Need for scrollbars
The use of the Navigator (a very handy tool) is a bit unwieldly when the score has many pages because it seems that MuseScore needs to create a second complete score to draw the miniature navigator version. I know version 3.0 will improve this, but in the meantime it would be nice to have scrollbars to move rapidly through the score. The use of the hand tool is slow when one needs to go forward many pages, and carries the risk of inadvertently selecting or even moving some element.
Comments
You are aware of the keyboard/mouse/scroll-wheel shortcuts to move about in the score?
In reply to You are aware of the… by Jojo-Schmitz
I'm aware of some of them at least (scroll-wheel and Shift-scroll-wheel), but they are still slow.
In reply to I'm aware of some of them at… by fmiyara
Reaching out to a scroll bar and moving it surely is slower than using those shortcuts.
In reply to Reaching out to a scroll bar… by Jojo-Schmitz
It is slower if in the scrollbar one limits to click on the arrow buttons, but clicking on the free parts of the trough or just dragging the handle is way faster. Indeed, the Navigator does have a scrollbar and it is very handy. The only drawback would be the small useful area reduction, but this is seldom an inconvenience. I guess it wouldn't be much of a burden to include scroll bars as an alternative navigation tool.
In the absence of the Navigator (and its scrollbar) it is very hard to reach a specific page if the score has more than a few pages.
In reply to It is slower if in the… by fmiyara
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In reply to [inline:18012803.png] ? by Shoichi
Home and End are really fast, but one seldom needs to go to the first or last page. Page Up/Down advance or go back one screen at a time. Holding down for a while is relatively fast, but for a 100+ page score it takes several seconds to reach the desired page, while the scroll bar (tested with the Navigator's one) takes less than one second. Much more friendly!
In reply to It is slower if in the… by fmiyara
Cltr+F gets you to a specific page (enter "p9", for example), and as mentioned, home/end etc function normally. So I'm still not really understand the use case in which scroll bars do anything but take valuable space. I guess if your score has like 100 pages and you are trying to reach a point about 2/3 of the way through (so "end" doesn't help) but you don't know the exact page or measure number or rehearsal letter, you can get their with scroll bars faster than the wheel? I could see that on rare occasions like this there might be a second or two to save, but I still have trouble seeing this as something worth giving up screen real estate for when there are so many good alternatives already (and more coming with 3.0 and the "timeline" view).
In reply to Cltr+F gets you to a… by Marc Sabatella
<< I'm still not really understand the use case in which scroll bars do anything but take valuable space >>
I strongly disagree with that. Scroll bars are a very simple and powerful tool to navigate in documents and I find strange the choice of musescore to not have these.
Of course, the need for scroll bars would be lower if keyboard keys were better handled as proposed in https://musescore.org/en/node/108736
In reply to Cltr+F gets you to a… by Marc Sabatella
I don't think the scrollbars imply such a high "screen real estate" toll. As a matter of fact the navigator uses far much space and it does include a built-in scrollbar! Besides, as I suggested, it could be optional, to be enabled or disabled from the View menu, so those of us who like the feature could enable it and those who prefer a bit more working area could disable it.
As a consequence of these comments I've done a search and I see that there have been several posts asking for the scrollbar feature starting as far back as 2009, so I'm not the only one expecting this. My impression is that the whole thing boils down to the fact that the programmers team doesn't like the feature. I'm OK with this and will keep waiting for the new alternatives of 3.0.
In reply to I'm aware of some of them at… by fmiyara
Indeed, scroll wheel should be at least as fast as scroll bars. There really is no particular advantage to scroll bars except maybe familiarity for people like me who grew up before scroll wheels, touch pads, or tablets :-)
In reply to Indeed, scroll wheel should… by Marc Sabatella
As to speed, see my previous answer. Regarding the scroll wheel, when in horizontal scrolling mode you have to press shift to navigate horizontally to distant pages, but also note that clcking on the scroll wheel doesn't enable the fast scrolling mode as in other programs (I don't say this would be very useful, however, since it is difficut to have control of where one ends up).
To really move rapidly through the score, you could also use the find function. Jumps directly to a measure or rehearsal mark.
In reply to To really move rapidly… by jeetee
This is good piece of advice, thank you. It is nice that you just type the number, not need to enter. But sometimes one doesn't know the measure number, it is there when the scrollbar is unsurpassed.
The main argument against scrollbars, it seems, is that they take up space on the screen. I feel I have to point out that this is equally true in every other software that uses scrollbars.
The argument that nobody would use them because of the mouse/trackpad gestures is also equally true in every other software.
The argument that they're not needed because of the Navigator is not true in as many programs, but (a) the Navigator takes ten times as much space as scrollbars would, and (b) in those other programs that do have an analogous thumbnail view (including Sibelius, whose Navigator model MuseScore followed!), they still also have scrollbars.
Sometimes the scrollbars only appear when the mouse cursor goes over to their area or when scrolling through other means, but the scrollbars are available. People do expect them. This is just a case where MuseScore is choosing to be weird.
In reply to The main argument against… by Isaac Weiss
Well said Isaac!
In reply to The main argument against… by Isaac Weiss
FWIW, MuseScore is hardly the other 21st-century application to not use scrollbars for its main view area. True, most 1980's / 1990's app do still include them, but to me copying the user interface of programs that old isn't necessarily an important consideration.
Anyhow, I'm not opposed to them if they are made optional. I just don't get get the big deal when there are so many other ways to navigate already. I can think of 100 user interface improvements that would be more worth the development effort.
In reply to FWIW, MuseScore is hardly… by Marc Sabatella
This has to be a boolean option in Qt already, right?
In reply to This has to be a boolean… by Isaac Weiss
It probably would be if a scoreview were a built-in primitive the way text boxes etc are. As it is, I assume we have to implement this ourselves. It is of course possible I am mistaken.
In reply to FWIW, MuseScore is hardly… by Marc Sabatella
I think scrollbars do not demand so much development effort. They are a readily available feature in every visual development environment. As to the "démodée theory", I don't think it applies when it is about making things easier for an interesting number of people. The modern look and touch of touch-screen interfaces definitely is not the best tool to navigate long documents.
This afternoon I forced myself to navigate through a 160 page score using the scroll wheel, the keyboard and the search tool to see if I could love it a bit more. I must say I was disappointed. Then I engaged the navigator, not for the navigator itself but to take advantage of its scrollbar. It is much faster. Unfortunately I cannot use the navigator with this size of score because the addition of a single slur takes much time to render the miniatures.
I think an optional scroll bar feature would be a fair tradeoff.
One more vote for a scrollbars option! It's a computing standard and browsing through long scores with other means can be alienating for many users.
Shift+mouse-wheel is the closest, but requires two hands instead of one: way less comfortable and flexible.