Re: [Finale] Audacity
Many thanks ... for some reason, I couldn't get to that page with my browser .. Safari, but this came up in Firefox with no prob. Thanks again, Dean On May 31, 2009, at 9:05 PM, shirling & neueweise wrote: manual here, i haven't read it, but maybe the info is there http://en.flossmanuals.net/audacity ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale Canto ergo sum And, I'd rather be composing than decomposing Dean M. Estabrook http://deanestabrook.googlepages.com/home ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Audacity
manual here, i haven't read it, but maybe the info is there http://en.flossmanuals.net/audacity ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
[Finale] Audacity
Even though I do most of my simple editing in Fission, I was putzing around with Audacity today. The help file doesn't give any answers in particular, so when I import a mp3 file, I can get it to play ... but that's about it. All of the editing functions except "Select" are disabled, ergo, zip editing can be done ... any clues? Dean Canto ergo sum And, I'd rather be composing than decomposing Dean M. Estabrook http://deanestabrook.googlepages.com/home ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Sibelius 6 :: Finale discouraging upgrades
The "database" doesn't have to be fast. The objects are stored in memory during program execution. The penalty would only apply when opening or saving files. If there is a decoding penalty during runtime it would surely be negligible. But the underlying premise of that argument, if I understand what you are saying, is just wrong. You seem to be saying that a proprietary, highly structured binary format cannot provide forward compatibility. That is simply not true. ANY file storage system can provide forward compatibility at very little cost. It is simply a question priorities and the competence of the system designers. I haven't designed forward compatibility into every single project I've every done, but you can bet I have done that for any project that anticipated having multiple releases in the field where file interoperability would be a concern. Honestly, it isn't that hard. For a system designer who knows what he's doing, it adds no more than 1% to the system cost / time and can be done on ANY file storage platform that I have ever encountered. I get that Finale doesn't think this is important and is never going to do it. I'm simply pointing out they make that decision at their own peril because for people like me, it makes me less likely to buy every upgrade. David W. Fenton wrote: On 31 May 2009 at 14:04, Craig Parmerlee wrote: It is absolutely routine. Today, with inherently extensible formats like XML, you would have to go out of your way NOT to have forward compatibility. The programming rule couldn't be simpler - handle all the objects you recognize and ignore the ones you don't. Text-based storage of relational database data is inherently very slow. This is why no database that I know of uses XML as it's native storage format, but instead uses a structured binary format for storage and exports to XML when needed. I realize Finale's files aren't stored in XML, but the same principle can be used in ANY storage system. But not efficiently. I have been designing commercial business applications since 1973. Trust me. Not only is it possible, it is easy to do has essentially no cost when planned from the outset. I disagree. Text-based storage of data will never be as fast as binary storage with indexing and structured record formats. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On 5/31/2009 9:48 PM, Christopher Smith wrote: Sure you can. I do it all the time. It's a great way to compose, actually, writing the rhythms and maybe an approximate contour, then go back and choose the pitches. I can only do it with a pencil, though (so far!) But I think you two are talking apples and oranges. John was discussing copying, implying that you already know what you are putting down on paper. Actually, I was discussing copying as well. I hadn't thought about it, but I can certainly see why duration first might be useful for a composer. That's an important distinction. Good thing Finale allows for both, as we keep coming back to. Aaron. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On 5/31/2009 9:39 PM, John Howell wrote: Hi, Aaron. Not meaning to be picky, but you're breaking a single integrated action up into two distinct actions (which is what Finale, Sibelius, and Mosaic all do). When I move my hand I already know both the pitch and the duration I'm going to write, so it's a single "mental" action, and that single action encompasses note placement, note shape, and note color. The computer only knows one thing at a time. I think your choice of words is clouding your argument here. I agree that the mental decision to write a certain note generally encompasses both the pitch and the duration, but the act of writing that note consists of two steps -- moving your pen to the correct staff level and then drawing the appropriate duration. You use the word "action" for both the mental and physical parts of this, and then you seem to imply that because the former is indivisible, the latter must be also. But this is not true. Compare, for example, hand copying of music with old style engraving with punches. It is clear that the two methods require a different order to the component actions. In hand copying, you move to the correct pitch and then draw a duration. With punches, you have to pick up the punch of the correct duration before you can place the note on the staff. In both cases, the engraver knows beforehand both pitch and duration, and yet the order is clearly important. Aaron. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: Dots / Strokes / Daggers was orginally Re: [Finale] Fin2010 announced
On 31 May 2009 at 21:42, Kim Patrick Clow wrote: > >> At 12:39 AM -0400 5/31/09, David W. Fenton wrote: > > > >> >The old dot vs. stroke controversy c. 1800 has always struck me as an > >> >interesting example of engravers having to make decisions on which > >> >engraving tool to use when copying from a manuscript in which the > >> >staccatto marks could vary from a dot to a hasty dot that almost > >> >looks like a stroke, to strokes that are so small they look like > >> >dots, to regular strokes, and all the way to hasty strokes that are > >> >very large and sometimes lean and look like our modern tenuto marks. > >> > >> An excellent example, David. (And a potential doctoral dissertation > >> for someone, if I'm not mistaken!) > > > > It's already been done: > > > > Robert D. Riggs. "Articulation in Mozart's and Beethoven's Sonatas > > for Violin and Piano." Ph.D. Diss., Harvard, 1987. > > I know those symbols are a nightmare for me in Graupner, Telemann, and > Fasch's manuscripts. I try my best to put into my file what I see in > the original manuscript and make a note of it in the critical report. > I know these markings continued into the classical period, which I'm > finding in Wanhal / Cannabich / Ordonez manuscripts now. Riggs's conclusions were very narrow, but a good demonstration of what you find when you actually look at the sources. My experience with printed sources from 1780-1820 is that for most of that period, there was no real distinction between the dot and stroke. A single work would have some parts that used dots exclusively, some parts that used strokes exclusively, and even sometimes other parts that mixed them. This is because most editions with parts were not engraved by a single person. For instance, a piano trio would probably have the piano part engraved by an engraver who specializes in keyboard parts, and the string parts engraved by a different engraver. I can tell by looking at the engraving how many engravers there were, simply because their engraving tools weren't always identical, and even when they were, there are patterns that fit together that allow you to distinguish two engravers whose tools are indistinguishable. Mostly it's about angle and placement, e.g., treble clefs tend to be angled differently by different engravers, and key signatures aligned differently. Likewise for the placement of dynamic marks. Anyway, my point is that one assumes that a single designer/editor created the stichvorlage (assuming they weren't engraving from a score), and would have been consistent in using dots and strokes. But the variation within a single publisher's engraving staff and within a single published edition is phenomenal. I do believe that there were likely local conventions, and, say, a Bohemian musician might interpret things differently than an Italian musician. But I don't have the research to back that up -- it's just a hunch. Our modern distinction between the two symbols is not something that I think was honored in performance, even though it's quite clear that the two symbols were used in engraving well back into the 18th century. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On May 31, 2009, at 8:58 PM, Aaron Sherber wrote: On 5/31/2009 8:43 PM, John Howell wrote: I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it black or white, and then finish up the details. But in hand copying you *don't* do both simultaneously. You first move your hand to the right position on the staff, and then you put a specific kind of note there. There's no other way to do it in hand copying -- you can't draw a note of a specific duration until you have first decided what the pitch is going to be. Aaron. Sure you can. I do it all the time. It's a great way to compose, actually, writing the rhythms and maybe an approximate contour, then go back and choose the pitches. I can only do it with a pencil, though (so far!) But I think you two are talking apples and oranges. John was discussing copying, implying that you already know what you are putting down on paper. Christopher ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On May 31, 2009, at 8:53 PM, Adam Golding wrote: 2009/5/31 John Howell At 2:22 PM -0700 5/31/09, Eric Dannewitz wrote: No, that is NOT Speedy. Speedy allows you to be holding down a chord and then deciding on the notes value. Sibelius, as far as I know, does not have this. I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it black or white, and then finish up the details. And that goes clear back to monks with featers! Any computer program breaks that down and requires doing one and then the other. Big deal! The human mind is really a bit more flexible that that. I used Mosaic for years, and I honestly can't remember the order for entry. Duration first, I think, using the number keys, then pitch entry (which would make it more similar to Sibelius), but I honestly can't remember how the pitch was entered, except that mousing it (as always) was the least desirable option. (So soon we forget!!) But I can't remember getting emotionally involved about it, either. John For what it's worth, when improvising or composing at the piano, you hit a note first, and then later choose when to change notes or stop the note. And when composing on paper you can write black noteheads without rhythms, or rhythms without pitches, and that flexibility can be very useful (in fact, I wish there were more cases of computer composition environments allowing composition in such an 'abstract' manner where not all parameters are initially specified..). Oh yeah, that's for sure! Having to specify the exact rhythm right away is what keeps me from using Finale as a composition tool. I can only go to Finale once I know what I am doing, after the pencil sketch stage at the earliest. As for John not getting emotionally involved with his tools, well I guess some people think like that. Not me, though. Even when I use paper and pencil I still need my brand of paper and the kind of pencil I am used to, or it is a distraction. It doesn't take much to derail my train of thought when I'm in creative mode. Christopher ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Dots / Strokes / Daggers was orginally Re: [Finale] Fin2010 announced
>> At 12:39 AM -0400 5/31/09, David W. Fenton wrote: > >> >The old dot vs. stroke controversy c. 1800 has always struck me as an >> >interesting example of engravers having to make decisions on which >> >engraving tool to use when copying from a manuscript in which the >> >staccatto marks could vary from a dot to a hasty dot that almost >> >looks like a stroke, to strokes that are so small they look like >> >dots, to regular strokes, and all the way to hasty strokes that are >> >very large and sometimes lean and look like our modern tenuto marks. >> >> An excellent example, David. (And a potential doctoral dissertation >> for someone, if I'm not mistaken!) > > It's already been done: > > Robert D. Riggs. "Articulation in Mozart's and Beethoven's Sonatas > for Violin and Piano." Ph.D. Diss., Harvard, 1987. I know those symbols are a nightmare for me in Graupner, Telemann, and Fasch's manuscripts. I try my best to put into my file what I see in the original manuscript and make a note of it in the critical report. I know these markings continued into the classical period, which I'm finding in Wanhal / Cannabich / Ordonez manuscripts now. Thanks Kim ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
At 8:58 PM -0400 5/31/09, Aaron Sherber wrote: On 5/31/2009 8:43 PM, John Howell wrote: I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it black or white, and then finish up the details. But in hand copying you *don't* do both simultaneously. You first move your hand to the right position on the staff, and then you put a specific kind of note there. There's no other way to do it in hand copying -- you can't draw a note of a specific duration until you have first decided what the pitch is going to be. Hi, Aaron. Not meaning to be picky, but you're breaking a single integrated action up into two distinct actions (which is what Finale, Sibelius, and Mosaic all do). When I move my hand I already know both the pitch and the duration I'm going to write, so it's a single "mental" action, and that single action encompasses note placement, note shape, and note color. The computer only knows one thing at a time. John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts & Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html "We never play anything the same way once." Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
Eric Dannewitz wrote: Not necessarily..For example, when I am writing out something, I frequently go through and block out chords, then go back and do the duration. And speedy also lets me play or even keep sounding the chord before and lets me play/mess around with different voicings before putting them into the score. And that's the model that works for you. When transcribing tunes, I generally map the rhythm, and approximate pitch (up or down), and then go back and fine tune the pitches. But when arranging I block the chords and then voice them according to instrumentation. And I'm sure others have other methods for doing what they do. The advantage of a flexible program is that we can all use what works best for us without too many hiccups. Finale is flexible enough to allow that, and that is why I continue to use it despite the fact that the company seems to have its head up its...yeah Agreed. cd -- http://www.livejournal.com/users/dershem/# http://members.cox.net/dershem ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
Not necessarily..For example, when I am writing out something, I frequently go through and block out chords, then go back and do the duration. And speedy also lets me play or even keep sounding the chord before and lets me play/mess around with different voicings before putting them into the score. Finale is flexible enough to allow that, and that is why I continue to use it despite the fact that the company seems to have its head up its...yeah On 5/31/09 5:43 PM, John Howell wrote: I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it black or white, and then finish up the details. And that goes clear back to monks with featers! Any computer program breaks that down and requires doing one and then the other. Big deal! The human mind is really a bit more flexible that that. I used Mosaic for years, and I honestly can't remember the order for entry. Duration first, I think, using the number keys, then pitch entry (which would make it more similar to Sibelius), but I honestly can't remember how the pitch was entered, except that mousing it (as always) was the least desirable option. (So soon we forget!!) But I can't remember getting emotionally involved about it, either. John ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Sibelius 6 :: Finale discouraging upgrades
On 31 May 2009 at 14:04, Craig Parmerlee wrote: > David W. Fenton wrote: > > On 30 May 2009 at 20:26, Craig Parmerlee wrote: > > > >> The obvious solution is to program each release such that it can read > >> future files but simply ignore any elements it doesn't recognize. If > >> Finale worked this way, I would automatically purchase every upgrade. > > > > That is a complete impossibility without there being a freeze on the > > basic structure of the file format. Sure, it's possible to design an > > extensible file format, but that's a very complex task, especially > > for a database format (which is what a Finale file is). > > No it isn't. Uh, yes it is. What do you think those C-Tree error messages that pop up every now and again are referring to? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-tree > We do this every day of the week. What is "this"? > It is absolutely > routine. Today, with inherently extensible formats like XML, you would > have to go out of your way NOT to have forward compatibility. The > programming rule couldn't be simpler - handle all the objects you > recognize and ignore the ones you don't. Text-based storage of relational database data is inherently very slow. This is why no database that I know of uses XML as it's native storage format, but instead uses a structured binary format for storage and exports to XML when needed. > I realize Finale's files aren't stored in XML, but the same principle > can be used in ANY storage system. But not efficiently. > I have been designing commercial business applications since 1973. > Trust me. Not only is it possible, it is easy to do has essentially no > cost when planned from the outset. I disagree. Text-based storage of data will never be as fast as binary storage with indexing and structured record formats. > Regarding the examples of Microsoft Word, whenever they have not > preserved forward compatibility, they have released a free filter that > users install retroactively on the older release to enable seamless file > sharing. Microsoft, unlike Finale, understands that file sharing is an > essential requirement for their users. And Microsoft's file format is very simple compared to Finale's because it's stream-based (i.e., it's a collection of text streams related by pointers). It's a problem that is several orders of magnitude simpler than maintaining backward compatibility in a database format. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On 31 May 2009 at 23:08, Torges Gerhard wrote: > Am 30.05.2009 um 01:57 schrieb David W. Fenton: > > If they are trying to promote Finale on the grounds of versatility of > > getting notes into your files, why do they leave out one of the main > > methods, Speedy entry? > > They didn't. > > Look: > > > * Enter notes with your computer keyboard and/or mouse. > > Isn't that Speedy entry? Not per se. It covers simple entry just as easily, and all the detail pages that are linked from that page talk about Simple Entry exclusively -- there is nothing specific about Speedy at all. Someone who doesn't already know Finale would have no idea from that bullet point that Finale offers two distinct approaches to entering notes with computer keyboard and/or mouse. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On 5/31/2009 8:43 PM, John Howell wrote: I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it black or white, and then finish up the details. But in hand copying you *don't* do both simultaneously. You first move your hand to the right position on the staff, and then you put a specific kind of note there. There's no other way to do it in hand copying -- you can't draw a note of a specific duration until you have first decided what the pitch is going to be. Aaron. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
2009/5/31 John Howell > At 2:22 PM -0700 5/31/09, Eric Dannewitz wrote: > >> No, that is NOT Speedy. Speedy allows you to be holding down a chord >> and then deciding on the notes value. Sibelius, as far as I know, does >> not have this. >> > > I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I > find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before > duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), > you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it > black or white, and then finish up the details. And that goes clear back to > monks with featers! Any computer program breaks that down and requires > doing one and then the other. Big deal! The human mind is really a bit > more flexible that that. > > I used Mosaic for years, and I honestly can't remember the order for entry. > Duration first, I think, using the number keys, then pitch entry (which > would make it more similar to Sibelius), but I honestly can't remember how > the pitch was entered, except that mousing it (as always) was the least > desirable option. (So soon we forget!!) But I can't remember getting > emotionally involved about it, either. > > John > For what it's worth, when improvising or composing at the piano, you hit a note first, and then later choose when to change notes or stop the note. And when composing on paper you can write black noteheads without rhythms, or rhythms without pitches, and that flexibility can be very useful (in fact, I wish there were more cases of computer composition environments allowing composition in such an 'abstract' manner where not all parameters are initially specified..). > > > > -- > John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music > Virginia Tech Department of Music > College of Liberal Arts & Human Sciences > Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 > Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 > (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) > http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html > > "We never play anything the same way once." Shelly Manne's definition > of jazz musicians. > ___ > Finale mailing list > Finale@shsu.edu > http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale > ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Fin2010 announced
On 31 May 2009 at 13:05, John Howell wrote: > At 12:39 AM -0400 5/31/09, David W. Fenton wrote: > >The old dot vs. stroke controversy c. 1800 has always struck me as an > >interesting example of engravers having to make decisions on which > >engraving tool to use when copying from a manuscript in which the > >staccatto marks could vary from a dot to a hasty dot that almost > >looks like a stroke, to strokes that are so small they look like > >dots, to regular strokes, and all the way to hasty strokes that are > >very large and sometimes lean and look like our modern tenuto marks. > > An excellent example, David. (And a potential doctoral dissertation > for someone, if I'm not mistaken!) It's already been done: Robert D. Riggs. "Articulation in Mozart's and Beethoven's Sonatas for Violin and Piano." Ph.D. Diss., Harvard, 1987. Riggs concluded that there was no distinction between dot and stroke in this repertory for these two composers, except for one figure in Beethoven, and that was the string figure of repeated 8th notes with dots on them and bowed as a group (usually groups of 4). Beethoven never used anything but clear dots in that context, never a stroke. Elsewhere, strokes and dots were mixed all over the place, with no consistent pattern in the composer autographs, nor in the printed editions of the time. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
At 2:22 PM -0700 5/31/09, Eric Dannewitz wrote: No, that is NOT Speedy. Speedy allows you to be holding down a chord and then deciding on the notes value. Sibelius, as far as I know, does not have this. I fully realize that different people have different ways of working, but I find this particular argument (duration before pitch or pitch before duration) rather amusing. In hand copying (remember doing THAT, anyone?!!), you do both simultaneously, placing a note on a line or space and making it black or white, and then finish up the details. And that goes clear back to monks with featers! Any computer program breaks that down and requires doing one and then the other. Big deal! The human mind is really a bit more flexible that that. I used Mosaic for years, and I honestly can't remember the order for entry. Duration first, I think, using the number keys, then pitch entry (which would make it more similar to Sibelius), but I honestly can't remember how the pitch was entered, except that mousing it (as always) was the least desirable option. (So soon we forget!!) But I can't remember getting emotionally involved about it, either. John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts & Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html "We never play anything the same way once." Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
On May 31, 2009, at 5:08 PM, Torges Gerhard wrote: Hello! Am 30.05.2009 um 01:57 schrieb David W. Fenton: http://www.finalemusic.com/Finale/features/enteringnotes/default.aspx If they are trying to promote Finale on the grounds of versatility of getting notes into your files, why do they leave out one of the main methods, Speedy entry? They didn't. Look: * Enter notes with your computer keyboard and/or mouse. Isn't that Speedy entry? Gerhard Yes, but you would never know it from the website. Click the link that David included (I left it in the message.) It brings you to a tabbed window open to Simple, and aside from Simple the tabs only include Hyperscribe, MicNotator and Scanning. No Speedy. No mention of Speedy at all in any of the promotional material for 2010. No wonder alarm bells went off. Christopher ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
No, that is NOT Speedy. Speedy allows you to be holding down a chord and then deciding on the notes value. Sibelius, as far as I know, does not have this. On Sun, May 31, 2009 at 2:08 PM, Torges Gerhard wrote: > > No other? > Well, I know another one ... ;-) > >> If they are trying to promote Finale on the grounds of versatility of >> getting notes into your files, why do they leave out one of the main >> methods, Speedy entry? > > They didn't. > > Look: > >> * Enter notes with your computer keyboard and/or mouse. > > Isn't that Speedy entry? > ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Fin2010 announced
Hello! Am 30.05.2009 um 01:57 schrieb David W. Fenton: We're well aware of the fact that MM is working towards promoting Simple over Speedy for new users. Add to that the fact that they are careless enough as to not mention it in their page on all the various methods for entering notes: http://www.finalemusic.com/Finale/features/enteringnotes/default.aspx seems to me to be worth worrying about. The first paragraph says: * Enter notes with your computer keyboard and/or mouse. * Use your MIDI keyboard (or any other MIDI device) in combination with your computer keyboard and mouse to enter notes and chords. * Play a MIDI keyboard and watch your music appear on-screen in real time. * Use Finale´s exclusive MicNotator® to play notes into your microphone with a brass or woodwind instrument. * Scan existing sheet music. * Import MIDI, MusicXML, Smartscore, or Finale family notation files. No other notation software offers this breadth of note entry options. No other? Well, I know another one ... ;-) If they are trying to promote Finale on the grounds of versatility of getting notes into your files, why do they leave out one of the main methods, Speedy entry? They didn't. Look: * Enter notes with your computer keyboard and/or mouse. Isn't that Speedy entry? Gerhard ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Sibelius 6 :: Finale discouraging upgrades
At 5/31/2009 01:14 PM, Craig Parmerlee wrote: >I agree with your comments about the trade-offs of filters versus XML. >I would be just as happy if I knew I could send a 2010 filter to any >collaborators so that they could open my 2010 files. > >Not to nitpick, but 2 additional points: > >1) Even in a database oriented structure, you can still plan for object >extensibility. The main reason for the size of XML is that it contains >mostly formatting characters and self-definition structures. That >enables XML to be used for any application by any combination of >partners using any combination of programming frameworks. In the case >of Finale, you don't need most of that overhead if the goal is simply to >have forward compatibility between different programs released by MakeMusic. In AutoCAD and Revit, all database objects are labelled with a version number. Then an earlier version can tell they don't know how to deal with a later version number, and later versions know how to deal with earlier version numbers and convert them to updated versions. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Sibelius 6 :: Finale discouraging upgrades
I agree with your comments about the trade-offs of filters versus XML. I would be just as happy if I knew I could send a 2010 filter to any collaborators so that they could open my 2010 files. Not to nitpick, but 2 additional points: 1) Even in a database oriented structure, you can still plan for object extensibility. The main reason for the size of XML is that it contains mostly formatting characters and self-definition structures. That enables XML to be used for any application by any combination of partners using any combination of programming frameworks. In the case of Finale, you don't need most of that overhead if the goal is simply to have forward compatibility between different programs released by MakeMusic. 2) In today's storage and high-speed networking market, size isn't much of a factor. Of course, Finale must live with the legacy file format. I haven't spent a lot of time with MusicXML in recent years. If it has evolved sufficiently, then maybe the answer is for Finale to allow the user the default of storing all files as MusicXML, with the .MUS format becoming an internal structure not evident to the user. David W. Fenton wrote: On 30 May 2009 at 22:44, John Howell wrote: When MS brought out WinOffice2007 their .docx files could not be opened in ANY previous version of Word, or in Word for Mac, so there's a limit to backward compatibility when big changes are made. But they quickly brought out file filters for older versions of Office (at least on Windows -- the Mac version was delayed an inordinately long time). MS Office document formats, and especially the Open Doc formats (which use a proprietary, though published, form of XML, i.e., text and no binary code) are substantially simpler than a database file. There is no Open Doc Access file format, because it would be completely impossible. A database filed stored in plain text is not really a database (no indexes, for instance), and would be incredibly hard to edit efficiently. Finale files are database files, with all the benefits (and complexities) that come with that. I just checked the size of a MusicXML file exported from Finale. The original file is 354KB, while the MusicXML file produced from it is 4.4MBs. That's 10x as large because it simply takes a lot more data to store a database in plain text than in a binary file. Consider that in a database file, a piece of data's meaning is defined by where it is stored in the file -- it's in a particular row of a table and in a particular column. With XML formats, every data point has to be surrounded by verbose tags describing what it is, and those tags in turn are surrounded by even more tags. So, for a single column of a data table, every row repeats the XML tags for each piece of data. That adds huge overhead to the file. But it also makes it extremely easy to interpret the data, which is, of course, the whole reason for the existince of XML, to be able to create documents with customized and flexible structures that are nonetheless easy to interpret as long as you have the document type declaration that describes what the tags mean. Thus, creating read/save filters for the Open Doc formats (which are XML) was a relatively easy task compared to creating filters for binary formats. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Re: Sibelius 6 :: Finale discouraging upgrades
David W. Fenton wrote: On 30 May 2009 at 20:26, Craig Parmerlee wrote: The obvious solution is to program each release such that it can read future files but simply ignore any elements it doesn't recognize. If Finale worked this way, I would automatically purchase every upgrade. That is a complete impossibility without there being a freeze on the basic structure of the file format. Sure, it's possible to design an extensible file format, but that's a very complex task, especially for a database format (which is what a Finale file is). No it isn't. We do this every day of the week. It is absolutely routine. Today, with inherently extensible formats like XML, you would have to go out of your way NOT to have forward compatibility. The programming rule couldn't be simpler - handle all the objects you recognize and ignore the ones you don't. I realize Finale's files aren't stored in XML, but the same principle can be used in ANY storage system. I have been designing commercial business applications since 1973. Trust me. Not only is it possible, it is easy to do has essentially no cost when planned from the outset. Regarding the examples of Microsoft Word, whenever they have not preserved forward compatibility, they have released a free filter that users install retroactively on the older release to enable seamless file sharing. Microsoft, unlike Finale, understands that file sharing is an essential requirement for their users. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Fin2010 announced
At 12:39 AM -0400 5/31/09, David W. Fenton wrote: On 30 May 2009 at 19:21, Christopher Smith wrote: Things that are not easy to accomplish in Finale or Sibelius simply don't appear in notation very often any more. I would include some specialised jazz notations among those items, though I think most of Dennis' argument was based around graphic notation. This means that the next generation might not want to see a hand-formed jazz turn (gruppetto) and might not even recognise it, for example. Falls used to be notated in relative length. Now that there is one, maybe two lengths of falls in the articulation tool, we won't get that level of detail much any more. That is actually not a new phenomenon. The old dot vs. stroke controversy c. 1800 has always struck me as an interesting example of engravers having to make decisions on which engraving tool to use when copying from a manuscript in which the staccatto marks could vary from a dot to a hasty dot that almost looks like a stroke, to strokes that are so small they look like dots, to regular strokes, and all the way to hasty strokes that are very large and sometimes lean and look like our modern tenuto marks. An excellent example, David. (And a potential doctoral dissertation for someone, if I'm not mistaken!) Other things that come to mind: The impossibility of beaming notes together in the 16th century, when music was set up with individual pieces of movable type, each of which carried a note or rest along with its own short length of the 5-line staff, which carried through into the 20th century in the vocal music of publishers who continued to set individual, unbeamed 8th notes and shorter. And, in contrast, the wildly-variable swooping beaming of notes together without letting such things as beats or bar lines get in your way (which might actually have carried some important musical information) after the technology of engraving on copper plates was developed in the 17th and 18th centuries, which has carried into modern notation to the extent that beaming over barlines is something that both major engraving programs, which are locked into discrete measure, have had to deal with. Not to mention, of course, that the introduction of paper into the music copying business in the 15th century meant the abandonment of black notation and the introduction of white notation, when some of the inks of the time could spread along the wood fibers in the paper and make blots. Point well made. John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts & Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html "We never play anything the same way once." Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
