm pretty sure they had claimed to at that time, since there was very little new functionality, just compatibility with OS X. There were comments about it being future-proofed. Well, it clearly wasn't. When Sibelius fell on hard times and it looked like it was circling the drain and about to be gone forever, there was some talk from MM if I recall correctly that Finale is in good shape for the future. Guess not. 

We used to have a very active beta testing program. That didn't happen before the initial release of F27 (I sure can't find anyone who was involved with any beta testing of the initial release and it seems most of all of us beta testers were left out until a dot release some time later). Lack of updates , lack of new features, lack of bug fixes, lack of UX improvements = dwindling user base. That makes the announcement not a surprise. What was a bit of a shock was the fairly quick loss of authorization. I am hopeful that with the outcry, that will change a bit, but nobody knows for sure outside of MM, perhaps.

MakeMusic just announced that authorizations will continue indefenitely...

Updates

8/27/2024 @ 5:30 PM ET:

Clarifications on the initial announcement

1.  Finale authorization will remain available indefinitely: Please note that future OS changes can still impact your ability to use Finale on new devices. 
2. Finale v27 to be included with Dorico Pro Crossgrades: We are currently working on a solution for all customers who have purchased or intend to purchase a Dorico Pro crossgrade to be able to download Finale v27. This will ensure that you can export your Finale files using MusicXML 4.0, the most robust version of MusicXML available. Thank you for your patience, we will provide more information soon.

 

wow-that was fast. Good. They really mismanaged this whole thing but at least are now in cleanup mode. Much appreciated.

Yea.  Great for Windows users, and bundling it with the cross grade will allow people the best means to move over their data.

I just don't want to hunt down all my scores and convert them.  Give me an add-on for Dorico so that it can read my Finale scores.

Just keep Finale 27 installed and convert as the need arises.

If you're on macOS, then getting a cheap PC laptop to use for that wouldn't be a bad idea, either. The software should run for many years on that platform, but I reckon macOS will break it within the next release or two.  I suppose you could buy or use an older Mac running an earlier OS version as well.

The activation is being maintained, so there is no need for them to create solutions like you mentioned.

not sure macOS will break it anytime soon since that really hasn’t been an issue for a few years, but at least then one could use a VM with the prior release or wait until Thanksgiving and likely get a discount on Dorico. 

macOS still breaks software on the regular.  Lol.

Dorico is a quality product though.  OP needs to take a chill pill.

It used to be that Finale was the Word '93 to Sibelius's Claris Works 3.  Now, Finale is the Word '98 to Sibelius's Word 2003.  Dorico works better than both in a lot of ways.  I get that.

If a ground up rebuild wasn't profitable, I get it.

It's the man hours involved in the great file hunt that I'm dreading, man-hours I could be spending doing productive work.

I have backups, but it's a lot of folders and I'm only 99% certain I've moved everything over to cloud storage.  Or if I trust my cloud storage--it is just somebody else's computer after all.  Eventually an older computer will fail: without the capability to read the file types, whatever I couldn't find or I forgot about at the time will be lost permanently.

Unless Makemusic's now decedent proprietary file type is able to be read by other programs, I'm not going to see the problem as resolved.

@Nathaniel having tested many develop seeds of macOS over the years, it does indeed break a lot of software. But usually Finale has been spared.

EDIT:  Samuel Staton

MakeMusic is not responsible for your backup strategy, which should be multi-pronged and redundant - not rely solely on Cloud Storage.  They're also not responsible for how you organize your files.  You having issues finding files in a reasonable time frame is a personal problem, and what you're asking for will not help with either of those issues...

How would Dorico being able to open these files directly (or convert them) help you finding a file you backed up?  That's an issue you have to tackle on the front end - by creating an efficient and productive file organization and backup strategy.  You're conflating two completely unrelated issues.  This issue is personal, and MakeMusic has literally nothing to do with it.  It would still exist even if they yelled "SIKE!" released Finale 28 tomorrow.

The only "problem" was the deactivation of the authorization servers, which they have doubled back on today.

The file types are readable, by Finale 27, which now will be able to be authorized for the forseeable future.  The only factor now is compatibility with future OS releases/updates - something that is more reliable on Windows than macOS... so users who want to maintain access to these files without relying on conversion must take that into account.

The extra man hours of work that involves has nothing to do with your finding files.  It may take you a long time, but that's a personal problem.  The core issue is the extra work you have to do when doing a MusicXML conversion - cause the files never import perfectly into the other application, as MusicXML does not support all notation information supported by the source application - which has an engine designed specifically to accommodate its specific feature set (which differs from other applications).

However, we should be accustomed to this, as it is normal when moving things between Word Processor, Spreadsheet applications, or even PSDs from Photoshop into other graphics design applications that may have a different feature set.

Keeping the Authorization Open and bundling F27 with Dorico Pro crossgrades reasonably addresses both of those issues.  You can just open the file in Finale 27 directly, assuming you still run a compatible PC.

Dear Adrian, 

could you please specify what is Finale support for aleatoric music?

your quote

"The principal weakness that Dorico would have for those who would switch from Finale is its support for aleatoric music"

Just from the point of view of notation, since I do not expect either Finale (from what I recall) or Dorico would be particularly adept at playing back an aleatoric piece, Dorico so far has more problem drawing boxes and lines and cutaway scores than Finale does (as I recall). Such things are "more or less" possible in Dorico, but they are not yet idiomatic; so they require extensive work-arounds beyond what finale would require.

The development team is aware that some users need these capabilities; so I expect that down the road (how far, no one will say) the team will come up with some pretty creative solutions.

I've been using Dorico for years and I find that the workarounds for boxes in Dorico are not bad at all. I use the line tool to make a "box top" and "box bottom" as per a video that I found on YouTube detailing the process. It isn't as big of an issue as it might sound because if you create the top and bottom on the same beats or subdivisions of the beat, they will already be precisely horizontally aligned and immediately form the box, although you may have to adjust the vertical offset if they try to avoid collisions. Creating the duration line is also similarly pretty easy.

Cutaway scores are the main thing that is too much work in Dorico currently. The workarounds there are too clunky and involved at the moment - it is *possible* to do pretty much any cutaway score you want, if you want to put in the effort into clunky workarounds, but you'll be a lot better off waiting until they have proper support for this.