Insert Bars doesn't work when meter is undefined

Dorico
1

When the time signature of the current selection is X,the Insert Bars tool on the panel doesn’t do anything. A possible bug?

It’s OK to add barlines into an X bar, and there might be a need for more musical room before or after an X bar. I realize Dorico won’t know how many beats to put in the bar, but there could be a default. If not a bug, it’s frustrating for it to just do nothing. A message, or a dialog of how much of the current duration to add would be good.

Also, once you’ve added barlines into an area of undefined meter, is there a way to increase the duration of an existing X bar? Note Insert mode just proceeds across the barline. I suppose I could just move the barline then.

This comes up while I am composing right into Dorico. The music needs much adjusting.

2

Have you tried typing something like “2/4” into the bars popover? It inserts the specified rhythmic value—in that case, 2 quarter notes.

3

The doc says to type the number of bars, not a time sig. Are you thinking of the Meter popover? Maybe I can turn a brief section of music into a metered passage, then delete meters afterward.

4

No. This is a new feature since 2.2. Try it! Shift-B, 2/4 or 3/8 or whatever you want.

I don’t use unmeasured meter, so I don’t know if it works for that, but it works beautifully for conventional meters. It is one of my favorite new features of 2.2.

5

Ah, good tip! I hadn’t checked for updates since upgrading.

6

It’s definitely not a bug that you can’t add a number of bars via the Shift+B popover when you have an open meter: Dorico wouldn’t know how long each bar to be added should be.

7

However, some feedback, like a boop sound, or a message would have saved frustration. What if it had added a 4/4 bar and I changed it to open meter afterward. But I understand better now, how to get what I needed.