Dear Daniel,
I spent some time this week-end trying to edit a string ensemble score with specific notations, and I must admit it has not been as easy as my previous works in Dorico.
The things I have been missing most :
- expressions like “arco” (though I could find pizz. I find it quite strange not to have both playing techniques !) [edit] Thanks to dannemoller, I found it !
- indications like “divisi” or “div.”, and the contrary
- espr. or espressivo (I could not find it, but it MUST be there !)
- the fact that some playing techniques are in Common category and others in Strings. That is painful ! I just discovered the “con sord.” and “senza sord.” in the common category, writing this post, and it took me a while to find the sign for harmonics ! I would suggest to allow all the playing techniques useful for an instrument to be included in its category, it does not matter to have those both in common and in specific category.
- brackets for double or triple string strokes (I hope that is the proper name in english — please correct me if I am wrong, I love to learn !)
- white diamond noteheads (for harmonics)
- small noteheads (still for harmonics)
- proper harmonic notation (because I had to trick the software to get the result needed, and the result achieved in the full score did not apply in the parts… I became a specialist in changing columns, stacking voices with different headnotes and durations. And that was hard !)
- a way to make a glissando start later than right after the first note — this could give a rythmic indication of how this glissando should be played. And also a way to change the text of glissando (poco gliss…)
- system dividers
I managed to find workarounds, using dynamics (with suffixes or prefixes) and shift+X (for system dividers or parenthesis for harmonics), but not for small noteheads, but I think this is not how Dorico is supposed to used 
I understand these notations are probably not as high in Dorico’s priorities as chords implementation. Yet I give you the feedback.
Another problem arised : for solo parts, I tried to “mix” the tutti parts with the solo phrases (i.e. insert the tutti parts between the solos). I guess it has a lot in common with “inserting cue notes”, since doing that ruined the full score. Happily enough, I thought this through BEFORE doing it, so I saved my worked and created a new Dorico file (with save as) for the work on the solo parts. I experienced a repeated crashing situation when copying tutti cello bars (12) to the solo voice. I finally managed to get the job done restarting the mac, and then copying a few bars at a time. It surprised me though, for I had the feeling that Dorico was rock stable…
In the end, I did not get the feeling that the workflow had been that focused on music, since I spent more time trying to find workarounds and modify the parts that would not include all the edits in the full score. But I am confident that it will improve with the next updates !
I hope this feedback will help !
