Notation Express Wish List

Dorico
1

Is there a place to mention items that would be desirable for future editions of Notation Express?

I have just installed it and can see some good utility with what is there already. One Item I was particularly hoping to see was a row of buttons to change the note entry resolution. I normally leave this at 8th notes, but there are times when it would be a lot quicker to have the resolution set to quarter or half notes, and sometimes it is necessary to set it to 16th notes to get a rhythm entered correctly. I do have keyboard shortcuts for this, but it would be quicker to have a row of buttons – actually 2 rows (with and without dots.)

I guess there is a way for me to add my own buttons, but I haven’t explored that yet.

1 Like
2

I’m not sure exactly what you mean by note entry resolution. Do you mean the rhythmic grid resolution, at the bottom left of the Dorico window? There is a Notation Express set of buttons for this, under “More notes”.

more-notes-streamdeck
more-notes-streamdeck952Ă—584 72.2 KB

3

Right you are. That will work. I was expecting to see a set of buttons to set the grid to absolute values, which I still think would be helpful, especially on the XL.

To give an example, I might normally be working in quarter notes, but if I want to adjust one of those notes to jump by 1/16, I would have to press the “increase:” button 4 times, make the adjustment to rhythmic position and length, then press the “decrease” button 4 times. I would rather see a row of grid buttons with 32nd, 16th, 8th, 1/4, 1/2, and whole, and a row above that with the same thing, except dotted. Chances are when working on my melodic lines and counterpoint, I would leave that Stream Deck page displaying the whole time.

2 Likes
4

This is possible. I don’t know if one changes the grid resolution often enough for this to make sense as a dedicated StreamDeck page, but NE might of course add such a page. If they don’t, or until they do, you could add a few key commands to your keycommands_en.json file. I have set up the key combination Ctrl+Shift+G, followed by the note value number (8 for whole note, 7 for half note etc.).

If you haven’t yet created any personal key commands (i. e. if there is no keycommands_en.json file in your Dorico preferences folder (%Appdata%\Steinberg\Dorico 4 on Windows), then you can simply extract the attached ZIP file to that folder.

keycommands_en.zip (417 Bytes)

If you do have that file already, first make a backup copy of it. Then use a text editor to find the lines

					"context" : "kWriteMode",
					"shortcuts" : [

and add these lines immediately below them:

					{
						"NoteInput.SetGridResolution?RhythmicGridResolutionValue=kDemisemiquaver" : [ "Ctrl+Shift+G, 3" ]
					},
					
					{
						"NoteInput.SetGridResolution?RhythmicGridResolutionValue=kSemiquaver" : [ "Ctrl+Shift+G, 4" ]
					},
					
					{
						"NoteInput.SetGridResolution?RhythmicGridResolutionValue=kQuaver" : [ "Ctrl+Shift+G, 5" ]
					},
					
					{
						"NoteInput.SetGridResolution?RhythmicGridResolutionValue=kCrotchet" : [ "Ctrl+Shift+G, 6" ]
					},
					
					{
						"NoteInput.SetGridResolution?RhythmicGridResolutionValue=kMinim" : [ "Ctrl+Shift+G, 7" ]
					},
					
					{
						"NoteInput.SetGridResolution?RhythmicGridResolutionValue=kSemibreve" : [ "Ctrl+Shift+G, 8" ]
					},

Now you can set the grid resolution directly by typing the key combinations. Of course, you can also add a StreamDeck page that utilizes these shortcuts as well.

2 Likes
5

I have assigned key commands ”shift + number” to set the absolute grid value to that note lenght. But there was no need to hack the json file, I think those key commands already exist in dorico.

1 Like
6

Of course. I just thought it’s easier to copy/edit the JSON file than manually creating all these shortcuts in Preferences.

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7

Thank you for that JSON suggestion. I had already created a few as key command shortcuts. In my instance I really only use 1/16, 1/8 and 1/4, and almost never use the dotted values. Bot others would have different needs.

I take you r point about whether or not the user base as a whole would value that enough to justify a page for that. Certainly I would be happy with a third level page because when I am working on things where I have to switch the grid frequently, I’m unlikely to need most of the other NE features.

I don’t yet know enough about how Stream Deck / NE is packaged, but I’d like to think that NE could provide optional pages that people could choose to hook into their menu structure if it fits their project type and work flow.

1 Like