FR: Make ties easier in Pitch-Before-Duration

Dorico
1

Hello,
when I’m in PBD-Inut mode (specify accidentals before inputting note) and enter a whole note with a flat (which fills out the entire bar) and I want to tie to a quarter note afterwards, you always have to turn on the flat symbol again. It turns off the flat symbol which is logical because you are in a new bar, but it feels inconvenient.

When you press T on your keyboard, you most of the time have a specific intent to tie a note to the previous one. If there isn’t a note with the note value (natural in this case) already in the staff, Dorico ignores you and places a single quarter note with a natural. If there is a note with the note value and a natural already on the staff, it creates a super-duper-long tie across the whole score to your newly entered natural quarter.

Both cases don’t match the intention, so my feature request is that in the moment when you press the note value for the quarter note, it just ties it to the last note altough the flat wasn’t specified again. Automatically turning the flat symbol on after pressing T is not a good idea as it will throw people off… Thats why I suggest that Dorico just makes this clever exception after pressing the note value, when it recognizes that tie is on.

Best regards
Stephan

2

One of the advantages of Dorico’s method of handling ties is that conceptually I think of it as creating a tie to rather than a tie from. Coming from Finale it took me a while to come around to this concept, but I really think it is a better way to do it. It sure makes it simple to do stuff like this:

ties
ties969×373 35.9 KB

I’m virtually always using PBD with a MIDI keyboard, so I don’t run into your issue often, but with your FR it would be more difficult to create a tie from a note that isn’t the previous one.

In your example, while the whole note is still selected, just Alt+Shift+right arrow 2x (with an eighth note grid) and Dorico will automatically extend your flat whole note to a quarter, which will be less keystrokes anyway.

2 Likes
3

Well, good catch! Haven’t thought about that use case.

Sadly Alt+Shift+Right doesn’t work in “Specify-accidentals-before-duration-mode”. But I’ve already made a post about that, so no need to moan about it now :slight_smile:

The only thing that irritates me about it (and probably will do for some time) that you have to think about barlines. If everything stays in one bar, you must not press the flat button as it would turn it off. If your tie does cross a barline, you must press the flat button.