New text style

• Dec 7, 2020 - 10:53

Hi, I'm wanting to create a text style of my own that I can use (in all my scores), to place above the stave. I've gone to the Format - Style - Text Styles Menu and double-clicked the User-1 text style, changed it's name to "Key" and come back out. When I do an Add - Text I expect to see "Key" as one of the choices, but it ain't there? Have I missed something?


Comments

In reply to by Ali Wood

That's a good way of describing it, and in fact "text class" is quite accurate from the perspective of the code itself! But just to clarify the terminology as used in the application, these things are "element types". So, "staff text" is a type of element, that indeed uses the "staff text" text style as its default, but can easily be changed to a different text style. Th word "element" appears in enough places in the UI that you might want to be aware that this is what you are really talking about.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

I think I am still frustrated by this. Is there any way I can create for example a "HugeCourier" style (with a unique font style, size etc) which appears as a window in the palette which I can use to add text to the score with that HugeCourier style? If not it means borrowing one of the standard text styles like staff text having changed it's style (which is easily forgotten).
So whenever I want this Huge Courier I pick Huge Courier, and don't have to think "Hmmm... Was it staff, or stave, or expression or whatever text that I allocated this style to?"
And it also appears on the drop down menu for Add Text, as "Huge Courier"
I looked at User-1 User-2 styles but I cannot see how to incorporate these.

In reply to by Ali Wood

I think you are misunderstanding. If you create a text style called "HugeCourier", you don't have to "remember" what text you allocated the style to - the whole point is you can apply it to any text you want. So, select a lyric, mark it HugeCourier, done. Or, select a staff text, mark it HugeCourier, Or a tempo text, or a dynamic - you can apply your text style to whatever kind of text you want. You don't have to "remember" anything. To use this, simply go to Format / Style / Text Styles and redefine User1 to have the name HugeCourier and whatever properties you want.

Now, if you know it's only going to be staff texts you want to set up this way, then you don't even need a style. Simply customize one staff text that way and then add it to your palette normally. Now any time you want to add text with that style, just add it from the palette. Again, you don't need to remember that it was staff text - just add it, MuseScore knows what it is.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

OK, so here's the rub;
I've created myself a HugeCourier text style:
Method: Format -- Style -- Text Styles -- Edit Text Style -- change the font to 20 and rename from User-2 to HugeCourier.
But now, when I use the Add Text button, there is no sign of my HugeCourier text style. Could you please explain where I'm going wrong. Thanks
(I think Jojo explained the only way was to use the inspector but it seems intuitive that there should be an easier way!)

In reply to by Ali Wood

Right, as I said, you've creqated a text style you can apply to any type of text. So, add staff text, then apply HugeCourier. or add lyric, then apply HugeCourier. The whole point of using a text style for this purpose is to allow that sort of flexibility - the ability to apply that style to an existing element of whatever type you want. The Inspector is easy to use, certainly fewer clicks than using the menus, but again, this is the right tool only if you are looking for that sort of flexibility, which it sounds like you arne't.

If you're not looking for the ability to apply a text style to lots of different kinds of elements, but instead you just want to add a next piece of text, then a text style is the wrong tool. If you just want to easily add a staff text but have it appear in courier 20 pt, then don't mess with text styles at all - wrong tool for the job. Simply add a staff text to your score, make it courier 20 pt, then Ctrl+Shift+drag it to your palette for easy reuse. now you can add it from the palette at a single click as often as you want - and not just in this score (text styles are specific to a score) but in any score.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

You are being very patient.
I've got there, but not quite the way you've described. After creating my user defined HugeCourier style, I added Staff Text to the score, typed in "ABC" and using the inspector, changed the style to HugeCourier. it correctly switched to the HugeCourier font etc.
Knowing that I didn't want to have to do this every time I needed to employ HugeCourier, I used Ctrl+Shift+drag to install it in the palette like you said.
Unfortunately the palette box label showed "ABC", not "HugeCourier".
So I went into properties for that palette and changed the Name to HugeCourier. This had no effect.
So I deleted everything I'd done, and repeated the exercise, only this time typed "Huge Courier" into the text (on the score), dragged this to the palette and Eureka, the palette box showed "Huge Courier".
Strange - but at least I now have a palette box which I can quickly spot, use and double click to add to the score, exactly what I need.
I hope this illustrates what I wanted. Similar to your second paragraph, but the crucial thing was being able to see the "HugeCourier" palette label. for instant recognition.

In reply to by Ali Wood

If you want the text in the palette to say HugeCourier, you do indeed edit it to say that in your score before adding it to that palette. After that it is too late. And the name in the palette properties is just for search and for the tooltip, it doesn't change the appearance. After all, most things in the palette aren't even text - you can't change treble clef into a bass clef just by giving it a new name.

But note, doing it the way you did will only work in this score, because as I said, styles are per-score. If you want it to work in all scores, you have to it as I said and don't use a text style, instead applying the properties to the text directly before adding it to the palette.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

"After all, most things in the palette aren't even text " -----
.... but we are talking about the text palette, yes? (attached, with a "Verse description" added in this fashion)

Other files do in fact now show this extra pigeon hole in the text palette, so I don't understand you when you say it is only for the piece you are working on?

Attachment Size
Capture.JPG 19.22 KB

In reply to by Ali Wood

I mean the reason the palette properties dialog doesn't change the contents of the palette itself is that it was just never designed to, but it would not make sense for most of the palette.

As for the palette not working in other scores, what I mean is, use the palette cell will appear, and it will say HugeCourier. But if the text actually contained in that palette is using, for example, the text style "User-1", then when you try to add that to a score, it will be added using *whatever that score has set for User-1". This is essential to how text styles work. It wouldn't be much use to be able to customize a text style - the Tempo Text style for example - if then every time you added a tempo text from the palette, it ignored your text style. it's crucial that the text style in the score override what's in the palette.

So if you want a palette item to always apply the same formatting regardless of the text style defined in the score, you need to make sure the palette itsem does not depend on the text style, by applying the formatting directly to the text item and not as a style.

So, one again, add a staff text to your score, set it to courier 20 pt using the Inspector but without changing the text style, then drag the text to the palette. It works flawlessly in far less time than it takes to read this comment :-).

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

I did what you said , adding System Text, and then setting the text using the inspector to Freestyle font size 10. I deliberately typed "Verse Text" in that text, dragged it over to the palette. So now I have a palette with a box saying "Verse Text" and am able to add this as many times as I like , quickly and easily, to several places in the score. Pleased about that.
I go into a totally different score, I see the palette has a "Verse Text" box. Good, but when I add this to a point in the new score it takes on the characteristics of the System Text style in that score, not the Verse Text characteristics. Maybe that's what you were saying. But I have to change this using the inspector in each new score that I visit (I think), which isn't really what I wanted :( I wanted a 'universal "Verse Text" that was the same for every score.

In reply to by Ali Wood

That would happen only if you also set a style for that. That is why I keep saying, don't do that. Only set the properties, do not set as style. because If MuseScore sees that the properties of what you are adding to the palette are at the style default, it doesn't record that setting at all. Only settings that are different from the style default will be recorded in the palette. Then when you switch scores, using that palette element will use the defaults for that score which might be different - but then apply the override it previously recorded.

So again, don't change the style in any way at all. Add a system text, make sure it is at the default style. Then change only the properties you want to change, and do not hit "set as style". Copy that to palette.

If you want it completely the same for every score even though those scores might have different defaults, you'll have to customize each and every setting you want consistent. If you only customize size, only size will be customized, etc.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

I think we're at cross purposes here. I have done exactly as you say in your second paragraph. I have NOT hit "Set as Style".
In Test Text 1, I have inspected it, changed it, copied it to the palette, and saved the score.
On Test Text 2, I see it on the palette, but when I select it and double-click onto a note, I see it has reverted to the old system text, and I have to customise it again. That's what I was hoping I wouldn't have to do. I was hoping it would remember my altered characteristics.

Attachment Size
Test text 1.mscz 6.52 KB
Test text 2.mscz 6.52 KB

In reply to by Ali Wood

It should. Try right-clicking the palette, choosing Save Palette, then uploading that file. Something must be not right about what you are doing because it works fine for me, but we'd need to see the actual palette to say.

That or maybe try a screen capture video, this is one of the rare times that could be the more helpful tool.

In reply to by Ali Wood

Neither of those palettes contains any element that was manually set to Courier. I see a "Verse Title" and an "Expression" in there for both. Verse Title has no custom properties at all; it was created using your style defaults. Epxression was set explicitly to 12 pt, that was the only custom property you set on that.

Anyhow, again, it's imperative you do not define Courtier as part of the text style n the score if you want to use that score to create a Courier element in the palette.

Feel free to attach the score from which you added these elements, and a screen capture video showing you adding the element, customizing the property, and then adding it to the palette. Then we can see more where things are going wrong. But it really truly should be that simple. I just went and did that (I didn't have Courier so I used FreeSans, 20 pt). The result is attached. It contains a second Verse Title that was created correctly as I have described, and it works.

Attachment Size
Text3.mpal 1.2 KB

In reply to by Ali Wood

Glad to hear it! I've made that mistake before trying to create an "annotation" (red text with yellow background) element for my palette, so I know it's easy to get it wrong if yiou've first experimented with using a style for it. So I was pretty confident that was the issue and that you'd sort it out in the end :-)

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

After all the discussion we had over a problem involving a style, an element, a text and a palette, I am sure that the handbook could give a better overview<-i> (I wish I could find the shortcut to italicize a word!) of how these concepts fit together. Other software such as Microsoft Word seems to do it effortlessly; it is to me still a bit of a jigsaw puzzle in MS. The handbook explains well how to do low level tasks (even if dummies like me take ages to get it right!) but perhaps a diagram showing how these definitions and actions relate to each other would help us all.
It is NOT intuitive (as my struggle showed!) and I sense deep down that it could be designed to be more so for the user.

In reply to by Ali Wood

Could be, and since it's open source, feel free to make any changes you feel would help. But I would note, everyone wants to do different things. The specific thing you are trying to do is something 99% of people would never need, so there wasn't specific step by step instructions on that to be sure. If we tried to put in specific step by step instructions to accomplish any tasks anyone ever wanted, the Handbook would be far too long to read. So it's important to strike a balance.

Do you still have an unanswered question? Please log in first to post your question.