"Follow text" able to work with a single number in the tempo text

• Oct 16, 2019 - 09:11
Type
Functional
Frequency
Once
Severity
S5 - Suggestion
Status
active
Regression
No
Workaround
Yes
Project

With a single number written in the tempo text (such as "100"), the tempo value be set to "100" instead of staying the same because of "♩ = " missing.

I understand the "♩ = " is vital for a tempo marking, and without it can lead to ambiguity, but if I want to create many invisible tempos in a small time stretch (like a quick accel./rit.) I hope to let the text be as short as possible so that they have less overlap. It can be really useful to just enter a number and make the tempo value change.


Comments

Status won't fix active

Hmm, in MIDI at least (and internammy in MuseScore too) 80 BPM always means 80 quarter notes per minute, so a plain number may just refert to those.
Still, in musical notation this would be very confusing

Maybe, but I really question whether implementig that is worth the effort?
If plain number && invisble -> assume quarter notes
What happens when toggling visibilty then?

In reply to by Jojo-Schmitz

I believe the fix is not hard. I don't have time to look into the code right now but if I'm right, this just requires adding a new interpretation rule.

In my humble opinion, I don't think we should consider this by judging "whether this style of writing is meaningful, or follows the principle of notation". People write this kind of tempo texts down for a reason: to save time and avoid too much overlap. The issue only requests for an automatic process of the number going into the actual value of the tempo. Whether or not the process is implemented, it cannot affect users' choice between a single number and the traditional text.

We have to admit that the majority of users use a single number by meaning "♩ = " that number. The automatic interpretation works perfectly with them. The rest (I've scarcely seen any) can mean "(an other note) = ", and the automatic interpretation means nothing to them. They write down a tempo change, they mean to have the tempo changed! If the generated value doesn't fit, they can edit it; if the value remains the original one, they will have to edit it, as well.

So what? It isn't a win-win, but it lets one win while not harming the other.

In reply to by Jojo-Schmitz

The mention of confusion prompts me to gatecrash this discussion to plug a suggestion of mine #291727: Improve tempo indication in Play Panel to reflect time signature. If implemented this would mean that the beats per minute seen and used in the play panel would match the beat desigination specified in a tempo text rather than being limited to quarter notes per minute. The current situation has a brisk march in 6/8 with dotted quarter = 120 (say) resulting in a frantic seeming sprint of 180 bpm being displayed (or having to be set) in the play panel.

For anyone so inclined it is probably better to continue discussion in the issue thread than here.

Sorry for the intrusion.