Measure attached horizontal line (or text underscore)

Dorico
1

I am stumped trying to get a fixed width horizontal line (or text underscore) positioned under all measures for a worksheet design.

This line would be the “answer line” under the measure(s). It needs to be fixed width (same in every bar - regardless of bar width), and it needs to show in all measures - centered between the bar lines, regardless of the contents of the bar - empty whole rest, or any note content.

In Finale, I would use bar numbers - adding an underscore prefix/suffix, and using a font with empty numeric characters so only the underscore will print. Worked great.

I could then position the “bar numbers” once and the line would appear in all measures where bar numbers are displayed.

Any ideas? Thanks!

2

Would a barline-attached horizontal line, positioned beneath the staff, work perhaps?

Or a custom playing technique, that comprises a string of underscore characters, or a line graphic?

If not, could you share a picture of the sort of thing you’re looking to recreate?

3

This recent thread had a few alternative ideas.

4

Thanks for the reply - Your first option does not produce a fixed width line that is in every measure - exactly the same width/position. Your second option requires at least one note or real rest to exist in the measure.

Here is what I’m trying to do:

Answer Line Example
Answer Line Example1872×996 35.3 KB

My experimenting with the line tool (so far anyway) produces a line that changes width based on measure width.

Also - any line tool option would require manual insertion in every measure. The above example uses a measure number region with an underscore prefix and hiding the actual measure number.

** PjotrB**: Thanks for the reply - your example requires at least one note/real rest to exist in a bar, and would need to be manually entered in all measures.

5

Not quite true, because you can input playing techniques anywhere in any bar, by positioning the caret at that position just before inputting the notation.

This short Tips Tuesday video is about dynamics, but the same principle applies across the board:

Admittedly, I can see how your previous method worked for you, however that’s not how Dorico works best: in Dorico, the semantic musical meaning is a priority, meaning we like to have features that serve their specific purpose, and keep things as much as possible to their intended category.

6

Thanks for the additional tips - and I do appreciate the “specific purpose” concept.

I think I figured out a solution (work around?) for a bar centered answer line auto-positioned in every measure (unless manually hidden). Here is what it looks like:

Worksheet Answer Lines
Worksheet Answer Lines1922×1678 180 KB

My solution was to create a font that has an extended underscore glyph and re-direct any numeric character(s) to this glyph as a ligature character.

So any number (from 1 to 50) will actually display as an underscore about 4-5 spaces wide. This allows me to create a paragraph style for bar lines (score) using this font - with every number displaying the “______” instead of the actual bar number. A quick adjustment to the default vertical/horizontal positions of the bar number object and every measure has a fixed width horizontal line centered below the bar, regardless of the bars contents or width.

I’m still experimenting with the font to allow for different width answer lines using conditional ligatures, but so far it’s working great (see image above). Has anyone else tried this? Are there any downsides to this option?

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7

Looks good to me! Ingenious.

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