Navigating without mouse while in Write mode

Dorico
1

KeyboardNavigationHelp.dorico (1.4 MB)

I’m new to Dorico, so forgive me if I’m missing something. Overall I’m loving this tool and think it’s incredibly well designed.

My overall goal is to minimize needing to go back and forth between mouse and keyboard while working. I know it’s not entirely possible, but the more I can streamline things, the better. This feels like what Dorico is trying to be good at.

  1. When I deselect items in Write mode (ctrl + D) or sometimes when I just finish up in note-input mode and hit Enter, what gets selected on the screen is e.g. the clef symbol, or the name of the instrument.

Hitting Tab or using the arrow keys does not allow me to navigate back to the notes from here. There is nothing I’ve found that lets me navigate back to the notes (using the computer’s keyboard).

The same goes for things like meter. Creating a meter (shift+m) creates a meter and leaves me with the new meter selected. Using the keyboard, I can navigate to other meters, but I can’t navigate to the notes to continue my work.

I have to use the mouse to select a note, and then I can navigate between notes again.

What am I missing? Is this something others have delt with? Am I trying to make Dorico something it’s not by wanting to avoid the mouse?

  1. Using Goto and the Jump bar moves the view to the location I’ve request (e.g. b32 for bar 32), but it doesn’t select anything at that location, and so using the arrows or Tab just goes back to what I had selected previously. This is annoying to me, but I can vaguely see how this would be a useful secondary behavior (not default).

Moreover, if the place you want to go is already visible, nothing happens.

To get the selection from one part of the page to another, move it slowly with the arrow keys one note at a time (after having had to click on some note object with the mouse).

2

Dorico is certainly designed with a lot of keyboard shortcuts, so that once they are familiar, you can work very quickly. However, I don’t think that you can use any application efficiently by ignoring the mouse entirely.

There may be some navigation commands in the Preferences > Key Commands section that might help:
“Navigate to Next Item at Position” – I have Tab for that, which lets me move to another notation element at the same rhythmic position. (I can’t remember if that’s a default.)

Most input devices (e.g. including Trackpads) do scrolling, as well as selecting areas and items, which aren’t areas that keyboard commands do well.

I can type at over 60 words per minute, and move my hand from the keyboard to the mouse (or trackpad) in half a second. But it’s usually my brain that’s the rate-determining step, rather than the mechanical action… :grinning_face:

1 Like