I wonder if the mouse-selection algorithm can be improved. Right now, I feel that it doesn’t really align with the upper left corner of the mouse pointer.
In the above instances, I clicked on the notehead, but Dorico also selected the slur above it.
I had to click on the right bottom edge of the notehead to have only the note selected:
In fact, rather than click on the notehead itself (which has quite a narrow sweet spot, as seen above), I could click just below the notehead to have it selected.
Although the last behavior might be desirable, so that there are tolerances on clicking, but perhaps the toleration-area is too large. Maybe it can be slightly reduced, to better align with the actual mouse pointer’s tip?
Post editing note:
Originally, I posted all the .gif images at 75%. Now they are at 100% to give a closer idea of how they were on my monitor.
I occasionally find myself grumbling about the response to the pointer too, @mxyzptlk, but figured it was a trade-off for the larger size I’ve told Mac OS to use so I can see the darn thing.
One quirk of the selection arrow in Dorico is that the “hot spot” around the tip is deliberately larger than just that one pixel. (The same is true in Sibelius.) As I like to say about several of these design features, “It’s helpful if you know how it works”!
Overall it does tend to make selecting easier because you don’t have to be on the the exact pixel to get your intended selection. It also allows selecting multiple nearby items with one click, such as 2 noteheads, a note and a slur, etc. Obviously if you don’t know it’s designed this way, it seems to be working badly. But maybe this info will help you acclimate to it.
The way to get more precise with the cursor is to zoom in. There is also the Shift-Alt-click technique, which selects only one of multiple overlapping objects and cycles through them with each click. And of course there are the arrow keys, if you clicked and got more than one object, or something next to the intended target. Also Tab cycles through the items at a given beat position.
Indeed, it’s a quirk.
For me, overall, it impedes my workflow. For example, I don’t think I’ve ever had intention to select one single note and its slur. Besides, it overlaps with marquee-selection (now, for my use case, this one is really a feature).
Yes, zoom in has always been the ultimate “solution.” It just happens that, although my monitor size & resolution is adequate for viewing & everything else, apparently it’s still not enough to accommodate Dorico’s mouse-selection style. I’m gonna need bigger monitor/resolution to avoid pressing Z & X all the time.
I even had a thought of binding regular mouse click with Shift-Alt. Of course, then it will create its own different problems.
Also, those others methods either requires the assistance from my non-mouse hand, or letting go the mouse (or not using it completely).
I’m hoping that the mouse itself can do more kind of selections with more precision.
Thank you for your response & ideas. I’ve been put up with this quirk since 3.5, and dream that 6 will have my “improvement” (or at least a tip-size option, such as in image-editing software).
There’s definitely a trade-off here, especially when zoomed-out that far. If it required an extreme level of precision to select the correct thing, you might actually accidentally select incorrect things if you are literally just a few pixels off; or if you desire to select a few elements at once, it would make it far more tedious if the slight pixel off made all the difference between selection and not.
I do agree in some way that it could be a little more precise, but I have a strong feeling that if it were extremely precise and literal we’d have tons of users complaining “I swear I clicked on the note and nothing happened!” and you would also sacrifice what Mark mentions above–the easier ability to select multiple items while moving quickly, which you’ll appreciate doesn’t require extreme precision and a steady hand at all times.
Usually zooming in a little solves most of these issues anyway.
The one that will drive me bonkers is in a dense score, trying to select a dynamic or hairpin which is overlapped with slurs and ledger lines. Yikes! Thank goodness for filters.
This is indeed the workaround until something changes.
I’d rather have a sure “at least 2 steps” procedure than “1 click/step but leave it to chance” (also, zoom in-select-zoom out will involve even more steps).
Thank you!
I find it quite peculiar though, that in order to do these kind of selections I need to click a smaller/thinner thing (the stem) instead of the obviously bigger notehead.
I love how Dorico selects multiple notes within a group of notes e.g. 4 quavers when I click on the beam, and it selects a single note/all notes of a chord if I hit the stem.
However, I hate trying to click on the notehead, and it selects everything except what’s desired even when I have a decent zoom, let’s say 100% on a solo instrument score. I share the exact same sentiment as mxyzptlk (your name seems like a wifi password ).
Sibelius is still superior to Dorico’s mouse selection on elements overall, hands down. A normal mouse click should be the current behavior of shift+alt + click, and vice versa.
It’s just one of the two things I struggle with Dorico.
I believe I wasn’t “zoomed-out too far.”
My video examples above were zoomed-in a little, but in reality, I still can see all the white spaces between notes and their slurs.
I’m sure nobody wants a one pixel precision (I know @Mark_Johnson wasn’t writing literally, and how could I select a stem if there’s no tolerance-area around the clicking spot?), but I think the trade-off can be managed better.
I won’t pretend to know how to code, but I’m pretty sure they don’t hard-code all those coordinates, it has to be relative to screen resolution etc. Or maybe even employs those trending “AI” paradigm, e.g.: if a user clicks on “something,” then select that “something,” otherwise try to scan the surrounding area to find “the nearest anything” to select. The latter happened in my 4th example, and I had no problem (maybe even happy about it). However, I find that the former didn’t work well in my usual working condition.
About ability to select multiple items, I prefer/propose to strictly use marquee-selection or Ctrl or Shift, rather than the current ability to be able to select multiple items with just 1 left click (with caveat, in light of @Sergei_Mozart’s post), especially when someone clicks directly on a notehead, and definitely not when those things are separated by white space.
In any case, just as Dorico provides an option to set a maximum overscroll amount, perhaps there can be an option for tolerated clicking area as well.
I heartily agree that this will need a generous amount of zoom-in and Shift-Alt.
I read your post while I’m typing, and I amended my reply above.
For a moment, I forgot about clicking beams. Of course this is a very useful feature. Thanks for reminding me.
Yes, with all the software I use that use mouse for selection, Dorico is the only one giving me challenges (imagine if an image-editing software has this behavior…). I also use Finale & Sibelius (though significantly not as much now), and I’m certain I don’t have these difficulties in selecting something.
Exactly. Right now, our “decent” might be enough for us to see & edit, but not decent enough to select things with precision (more zoom, please, says Dorico, I couldn’t tell whether you only want a notehead selected or also want its slur).
Btw, my username is an enemy of Superman, I find it amusing that it’s all consonants
Sure, perhaps not, but I can say from my own experience that zoom level would give me issues, and if it were me I know I would benefit from zooming in slightly. Then again I’m usually zoomed in a lot more than that in general.
My larger point wasn’t about pixel precision but just that the imprecision adds a forgiveness that I think some users find useful, whether by accident (unsteady hand, imperfect eyesight, or whatever), or working quickly without attention to detail, or simply acclimation to it. So there could be downsides to making it more precise, for other users. I’m sure there is a way, however, of striking a better balance. Sometimes I find the outside area to be too general as well.
Just thinking about this, I have no trouble with precision mouse selections at all. I have one of the expensive super high resolution gaming type mice from Logitech. I wonder if having this sort of mouse works to advantage here. I don’t really know!
@mxyzptlk I agree with you completely. I only have trouble selecting basic items like noteheads in Dorico. It’s never been an issue in Finale, even at small Zoom settings.
Here is a previous post that might interest you about the selection zone around staves:
Here is a situation that I constantly find perilous even at 300% zoom. I try to select the bottom note with the cursor (I use the smallest Mac cursor size for accuracy):
It seems to depend on exactly where on the notehead the tip of the cursor falls. A little too close to the stem or the edge of the notehead or the flag and I get the whole chord. Even in the exact middle of the note head it can seem random. One time I get the notehead , the next time the whole chord. Yes, one can zoom in. Yes, one can move up and down the chord with the up and down arrows. But…
Don’t waste time on it. Just select the chord and down arrow to the note you want.
(I doubt the team are going to change things in this area in the near term)
Genuinely curious, do you always able to have only one single note selected by clicking on its notehead, while in a “normal” zoom level, as in: not overly zoom-in (i.e.: a staccato dot still can be seen clearly, but doesn’t look like a bullet point)? Or maybe you’ve never clicked on a notehead, hence this has never been a bother?
I myself will try getting used to not doing it either, as per one wiser user’s suggestion above.
Could it be that the mouse hardware really make all the difference?
).
