Dorico doesn’t count 4 bars, it has a multirest-protocol, and that protocol is not to my likings. I’d like to be able to change the protocol rules. But then I’d still have to do some manual adjusting that I’d like to propagate to other parts. But maybe Dorico is not the right tool for my kind of scoring? Maybe it’s more of a classical composers dream?
Dorico does not “show 4 bars when possible” because in that case it would make this:
and I would really like it to do that. I’d like to be able to change the code of that protocol. That would make a lot of difference in manual adjustments. But still: there will always be exceptions, and I’d really like to be able to propagate that without polluting my score with system breaks. But again: maybe my work is not the real purpose of Dorico, maybe it’s more of a classical composers tool.
I’d like to keep using it though, but then we’ll have to agree on me having to do manual adjustments, and I hope you’ll understand I LOVE the propagate-tool with 20+ parts in a score.
AFAIK there is no such thing as an optical bar.
Without the project file, I’m guessing casting of is not set to 4 bars per system
It truly is! When set to 4 bars per system, Dorico doesn’t put 4 bars at a system. I can provide you with my score, but I had to do some manual labour, so you WILL find some things I changed. I’m sorry, I do have deadlines. I will put a project here when I have the time.
I think you have to accept Dorico counts bar 103-120 as 18 bars.
I don’t care how many actual bars dorico sets on a system, as long as it are 4 optical bars, that is the whole point of doing lay-out.
These are my settings:
This is the result:
And this is the file:
4barsperstystem.dorico (1.9 MB)
18 bars is no 4 bars, but 16 bars are also not 4 bars, but still Dorico sometimes puts 16 bars in a system. It has some kind of optical-4-bar-protocol, and that doesn’t work for me. That is no problem, as long as I can do manual adjustments that I can propagate to other parts. that really is all I want. I have to obey these rules. They are obeyed on the great Basie scores everybody loves. But maybe Dorico is just not able to do that. That’s fine, but can we agree then that I don’t do anything wrong? That me not getting what I want is due to Dorico not being able to deliver, and not me beinig to stupid to do it?
Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude. I’m not English and try to be clear about what I professionally need here, and what I’m willing to do (anything, as long as I can provide my dear colleageus withwhat they need to do their job as stressfree as possible)
That makes manual adjustments inevitable
And propagating very useful
I guess that ‘optical bar’ could be a feature request.
Thanks, I’ll have a look later, but more experienced users hopefully give you tips earlier.
(Het is mooi weer, ik ga even naar het strand)
I’m just reacting to this, actually. I think it’s just not possible to find these settings.
Ton! ik dacht al dat er iets nederlands aan hing. Je engels is duizend maal beter dan dat van mij! Veel plezier aan het strand!
For someone with a deadline, you sure spend a lot of time here complaining. I’m sure the Development Team has noted what you want by now (several times over). Whether they decide to implement it is up to them.
Those of us who try to read every post would probably appreciate brevity.
I am very sorry for my lack of brevity. I just react on the assumption that I do something wrong. Not because I’m vain, but because I want to solve it. I was under the impression that there was a misunderstanding here. I appreciate your great customer support and will try to make less posts.
I don’t handle stress very well at the moment. I’m actually very ill, and will be diagnosed soon. I guess this forum is not for me at the moment. I’m very sorry for all the inconvenience (I don’t know the proper word, I mean something very bad: anger?) I cause.
Sorry Roel, you’ll have to accept that what Dorico (and most musicians, I guess) considers a ‘bar’ is a unit of ‘musical time’, not ‘anything between two graphical barlines’. A multirest represents several bars (units of time) at once, it does not become one bar. In English, ‘bar’ and ‘measure’ are more or less used interchangeably (at least, that’s what I observed being a Dutch native speaker myself). It seems also to be slightly different in Europe vs. the Americas…
Apart from that, putting 4 bars on every line/system is not a graphical convention, but a purely musical one: many musical genres like jazz have quite consistently 4-bar phrases, and it helps sightreading players to keep track of the phrases they’re playing if the boundaries coincide with system breaks, especially in parts where many bars look the same, like drum parts or chord sheets. That’s where Dorico’s option to group bars by 4 on a system automatically comes in handy. If a multirest would count as 1 (graphical) bar, you lose this grouping.
(Ondertussen sterkte en veel beterschap gewenst!)
It seems to me that Dorico’s current method, as @TonH notes above, doesn’t maintain that musical grouping either, because it doesn’t break multi bar rests; it will take 4 bars plus any bars that are in a multi bar rest which ends the system. @RoelVanWijk’s post above shows the result, in which most systems have more than 4 bars.
From a musical point of view, it sounds like there’s room for a casting off option that will put exactly X bars on a system, breaking multi bar rests as appropriate.
And from a graphical point of view, I also appreciate @RoelVanWijk’s desire for an option that will put X barlines on a system, regardless of whether those barlines come at the ends of bars or multi bar rests.
I was under the impression I already said everything @PjotrB stated above, but my english is even worse than I thought. Anyway: the most important thing is that I’d really like to be able to manually tweak every score, and propagate this to other parts. On a professional level, no scoring is 100% to be set in Dorico settings after all, or am I wrong?
I’m not really interested in what Dorico calls a bar or measure. It’s more that it’s all about lay-outing, and that means you will need structure. In jazz and unterhaltungsmusik, 4 bars is often very convenient, but when there’s a 9-bar or 7-bar form, it’s even more convenient to be able to manually adjust that (and propagate without getting all the disadvantages). @TonH implied that I can avoid manual labour totally, and I don’t agree. Sorry for the lack of brevity, but I think I’m not the only one who likes to have clarity. @asherber Thanks for agreeing with some of my wishes.
Now I understand your definition of a bar, and where that differs from Dorico’s definition, I see why you can’t find options which fit those and have to do manual adjustment.