The creator used the „November“ font, which means my Finale Installation can not display the documents.
Ok, first thing I did was “Export to music.xml” and import those into Dorico - which worked rather well, as I can now see the music.
Still i will have to proofread and compare with the source document. I don’t think I will spend 90$ just for having a peek. I know, it is quite a beautiful font, still.
My procedure now: I am going to change the font for these documents to Finale Maestro, their default font - so to be able to inspect the music.
Running into a problem though, Finale does not let me change the default music font:
Yes, absolutely. A possible solution is to open a Default Maestro file (using old fonts and not Finale-Maestro-Default using SMuFL), then to import the file sender. We find it (on Mac) in ~Library/Application Support/Finale 27/Music Files/Default files/Maestro Font Default.
Open it ; save under another name (in order not to destroy this root file), and import the sender file.
Indeed, if we convert directly an XML file created with previous versions of Finale (before Finale 25), the display is like this one, because de default file opened is Finale-Maestro-font-default.
Note that, to prevent this kind of problem, Finale 27 is provided with, alongside, the two types of fonts (SMuFL and ancient .suit), and two types of templates/default files.
Conversely, when you want to send a file to someone using an older version of Finale, you need to take the precaution of creating the file with these old templates or these old default files, and then exporting it in XML if necessary.
But, in our case, we obviously need to have the November font and its Font annotations.
If you don’t, you can always ask the sender to convert the file to a more common font (Maestro) and then export it again.
yeah, instead of changing the Default Music Font I also tried to change aspects of it (Document Setup) and managed to get the note-heads, rests and keys, even the accidentals visible - but not any articulations and figured bass.
I will ask the sender again for an additional pdf version. Thanks for the good suggestions!
Indeed. I have already experienced this ; the Continuo doesn’t appear fine in such case. That is annoying.
These exchanges of files between different versions are often a headache !
Whilst waiting for the pdfs I managed to get two readable files.
In the depths of the ~Library I temporarily changed the name of Maestro Font Default font (I don’t know whether this was necessary).
I then imported the files - without being able to see anything sensible. Then changed the Default Music Font for the document first to Maestro (without preceding Finale) and then changed it to Finale Maestro Legacy.
After these steps the documents became visible: everything - even articulations, ornaments, all there. I hastily exported to .pdf (on Mac via the Print command) and thats my dose of Finale for 2025 done, I hope. Why didn’t I find Export to PDF? Also the app v.27.4.1 feels terrible. Sibelius is a modernist application in comparison. I don’t understand anybody who does not feel enchanted when dealing with Dorico…
Obiwan, thanks for the hint with renaming the font! Concerning the figured bass: interestingly it showed up as Chord Symbols in Dorico - after xml import. And the Chord Symbols even made sense…
There are some things that blow me away, a few things that irk me, but mostly I’ve been pretty happy with switching to Dorico in early Sept. I don’t miss Finale at all, and what I guess I don’t understand is why there are a few folks on their forums who trash Dorico for its complexity (kinda ironic given how Finale for years had the reputation of being overly complicated) and its learning curve, yet don’t care that Finale has become frozen, and has enough bugs and limitations that it makes little or no sense to stick with the HMS Titanic of notation apps. I didn’t want to switch, but once the writing was on the wall and it was clear the many bugs and missing features would never be addressed (and probably couldn’t have been without a major/entire code rewrite), it seemed irrational to stick with Finale. At least that’s how it seems to me.
I came to Steinberg via Cakewalk’s demise back in late 2017, and haven’t regretted a thing. Although I had tried Finale in the past, not being a notation expert or aficionado, the program was extremely difficult to grasp. Although it would be enriching, I decided that the learning effort required just wasn’t worth it for someone with my skill set/levels.
Now being in the Steinberg camp, and watching Dorico grow, I decide to bite and bought into Dorico, the Elements version at first. The Dorico developers obviously gave the program’s layout, design, interface and overall philosophy some serious consideration. They came up with a product that not only became comprehensive enough for professionals use (as intended), but its design also gave it a sort of didact-ability, a self learn ability for those inclined. This somewhat the the opposite of what someone trained in doing things in a particular way, say the Finale way, would experience. But to create a product that didn’t alienate both the very experienced user (of some other Notation application) and to appeal to the neophyte? I’d call that a coup.
Ouch ! was für eine Arbeit!
But, but one thing I didn’t quite understand: wouldn’t it have been simpler (or at least less complicated) to ask your sender to provide an XML file and then import it directly into Dorico?
Yes I did, but I haven’t received anything so far.
(Now I don’t need it anymore).
There are Finale users, that don’t use .pdf export.
There are Finale users, who have not used xml export either.
There are even Finale users who just keep doing as they always did. And have not considered switching yet.
True. My bad, but at least I knew it wasn’t the SS Titanic LOL. I’ve been to the Titanic Museum in Belfast when I was at a surgical conference last May, so that should have stuck with me.