On Jan 6, 2006, at 5:08 PM, Christopher Smith wrote:
On Jan 6, 2006, at 6:59 PM, Owain Sutton wrote:
Christopher Smith wrote:
Really, though, there IS a limit to how intuitive a complex
program like Finale could be.
Why?
No, I don't think it's an antagonistic comment. I think it's a
valid question. Music notation, while complex, isn't *that*
complex. The arrangement of the notation on the page, with as
little effort as can be achieved, is the difficult task. I don't
see that there's an obvious limit to how far this process can go.
If your comment was intended to say "there's a limit to how
intuitive an interface such as that of Finale can be", then that's
a different matter.
I honestly don't see the difference. Finale is one of the most
powerful notation programs on the planet, and its interface
reflects that. Balancing off getting things right without our input
against giving us the power to change things is VERY complex!
Sibelius maybe takes things out of our hands a bit more in return
for a simpler interface (which I don't think I could live with as
easily) while Score, by all reports, let you do almost ANYTHING
while doing almost nothing for you, and was beastly difficult to
learn and use.
To use an example I gave in the original post - what is the most
"intuitive" keystroke for toggling between Page and Scroll View? To
answer my own question, there is none. That is one of the limits
one comes up against rather quickly.
Or my other example - Staff tool, Smart Shape tool and Speedy Entry
- all start with S, so which one gets assigned to the S key?
Whoops! That key is not available. Neither are the second letters.
Maybe a bigger keyboard...
Christopher,
In response to the last suggestion: you can add an extension keyboard
that can be mapped to combination keystrokes. I have one set up for
tool selection, but I'm not sure it saves much time compared to
mousing for tools. Put on the left, it pulls your LH away from stuff
it is often otherwise poised to do, and put on the right - beyond the
mouse, it's as far away as (or further than) a mouse reach for a
tool. All in all, I'm underwhelmed, gadget oriented though I may
be. Anyone who thinks this would be good to try is welcome to write
me for details, but I'm just not sure it's worth it.
Chuck
Chuck Israels
230 North Garden Terrace
Bellingham, WA 98225-5836
phone (360) 671-3402
fax (360) 676-6055
www.chuckisraels.com
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