On 26 Nov 2006, at 4:07 PM, Chuck Israels wrote:
Why, Darcy? I've done this forever with no untoward incidents.
I've had tremendous problems in the past, especially with measure- attached expressions, staff styles, clef changes, and so on. I've tried to join individual files of multi-movement works into a single Finale score and even with Robert's Mass Copy, it was a nightmare.
Perhaps I'm just overcautious, but I will do just about anything to avoid having to copy between documents, including (in 2k6 and earlier) saving multiple copies of the score and using the Special Part Extraction trick on each staff.
Anyway, as far as linked parts go, I cannot emphasize enough how helpful it is to read the documentation -- print out the chapter on linked parts and read it over and over and over until you have it pretty much memorized, especially the entries on "If you want to make a change in the score but not the parts..." and "If you want to make a change in all parts but not the score..."
Once you've got the hang of using the override key, it is *incredibly* useful, even if you will eventually explode to separate documents. I think you will find all kinds of situations where you will need to nudge, say, a pair of chord symbols apart so they don't collide in the score -- but you don't want that operation to affect the part. If you just remember to hold down the command key (on Mac -- on Windows it's option, right?) when you nudge, then you won't have to remember to reset the chord location in the part. The same goes for any expression that needs to be moved from its usual location to avoid a collision in the score -- dynamics, text expressions, smart shapes, whatever.
My biggest beef with linked parts at the moment (other than measure number regions and kludgy plugin support) is that there's no insert for the abbreviated staff name, nor is there an insert for the current instrument name (either full or abbreviated). I realize that if Finale added this, it would eliminate the need for one feature of Robert's Copyists' Helper, but, you know, automation is nice. (Automatic Patterson Beams would be nice, too.)
Cheers, - Darcy ----- [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://homepage.mac.com/djargon Brooklyn, NY _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
