On 9/16/2013 5:26 AM, Eric Dannewitz wrote: > Just because an open source project isn't releasing a lot does not > mean it is losing momentum. Unless you are actually making that > conclusion by looking at the source changes and whatnot in whatever > they are using to keep the source base up to date (github?).
I agree with Eric on this -- MuseScore is still a growing product, but with development being done for free one can't expect any sort of regular releases. And regarding Craig's wondering if it has ruined the academic market for Sibelius/Finale, I doubt it. MuseScore is great for the casual notation user, but it lacks some of the features necessary for good publication quality. I know that some college students are using, and I've recommended it to some of my private students, but for those who are serious about turning out publication quality music, it's not on a par with Sibelius and Finale. > > I think finale will probably be on a less frequent release schedule, > like what it is now. They will release something when it's done. Not > every summer every year. That was stupid. There were so many > "features" that were not that. Like the ability to put in a copyright > symbol.....or yet another slur feature that is really just a bug fix > or tweak of the last versions which never worked right. > > So in 2016, maybe MakeMusic will be preparing to release another > version of finale after working on it for a good two years. I agree with Eric on this point also -- let's hope that this big gap between Finale 2012 and Finale2014 is indicative of the way the company intends to move. Of course, if they're really rewriting the code from the ground up, as had been indicated when the company was bought, that may be the toughest part and take the longest, and then they may go back to annual releases. But I hope not -- only time will tell. > > Avid.....I was sort of hopeful they would do something with Sibelius. > I think it was protools 8 or 9 that started to have some integration > with Sibelius. But then......nada. Avid has been having to retool for > the last couple of years, first by uncoupling protools from hardware > in version 9, and then in version 11 they have finally shed all their > legacy code (new plugin format and no backwards compatibility to older > plugins). Their bread and butter is Protools. And it faces a huge > onslaught from Logic, ableton, cuebase, reason....to name just a few > on the software side and they face tons of competition in hardware. I > somehow think Sibelius is going to languish or be sold. Probably > languish for another year and then sold. They just have to update it > for os x 10.9 and maybe windows 8.1. Other than that, it's a mature > cash cow they don't need to really spend any more time developing. > Here is where I disagree with Eric -- Avid bought Sibelius so that it could have its own development team more completely integrate Sibelius with ProTools, and that also means continuing to develop Sibelius to compete in the music notation marketplace. Avid is having some financial difficulties right now, but it is still releasing new products, and from what Daniel Spreadbury had said just before his employment with Sibelius ended, they already had most of Sibelius 8 completed so the new development team only had to put the finishing touches on it. So we can expect at least one new version for Sibelius. But I expect that if it can weather the current financial woes, Avid will continue to develop Sibelius. Certainly if one can say that Sibelius is a mature cash cow that doesn't need any more development, the same can be said for Finale, yet we wait and hope for new versions of Finale all the time. > Steinberg.....until they ship something, who knows. There are plenty > of other notation packages out there that are nice, but don't have a > real substantial user base. Plus people using Sibelius or finale > generally won't switch. I mean, I sure would have switched to sibelius > 5 back in the day, but the ONE thing that kept me from doing that is > being able to open my finale files in Sibelius. Not XML or conversion > program. If a new player in the notation market wants to get people to > switch, then offer native ability to open up Sibelius or finale files. > If the notation thing from Steinberg is amazing and leaves finale and > Sibelius looking like 1980s cell phone AND offers the ability to open > Sibelius and finale files within the program.......then I'd be > interested. > [snip] Daniel Spreadbury has already publicly said that they will not be reverse engineering the Sibelius file format -- aside from the possible legal issues (a former development team might have a hard time convincing a judge that the file format was truly reverse engineered and not simply stolen), they feel no need to do so. MusicXML in its full version does a pretty good, although not perfect, job of transferring files from one program to another and I am hopeful that it will continue to be developed and improved. With that put aside, though, I think that Steinberg's new product will be an amazing entry into the notation field that might well attract a lot of Finale and Sibelius users, given both companies' recent financial situations over the past few years. Steinberg has shown no financial instability, and Daniel Spreadbury's development team has proven that it is able to produce fantastic notation software, so I, for one, will buy this product (assuming it's at a price I can afford when it's released) and give it a chance. Sticking with a program due to file format incompatibility is all well and good, until that program dies and one is left with a need to quickly get up to speed on a new notation program. I prefer to get comfortable with several programs, long before there's a crisis which forces a change. Other people's mileage may vary. But I am hopeful that in 2016 we will have been using Finale2016 for 6 months already and looking forward in another year or so to Finale 2018. -- David H. Bailey [email protected] http://www.davidbaileymusicstudio.com _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
