Adding bars bug?

Dorico
#1

When I am in 4/4 and I am in write mode and I open with Shift + B the bar editing and I enter +3, then I get three more bars. Great, fine!
But when I am in 3/4 and I do the same, then I get four more bars, instead of three. Hmm? Does this happen on purpose?

I suspect that internally 12 quarters are added and those are divided by 3 quarters per bar which results in 4 bars.

I am using 1.2.10.139

Beside that: The latest unpitched percussions improvements are great and way beyond what I have expected. Many thanks!

#2

Dear felixp,
Well, I tried to create a new score from scratch, set the meter to 3/4, select the whole pause in the only bar, shift-B, +3 and… I get a total of four bars. Can you be more precise about the problem you had ? I do not remember seeing such a (huge) bug in a year and a half using Dorico on an almost daily basis. What I can tell you is that the result you got was not the expected one ! There’s no such thing as 12 quarters added when three more bars have to be added, no matter the meter, not in Dorico !

#3

I just tried it myself, and I only get 3 bars added (total of 4) in both 4/4 and in 3/4.

Can you provide a graphic or some more information about how this comes about?

Robby

#4

Here are my steps to reproduce:

  • Open a new project and add a single instrument, e.g. Piano
  • Entering the following: 4/4, whole D1, 3/4
  • With Ctrl/Cmd right jump to the last bar line. Now there are two bars, 1st with a whole note in a 4/4, 2nd 3/4 and a whole pause. The cursor is at the last bar. (screenshot 1)
  • Now open the bar entering with Shift+B and type +3. (screenshot 2)
  • Now there are four bars more, but only three should be there. (screenshot 3)
    PlusBarProblem01.png
    PlusBarProblem02.png
    PlusBarProblem03.png
    PlusBarProblem03.png1081×304 12.3 KB
#5

I was able to reproduce this behaviour.

#6

Dorico probably takes the bars depending on of the clock on the key, so 3* 4/4.
Base clock = 4/4.
3 * 4/4 = 12 quarter note.
4 * 3/4 = 12 quarter note.

#7

This might be related to the fact that it is the 3/4 meter that is selected (that could be related to the C meter before) instead of the whole rest… Just a guess.

#8

But if you do instead +1, you get 2 bars, +2, you get 3 bars… this is more than fuzzy math! Additionally, try making the meter 2/4 or 6/4, etc., and the same “extra” bar gets added. The only thing that seems to give the correct number of bars is “Insert Bar at start of flow” using the Notations Toolbox.

#9

Thanks for the graphics. Seems like your issue can be reproduced.

I wonder if it has to do with the rest in the 3/4 bar. In Dorico rests aren’t really there, unless you explicitly create them. I wonder if the behavior is the same if there are notes in the 3/4 bar. I’ll give all of this a try when I get home and am at my computer.

Robby

#10

I may have had a parallel (?) instance yesterday: I wanted three bars in 6/8 inserted near the start of a 4/4 Flow.

  1. SHIFT B (with the appropriate carline selected)
  2. +3
  3. (select the barline at the start of the first new, empty bar)
  4. SHIFT M
  5. 6/8
  6. entered the notes I needed; but - in the event - they didn’t fill all of all three (new) bars
  7. realized I could rebar that third new bar back to 4/4, which suited - because, of course, that was the rest of the Flow, so far
  8. (select the barline at the start of the first new, empty bar)
  9. SHIFT M
  10. 4/4
  11. on deleting the notes from that new, third, bar I got the wrong rest (single crotchet/quarter note).

Could this perhaps be in some way related, in terms of how Dorico is calculating (the relationship between) bars and notes/rests/beats therein???

#11

In playing around with this more, I am seeing that this is very reproducible.

My workflow when copying things out, is to add the number the number of bars I need from the start. I have noticed in several works I have done, that when there are time signature changes, that Dorico somehow ends up with more bars than what was initially entered. And I think this issue might be somewhat related.

Robby

#12

Make a new score with 2 bars of 4/4.
Change the base beat in ¾ or something else, it’s the same behavior.

It counts the first base clock.
At the 4/4, you get a base note ¼. Changing the stroke, the number of ¼ notes remains and it is rounded up to full new bars.

#13

Something is not quite right here, but the various theories about what might be wrong are not, I think, correct. From looking through the code I can see that Dorico does correctly retrieve the prevailing time signature. I think the confusion is caused by the fact that Dorico cannot straightforwardly “add bars”, because Dorico doesn’t think in bars: instead Dorico has to calculate how much rhythmic time would be occupied by the number of bars requested, and then by extending the flow by that amount of time, bars are naturally given rise to.