Measure and Note Selection Change and Latency

• Feb 2, 2020 - 04:30

Hey all,

I have noticed in this recent update (3.4) that a new feature that is causing many problems in writing and editing scores in context to the selection tool. In particular there seems to be a strange new selection method with measures.

Apparently, the selection tool has been updated from:
1. Measure is selected
2. Note is clicked (automatically selected) and is dragged
3. ONLY the note is dragged and re-pitched
to
1. Measure is selected
2. Note is clicked (but measure stays selected) and dragged
3. The whole measure is dragged and re-pitched

(Note:I have also noticed Musescore has the tendency to drag notes positions instead of re-pitching them more often)

To select a note, not the note must be clicked; however, there comes problems with this.
1. The note now must be double-clicked before it can be changed.
2. There is a very inconvenient latency between clicking a note and the note being selected (not due to lag)
3. The note is not always selected after clicking on it

I know this is a new problem (or maybe a new feature gone wrong) as I have downloaded a previous version of MuseScore (3.3) and the problem was not present. Additionally, I have tried themes recent nightly build, and this problem still arises. If this is a feature, what is it titled in the release notes? Additionally, is there a way to disable it? If not, I believe this bug should be further investigated.

I appreciate any help with this issue.


Comments

It's not clear what you are trying to accomplish by dragging notes. This isn't something most people would ever do. but in the rare cases where it comes up, there are two possible desired outcomes, as you note: either the note's offset is changed relative to other notes on the same beat, or the "leading space" setting is changed so all notes on the same beat are affected. No matter which we do by default, it seems someone prefers the other way, which is why it's actually changed several times over the past few releases. But in any case, dragging is never the preferred way to accomplish either (uncommon) task - better to use the Inspector. Much more precise.

But currently, you can get either behavior on drag also if you don't mind the inherent imprecision in that method. Drag directly to get the leading space adjustment, or drag after double-click to get the offset adjustment.

BTW, at no time do you need to select the measure, and indeed I can't see any good coming from it. It's either click & drag or double-click and drag.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

I think you misunderstood me. The accomplishment is not to drag notes, it is to repitch them. While editing a score it is quite common (for most people from my institution and community) drag the note with their mouse vertically to repitch them as it is often faster to do so than to click and enter a note with their midi controller or keyboard. This problem only arises after selecting measure (for example to add crescendos, dynamics, articulations, or any other reason), and after trying to select an individual note.

In reply to by Skunk Master Funk

Dragging notes up and down I would think would be even less common than dragging them vertically. Changing pitch using the arrow keys is more precise, but really, I don’t understand how clicking randomly then dragging could ever be faster than just entering the right note to begin with. So it seems somehow I am still missing. Might help if you attached a score and explained more about your unique workflow.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

This is mainly for editing. After entering in pitches many composers wish to change notes and harmonies as their piece evolves. My personal workflow is as follows:

  1. Concept of piece written on paper
  2. General melodies and chord progressions written on staff paper
  3. Concepts of transitions written on staff paper
  4. Entering of core melodies, chord progressions, and transitions into musescore
  5. Addition of harmonies and filling of orchestration (Where many changes to notes, melodies, and counter melodies may happen and experimentation of harmonies is done)
  6. Addition of articulations, dynamics, musical margins, etc. (much selection of measures which with new selection features of musescore can conflict with selection of notes and repitching).
  7. Final editing of the piece

Maybe others outside my institution do not have similar problems. Later I might create a short screen recording to better illustrate my problems; however, I find it unlikely that my institution and community are rarities of using this type of process.

In reply to by Skunk Master Funk

Changing pitch as a piece evolves I get, but I'm not understanding why you'd resort to dragging when there are faster and more precise methods. In all the years I've been using MuseScore and participating in these forums, I don't think I've heard more than a handful of other people ever mention doing this. Anyhow, it's true the dragging semantics changed, to better suit other use cases where you do in fact want to change multiple elements at once. Much faster than having to do so one at a time. but if you do wish to just do one at a time, and do wish to use dragging, just hit Esc first, or otherwise clear the selection.

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