There is no disambiguation for solo and section strings in the score order editor. They are treated as the same ID (FYI- divisi sections here are mine, not default):
As you can see, there is only one “violin”, one “viola” etc.
So “violin” can mean either solo or section to the score sort algorithm.
So the result is that you cannot distinguish where a solo violin goes in relation to it’s section, as you see here from adding strings using the “Orchestral” score order in Dorico:
So you get lucky if you just want one solo violin, as solos are usually above the section. Just consult any violin concerto. But it leaves you no possibility for arranging solo strings, which defeats the purpose of a custom score order sorting feature.
Furthermore, it’s default behaviour does not display consistent logic, as here it places all solo violas below the viola section:
Forgive me if this is information that you already know, but it’s possible that Dorico isn’t behaving the way you’d like because Dorico has other features for achieving the result you seem to be after:
if you want very specific player orders with solo players carefully positioned, it might be better to create project templates with that all set up?
to designate players as soloists, there’s a feature for that - it automatically names them “Soloist” and moves them to the traditional soloist position in the score order
for divisi, Dorico has a feature for that: it’s not a type of player, but it gives you a lot of flexibility within a work to split your violins (for eg) onto 2 staves, or 3 where the top is solo, etc
If this isn’t helpful for you, could you perhaps say a bit more about your workflow (ie what’s your end goal for setting up these specific score orders)?
Further to what Lillie has said, to make it explicit: there’s no way to specify that a specific instrument definition represents either a single instrument or a section. It is the type of player to which the instrument is assigned that determines that.
