Alphabetizing palettes and perhaps other things in UI

• Apr 12, 2016 - 03:05

I like to think that I've been intimately familiar with using MuseScore for a few years now. But after all this time, there are still a few things I find myself commonly forgetting. Strangely, they're all almost the same thing. What I always have to rediscover are things like "Where among the palettes is Repeats & Jumps?"

The palettes show very strong indications of having once been in alphabetical order—for example, Breaks & Spacers, Bagpipe Embellishments, and Beam Properties are all right next to each other. But right above Breaks & Spacers is Text—and the consecutive Breaths & Pauses and Brackets are separated from the other three "B" palettes by nine others. Meanwhile, below, the palettes end alphabetically with Frames & Measures followed by Fretboard Diagrams.

They've gotten completely jumbled, it seems to me. The current organization occasionally seems to have a logic—Key Signatures being next to Time Signatures—but it's overwhelmingly illogical. Why should Grace Notes be first?

Is there an important reason it's impossible to organize them alphabetically—perhaps no way to reconfigure based on translations?


Comments

Alphabetic could be OK, but personally I'd prefer a functional one. Keep the clef, key & time signatures, and barlines together, but then try to get more logical after that.

Having frames next to breaks & spacers would make me quite happy. So would moving bagpipe embellishments to the very end.

In reply to by Isaac Weiss

Maybe, maybe not.

I would start by separating the remaining palettes into a few categories:

- text-based palettes

- symbols you attach to individual notes (accidentals, grace notesarticulations & ornaments, fingering, tremolo, note heads, etc)

- symbols that attach more logically to measures ot regions (lines, repeats, etc)

- things that don't show up in the score as symbols but affect the formattiong (breaks & spacers, frames, etc)

I've been wanting an alphabetical palette to. I realize I can make my own, and can rearrange individual pallets by right clicking and clicking "Move Pallet Up" but that is too time-consuming. It would be nice to have an option to right click the palette and click "Sort Alphabetically", and maybe a corresponding revert to default order. And maybe even an easy way to reorder by dragging & dropping (and maybe the ability to drag a particular palette outside so it is undocked...maybe even be able to redock the individual palettes somewhere else like the top/right/bottom bar) so I can easily position them where I'd like.

In reply to by Isaac Weiss

Well, I started with a basis for discussion - see if people liked the basic breakdown. But sure, why not. How about this:

Brackets
Clefs
Key Signatures
Time Signatures
Barlines

Lines
Arpeggios & Glissandi

Frames & Measures
Breaks & Spacers

Text
Tempo
Repeats & Jumps
Dynamics
Fingering

Accidentals
Articulations & Ornaments
Beam Properties
Breaths & Pauses
Grace Notes
Tremolo
Note Heads

Fretboard Diagrams
Bagpipe Embellishments

Plenty of room for discussion / debate, but it's a start.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

Keeping in mind that those wouldn't actually be broken into sections, but just be an unbroken list, I don't really see that as any better than the current order. Perhaps worse, because it would be a change from the more familiar to the less without a clear organizing scheme to navigate it.

In reply to by Isaac Weiss

Any change is going to take getting used to, so try not to be too dissuaded by that. If we're afraid to make changes because current users would need to adjsut, there's no point in making any change at all. But I'd instead focus on whether it would seem more or less logical to a *new* user.

The current order has almost no logic to it all, so virtually anything is an improvement. To me there are very clear advantages of my proposed order over the current order, in that palettes likely to be *used* consecutively - or that are *conceptually* related - are *presented* in a way that reflects this, which would make it easier to find what you are looking for (grace notes are related to notes, so they with the other things related to notes). And the more commonly used palettes in each section are closer to the top, so you need to do less top-down scanning to find a specific palette once you find the right general area.

Of course, if we make this change, we *could* introduce actual dividers to make the organization more clear.

As far as I can tell, we probably started out with a logical presentation like this that grew organically over time but without a clear sense of that original design. I'd be happy to see is return to that.

Fwiw, though, even though I personally would never use it, a menu item "sort palettes alphabetically" makes perfect sense to me too. So we might default to the logical ordering, but a user who prefers alphabetic could have it.

In reply to by hasenfuss

It already is possible to change the order is not? Making it easier still would be fine, sure. But we have to provide *some* order by default. There is not wrong with trying to make it more logical, even if it is impossible to get everyone to agree on exactly what the most logical order is. And there is no reason to insult me just because I want to make MuseScore better by improving the default.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

In my view, the palettes organization is highly personal. And any attempt whatsoever will not receive the assent of a majority, probably? In particular, the idea of alphabetizing palettes, leaves me almost indifferent.

In contrast, an image (as in the toolbar) is definitely more meaningful than any other way. So, I would like it to be considered at one time or another this idea: a clef icon for the Clefs palette, another icon for the Time Signature palette, and so on. But I guess that entails a lot of changes, and work, and I have many scruples to propose that!

However, at first, I definitely vote for the ability to add separators to where you want. It is definitely easier to navigate eg, through 5 X 5 palettes instead a confused set of 25 palettes. Said in another manner by Marc in a previous comment: "Of course, if we make this change, we *could* introduce actual dividers to make the organization more clear." Agree 200%! :)
Personally, it would help me a lot.

Giving up on alphabetizing, and without dividers:

BASIC

Clefs
Key Signatures
Time Signatures
Accidentals
Articulations & Ornaments
Grace Notes
Lines
Barlines
Text
Tempo
Dynamics
Repeats & Jumps
Breaks & Spacers
Frames & Measures
Beam Properties

---------------

ADVANCED
Clefs
Key Signatures
Time Signatures
Brackets
Accidentals
Articulations & Ornaments
Breaths & Pauses
Grace Notes
Noteheads
Lines
Barlines
Arpeggios & Glissandi
Tremolo
Text
Tempo
Dynamics
Fingering
Repeats & Jumps
Fretboard Diagrams
Bagpipe Embellishments
Breaks & Spacers
Frames & Measures
Beam Properties

-------------------

Reasonable?

In reply to by Isaac Weiss

Without re-reading the previous discussion and thus running the risk of disagreeing with myself about any of this :-) - I think it looks pretty reasonable, although I'd suggest fretboard diagrams and bagpipe embellishments belong at the very bottom of the list, as the majority of users will never use either.

I would also toss out the idea of keeping together palettes that *modify* things that are generally already present (eg, barlines, noteheads, beam properties) in one group, palettes that almost always add brand new things (eg, dymamics, fingerings) in another group. Palettes that are kind of both (eg, clefs, key signatures, time signatures) might *logically* seem like they belong *between* the other groups, but somehow, they also seem fundamental enough to go on top.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

This does borrow significantly from your own list above, don't worry. ;-)

I have fretboard diagrams and and bagpipe embellishments at the bottom of "things to add to the music"—the following three at very bottom seem to me more like settings, or adjustments (except for the measure). In a way this is similar to what you're saying about modifying vs. adding new things, except we mentally categorize slightly differently.

EDIT: I'm also trying to keep things not far the general height that they are at present, though obviously this is secondary.

In reply to by Isaac Weiss

Yes, I agree that the three at the very bottom of your list are kind of unique. But they also seem important enough to not want to have to scroll past bagpipe embellishments to find. Using your list as a starting point, I'd be more inclined to move them up to the slot right after "Barlines".

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