I just upgraded to the most recent version of Dorico for Mac. When I open files, many of my chord symbols have fallen apart. I’m using a font other than the default, and have made some adjustments to the chord symbols library, but not every issue seems to be related to the library. For example, my custom “F/A” now looks like “FA”, and when I input “Fmin(maj7)/Ab” I get “F—^A” (with a triangle instead of the carat and no flat on the A). Also the “+” is missing from the Gma7(+5):
From what I’ve read, this might have to do with global font assignments or something, and I also seem to remember that Dorico handles chords a bit differently now, but I can’t find the details of how to fix it.
(By the way, I’m usually reluctant to update Dorico or any software until the old version is not working well or there’s some new feature that I need. In this case, I was experiencing an odd thing with a project where all of my layout changes like system and frame breaks were suddenly disappearing, and that terrified me. Hence the update. If the issue persists in the newest version, I’ll be mentioning that in a separate thread.)
I’m not really sure how you got all of those or why. Are the Chord Symbols Slash Font variants actually functional from my doricolib file? Or just another font?
Deleting all the chord symbol fonts that are possible to delete, and resetting all fonts that are possible to reset, takes me down to this:
Nor do I. Some of these fonts I no longer use, and they are not in use in the current project.
I cannot remember. I do remember having trouble with the slashes some years back and I cannot remember how exactly I solved it.
When I do all of those things, it still looks all wrong. I still have no slashes and I have no “+” on the alterations. Compared to what I see in your example, I believe I used a different font for the triangle, and maybe the accidentals look a bit different in my version (previously), but otherwise that’s close to what I would expect. Here’s an example from a PDF from before the update:
I do get the slash and alterations though simply by deleting and resetting fonts. I didn’t do any editing at all other than that. What font do you have selected for Chord Symbols Music Text Font (and variants) and Chord Symbols Slash Font (and variants if any)? If those fonts don’t contain the glyphs in the correct SMuFL locations, then they may not appear.
I’m using Petaluma Text. And after resetting it, I still cannot get it to reappear. Plus, it seems that whatever I do, if this is the correct approach, will require doing it for every project I have already created, right?
The only problem now is that, while I have the accidentals and slashes back, they’re in the wrong place and the wrong sizes. Plus, does this mean I have to go through this process for EVERY SINGLE PROJECT I’ve ever created? That’s insane if true!
I obviously don’t have that font, but typically the Chord Symbols Music Text font would be something like LS Iris Text, if that exists. Again, I don’t have that font so I can’t look and see, but I’m guess that LS Iris doesn’t have the correct glyphs in the locations that Dorico is looking for them so isn’t really compatible for chord symbols.
Chord Symbol Slash Font is not a factory font setting. Dorico doesn’t give you Engraving Options for the slash size and positioning so I wrote a doricolib file (details here) to give the user control over this. If you are actually using the doricolib file then this will give you control, but I’m guessing you aren’t as your slashes are LS Iris and neither of your Chord Symbol Slash Font settings are that font. If you just created that Font Style, then it won’t actually control the slashes without the doricolib file installed.
You should be able to reset the slashes with the Library Manager:
I’m not sure what else I can add as I obviously can’t view the glyph set for that font, but if the correct glyphs aren’t appearing for you, then it’s probably not completely SMuFL-compliant and will require workarounds to work with Dorico.
It should appear on the list at the left in alphabetical order, right?
Regardless, what I don’t understand is why all of this was working perfectly well yesterday morning until I updated to the latest version. I don’t understand what the newer version is doing differently with the fonts that might cause this problem. (I understand @FredGUnn that this is probably a question for the devs!)
But honestly, I now just want to revert to the old version so that I can do anything.
Chord Symbols Slash Font is not a factory thing, even though it should be. I wrote a doricolib file to create a functioning Chord Symbols Slash Font which I posted on the forum so the user can control this. It contains these elements:
If you installed that doricolib correctly, then you should have a functioning Chord Symbols Slash Font style, but only if you did that as this is not a factory default. If you just created a Chord Symbols Slash Font style then it won’t actually do anything to the slash (without manual editing) as the factory default glyphs.xml file points to the Chord Symbols Music Text font for these, not the Chord Symbols Slash Font:
As as result, I have no idea if your Chord Symbols Slash Font is functional or not. I’m suspecting it’s not as your Chord Symbols Music Text Font (LS Iris Regular) is being used for your slashes, as that is the factory specification.
The chord symbol components won’t show up in that editor. They have to be edited in the Edit Chord Symbol Component editing window. They will however appear along with other Music Symbols in Library Manager / Components / Music Symbols.
I don’t understand why an update would change functionality either, but I suspect it’s a font issue. If you’re using a font that isn’t fully SMuFL-compatible with a complete set of chord symbol glyphs in the locations that Dorico expects to find them, there certainly could be issues. If you can open up LS Iris Regular to view the entire set of glyphs, are there chord symbol slashes at E87B and/or E87C?
Seriously, forgive me, but all of this is so confusing because, as you can see in the image above, I see the font “Petaluma Text” under Chord Symbols Slash Font 2. So I don’t see how it can be using LS Iris. And I know I have not been using that for the slash because the slash in my PDFs is not a handwritten font.
Regardless, even if I’m messing up the slash font integration, that shouldn’t relate to the missing accidentals and alterations, correct?
At this point, I would just be happy to delete everything and start over with all new font settings, but a) I cannot delete most of the existing fonts, b) anything I try to change to reset the fonts does not seem to work, or works sometimes but not others, and c) I cannot delete any existing chord symbol alterations such that I could then rebuild everything cleanly.
I’m really hoping the devs can chime in here because I have some deadlines and I’m unable to do anything until I can get this fixed — and, I’m too dumb to understand how Dorico does and does not allow me to edit and change/delete chord adjustments to clean everything up and start again.
Your Chord Symbols Slash Font 2 doesn’t actually control anything. I can create a Font Style called Font I Want to Use for Slashes, but that doesn’t mean Dorico will actually use it. It all depends on the font that that particular glyph is assigned to. In your case it looks like the slashes are assigned to the factory default, which is your Chord Symbols Music Text Font (LS Iris Regular).
I was just focusing on the slash as it should be pretty straightforward to sleuth out. Your accidentals are more complicated as I can’t tell what any of the options are without your font.
I see this now. I don’t know why it shows this, as I have never set LS Iris to be the slash font. And now I do not know how to change it. I cannot delete the “F/A” chord definition, and I don’t understand why Dorico would rewrite my settings with the update. Is this to be expected? Is there no way to get rid of these customizations and start over?
The factory default is for the slash to use the Chord Symbols Music Text Font which you have changed to LS Iris Regular. If you change the Chord Symbols Music Text Font to Bravura Text or Petaluma Text, then all the missing glyphs reappear.
I see, and that works on my end. But I must have been using your custom slash font style because I have never actually seen LS Iris as my slash font.
If I reset the Chord Symbols Music Text Font to either Bravura or Petaluma Text, I do at least see the correct info in the chord symbols, but the design is a mess. All of my custom proportions are off. And even if I can figure out how to change them all back to the specific settings and custom adjustments I need, I am certainly worried that I’ll be in the same boat in the future.
Do you happen to know whether I can use the library manager to safely import these settings into my existing projects — assuming I can ever get the chords to look right again — without having to make tons of manual adjustments in each old project and/or worry about unplanned side effects?
did not have the Chord Symbols Slash Font.doricolib in the Dorico 6 folder, even though I had been using it successfully with v. 6.0. I copied it and pasted it into the Dorico 6 folder, but still nothing.
Doricolib settings are embedded in the project at the time of project creation. Whether or not it was in the correct folder should not have any effect on existing projects. Obviously it will have an effect on new projects created from File/New.
I’ve now gone through and completely rebuilt all of my chord symbol customizations, to the best I can remember, but I still cannot get the +/- to appear in the alterations. I can get them to appear if I reset the chord symbol music text font to Bravura, but that destroys all of my custom settings. I just want to show the +/- (or flat/sharp for that matter) on each alteration and can’t get them to appear! It’s been years since I customized these symbols so I cannot remember exactly how I worked through every detail and I don’t know if I did or did not do anything to customize the appearance of +/-. Regardless, I don’t know how to find the place where I could revisit those changes if they are buried in the code somewhere.
Please, please, someone — Dorico team — help me figure this out. I’m desperate and have sunk a solid 8-our day into fixing something that just should not need fixing in the first place. I’m dead in the water and coming up against deadlines.
I’m using LS Iris for one of my fonts to get the triangle to appear. I’m using Bravura for the accidentals on chord roots and bass notes. I’m using Sebastian for the half-diminished symbol (mainly because I don’t like Bravura or LS Iris for this and cannot remember what font I might have been using before). I’m using Kalam for the M-dash for minor chords. And I’m using Inria Sans for the roots and other regular text components. Here’s the latest version of a project that has my newly redesigned chord symbols:
I’ve found at least a couple of other threads from users who have had similar issues with chord symbols being mangled after a version update, so I know now that it’s not just me.
