At 7:25 PM 09/17/02, David W. Fenton wrote: >The fact is, it *doesn't* work. I can only get the right result by >drag copying within the file with lyrics copying turned off. > >That's a really bad alternative, but the best of it.
When I want to copy a section of music but without the lyrics, I just leave it at "copy everything" and then follow by doing Clear Lyrics on the newly copied section. I find that's easier than trying to get it to copy everything but lyrics in the first place. I do this VERY often, by the way, since I make abundant use of mass-copy and I never want lyrics assignments copied. >But, the fact that I didn't know that the copy's lyrics would be a >mirror of the original lyrics leaves my original lyrics in an >unacceptables state that I can't seem to rectify. The syntax of your sentence is perhaps unintended but it is accurate. The problem is "the fact that [you] didn't know" that copied lyrics would behave like a mirror. Now that you know, you won't have the problem again. As for rectifying the current file, I still say your best course is to clear out all the lyrics and re-enter them from scratch. >I'm stunned that after all these years, working with lyrics is so >incredibly fraught with counter-intuitive defaults that mess up your >files beyond the end users' ability to rectify. It was less counter-intuitive before they tried to make it more user-friendly. That is, the whole system was indirect, but since you had no choice but to follow along with the computer's indirect scheme, you at least understood what was going on. To satisfy users who found that system too complicated, they made it easier to just type syllables directly. But the system is still just as complicated; it's just easier to ignore it now. When a syllable is attached to a note, what is really attached it a pointer to a syllable in the syllable list. The essential problem is that it is possible to change the syllable on the screen in type-in-score mode. The unwary user believes he is changing the syllable in one place only, but in fact he is changing the element on the list, which affects any assignment that points to it. If you never assign the same syllable to more than one place, then there's no problem, but by using the mass-copy function you have created multiple assignments. That's what got you into trouble. >But I still don't understand the logic behind mirroring lyrics BY >DEFAULT. Yes, it's an obviously useful OPTION, but as a default >behavior with no acceptable alternative for doing otherwise, it >boggles the mind. The entire system of lyrics is based on the system of indirection. Everything else derives from that fact. Your intuition is telling you that each syllable should be a unique element attached directly to a note, rather than a pointer to an item from a list. That's not how it works. Sure, it could have been done that way, just as expressions or articulations could have been done that way, but that's not the choice Coda made. True, lyrics are somewhat different from expressions, since the list tends to be longer and independent from file to file; nevertheless, there are still advantages in the indirection. It is what makes possible the various conveniences of click assignment and shifting, selective baseline adjustment, comprehensive font change, etc. There are arguments for the other way, I suppose, but I believe that if you had more experience with lyrics you'd more readily see the advantages of this way. >I guess I just can't wrap my mind around the idea that something so >fundamental should be so poorly implemented in such a mature product. Well, for one thing, those of us who use lyrics regularly seem to be an unimportant minority in the user base. I've often felt that the developers don't much care about us. Things like word extension lines, hyphens (not) crossing over a system break, problems with non-breaking hyphens and spaces, unavailability of an alternate hyphen character, no support for kerning in lyrics, etc., are all less than perfect. >From the developers' point of view, I can see how dealing with lyrics is a difficult problem. Some users want to simply type on to the screen and have it be there. Others want to keep the power of the original system which lets us manipulate lyrics in complicated ways. The program has had to evolve to satisfy both. It's not clear to me what you're proposing instead. If every syllable were simple a one-time note-attached text, you'd be giving up an awful lot of functionality. I do agree that there are several safeguards that Coda could lay on top to keep users from shooting themselves in the foot, but I don't see how changing the fundamental scheme would be an improvement. If people really want a setting that tells mass-copy to create a duplicate set of lyrics and write new assignments to the duplicates, instead of simply copying the assignments, I have no problem with that. And if Coda decides that the program should ship with this option turned on so that it will seem more intuitive to those users who don't understand the concept of indirect lyric assignment, that's fine too. But your insistence on calling the current default of "mirroring" an aberration is just not inaccurate. It is the logical consequence of the data structure: You are copying measures, and what is attached to the measure is lyric assignments, not lyric syllables. Therefore, the mass-copy function copies assignments, not syllables. I realize that people like you and Darcy are extremely knowledge about other aspects of Finale, but it looks to me like the only reason this setting seems wrong to you is that you just don't do much work with lyrics. There are other things in Finale which probably seem counter-intuitive to those who don't use them much but seem normal to you. mdl _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
