Adjust system-crossing melisma's vertical position
Manual vertical positioning of any element may be necessary to avoid collisions, and this is especially true for lyrics. Melismas are attached to their preceding lyrics and, as a result, also gets their vertical offsets. This makes sense within a system, but if the melisma crosses to the next system, a user may want this melisma in a different position relative to the staff, not just to save space, but to align with the lyrics in the new system.
The use-case for this is best shown with an example.
There is currently no way to get the score with System 1 of the second page and Systems 2-5 of the first.
Comments
So, I agree that ultimately manual positioning of the continuation lines would be useful. However, I suspect that given this would require a more complete implementation of the lyrics line class, and changes to the file format, it may not happen for 2.0. But if we can solve this case automaitcally without too much fuss, that might be even better, at least as a first step for now. schepers suggested an interesting automatic solution - based the Y position of the continuation segment not on that of the parent lyric, but instead, on the Y position of the *next* lyric (assuming there is one).
This would be extremely simple to implement, and would handle this use case well I think. Plus the results are in line with what I would see as the next phase of automation in lyric layout - determining the proper distance below staff for lyrics automatically on a system by system basis (with some sort of style option to set minimum margin below lowest *note*, as opposed to the current setting for margin below the *staff*).
The only problem I can see with my "solution" is a cart-before-horse scenario. The lyric y-offset will have to be established first, then the melisma's drawn using that offset. I doubt it works that way now.
Actually, I think we luck out, in that melismas for the whole score are currently laid long after the lyric syllables themselves.
EDIT: I just tried it out, and it seems quite easy to do this. So the only question to me is if we can all agree it is a good thing to do. Given that we don't have independent editing of the segments, the question is: do we base the height of the continuation line on that of the lyric it is actually attached to (which is on the previous system) or on that of the *next* lyric (assuming it is on the same staff). I readily agree the latter makes more sense from a user perspective. But there is somewhat "hacky" aspect to it that makes me slightly uncomfortable. I'd live with it, as I do think the results are better. What do others think?
It also occurs to me regaridng the original request - there *is* a workaround. Use the old "Shift+Space" to enter an invisible lyric on the first note of the second system, then you have something you can adjust vertically. And if/when https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/pull/1636 goes through, it might even be possible to have it work for cases where there is only one note on the continuation.
Matching the second-system melisma line with the next syllable on that system sounds logical to me. The concept doesn't seem "hacky" to me.
The only time you might not want this behavior is if you are going from two verses at the end of a system with a melisma over the system break with a single chorus line on the next note (see image attached). A rare occurrence but maybe something to keep in mind.
Good point, for this I think the "shift+space" workaround would be the way to go.
This change will be easy to make but since it overlaps with the code in my current PR https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/pull/1638, I think I will wiat until that is merged.