Linked Staffs in Instruments

• Jul 19, 2013 - 20:33

1. Open attached score (produced in 1.3).
2. 'Instruments...'.
3. Click on one stave of each instrument and 'Add Linked Staff'.
4. 'OK'.
5. 'Instruments…'.

Result: Staves that were clicked to 'Add Linked Staff' are also ticked.

6. Click on the linked stave.
7. 'Remove'.

Result: The stave that was clicked to 'Add Linked Staff' is still ticked.

Using MuseScore 2.0 Nightly Build (74a2fb2) - Mac 10.7.5.

The above maybe a bug of its own, but I think there should be a clearer indication of what a stave is linked to.

Attachment Size
Linked Staffs in Instruments.mscz 2.43 KB

Comments

To clarify: the idea is that we are adding staves to each instrument one at a time. As you do so, a green check mark appears on the add linked staff but not on the source. I assume that's normal - the semantics are that a staff with a check is linked to the staff above. After doing hitting OK then returning to the dialog, check marks now appear next to the source staves as well, making it harder to tell what's actually linked to what. And if you remove one the linked staves you added, the source still shows the check, at least until you reload the score. So the instruments dialog is definitely showing misleading info as far as what's linked to what.

In reply to by [DELETED] 5

Makes sense. The tooltip on the "Link" column heading implies it is supposed to mean, linked to staff above. But this isn't really tenable - after all, you can rearrange the staves within the instrument. So saying it should mean "linked to something" is reasonable, so the behavior upon revisitng the dialog seems correct.

In which case, the issue - albeit a minor one - is that the check doesn't appear in the first place on the original the moment you add a linked staff. Also, the tooltip should be updated.

The fact that the check still appears after removing a linked staff is more bothersome. But not as bothersome as the fact that removing a linked staff destroys the contents of the other staff, of course, and maybe these bugs are all related: #17535: Removing linked staff removes time signature and bar rests & #17536: Removing staff in instrument with linked staff removes time signature and bar rests and moves bar 1 into clef area.

It's also been suggested the UI could make it more apparent *which* staves are linked - eg, instead of a check mark saying "this staff is linked to some other staff", there could be a graphic or number, but I think in practice, this will essentially never be an issue. It will normally be obvious.

Is there a way to do this with other instruments sounds? Like, I have a Casio CTK-710 that can layer strings behind the piano. Is it possible to make a linked Strings staff?

In reply to by Devyn_Horne

Do you mean you wish to actually see two staves with the same music, but have them plat back using two different sounds in MuseScore's internal synthesizer? Or you want to set up MuseScore to playback through your Casio and use the layered sound?

The first is not possible - you can link the staves, but there is no way to make them have different sounds. You can certainly create a normal second staff and copy/paste, though - which is probably a better idea, because normally you wouldn't literally want all notes doubled with strings.

But it should be possible to select your Casio as the MIDI output device in Edit / Preferences / I/O. Or, find a soundfont online somewhere for use within MsueScore that provides such a sound as a preset.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

Well, the preset for layered keys on this casio doesn't offer the option to select which noted are doubled, honestly. That's why I bought the sustain pedal, to basically control the strings to keep them from melting together too much. And I'm not sure many soundfonts do layering for their presets, unfortunately.

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