I wrote a passage but the durations need to be halved. The screenshot below shows the issue I’m having using a toy example: there are multiple voices, but not all measures contain the secondary voice(s).
I use the stop bar to protect the right part, and I use the insert mode. Then with the jump bar I “Divide duration by two” for the first three measures. The result is:
So basically the second part of the green voice disappears, seemingly because it does not exist in measure 2. I’m a bit at a loss, what is the right way to achieve this? (my actual section would be a bit tedious to rewrite note by note, would be great if this could work).
sim, could you try in the System Track to select the bars and make sure to make the tick at the right hand side? This will select everything.
Then do the procedure with halving the values.
If this doesn’t work, go to Notation Options->Rests and make sure all rests in all voices are shown. Then repeat the procedure.
You could try temporarily changing the Notation Options to show bar rests in additional voices, which gives you something to select and perform the duration transformation on.
(Edit: sorry, only just properly taken in that @k_b suggested that already!)
Thank you both for your help. Showing the rests makes it work for the example in my post, but it did not work with my actual work. I investigated a bit and I found a few failure cases that I describe here.
The main takeaway is that the example works because the green voice “exists” for the whole duration of the selection.
But say that a third voice starts at a later bar instead, it won’t show any rests even if the option is on and the procedure will fail. Like here:
The other situation where it fails is if the voice is the same, but the “Ends voice” property is active somewhere for it. In that case, the rests won’t show even if they’re enabled from the notation options, shown below:
I don’t think it would be relevant since my screenshots show exactly the problem with the function. Now that I know the cause I will be able to work around it by re-arranging the voices (or rewrite the passage). But in my opinion this should be logged as a bug for a future fix. And maybe improve the flow and make these manipulations transparent (show rests, apply, then hide rests) to the user. I do not see a situation where one would want to not do that (please enlighten me if that situation exist ).
That’s fine. You were the one who claimed the problem was more complicated than your example. Just offering to help.
Certainly, if the Dorico Team decides this is worth pursuing, it could be beneficial. I note that Finale has not corrected a similar problem in 20-30 years.
sim, in your examples I don’t see any rest for all voices. Are you sure, you have enabled them? As always, it is suggested, that you actually post a project file you are having the issues with. We’ll be able to solve your problem probably instantly
in your examples I don’t see any rest for all voices
Thanks again for your kind help. I did activate the “Show rest for all voices” in all my examples following your advice. This seems to have no effect in the two cases of my second post, which correspond to my situation (a new voice starting later for the first time). That’s why I did not feel the need to post a more complicated example, since this simple one shows exactly what the problem is. If one finds a direct solution for this simple example (other than just reassigning voices), it will work for my project too. test half.dorico (848.1 KB)
In general, “operations” in Dorico only ever are done to notes/items that are actively selected. Unfortunately, invisible rests cannot be selected, so cannot be acted upon.
Did you try halving note durations with Insert mode activated and set to the Global scope, so that changes to durations in any voice impact all voices/staves in the flow?
Stepping back a bit, there are situations where a more global, perhaps flow-based metric modulation feature would be useful: to turn an entire flow of 4/4 into 2/4 with halved durations, say, or 4/4 with triplets into 12/8. There are significant complications and details with such procedures, though!
I did try the other insert modes, but they all have the same issue.
Meanwhile, I tried to apply @rafaelv 's workaround to my work, but there was still an offset problem. After some investigation, it seems that partial ties in chords are incorrectly handled by divide duration.
Say I have this (single voice):
it results in:
edit: I’ve updated my test project with this case if anyone wants to play with. As I said, I understand the problem now, so I can get around it. test divide duration.dorico (932.2 KB)
).
