9 ms·

MuseScore 3.6

236 points by app4soft 6y ago

lagolinguini 6y ago
I really enjoy Tantacrul's videos on UX. I hope that he finds time to do some videos on Gnome or KDE someday.
- app4soft 6y ago
  Yeah, yesterday I played with MuseScore 3.6 a little bit — a lot of fun![0] As for me, MuseScore now took 2nd place (just after Blender, which keep 1st place) on my Top FLOSS software projects lists. P.S. The only issue, as for me, that MuseScore 4[1] (WIP) UI would be switched to QML (JavaScript). I tried its latest nightly builds — it looks like common Electron apps & for me its UI/UX looks horrible. Guess, I would stuck to MuseScore 3.x forever. [0] https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1350904572450123778 https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1350904572450123778 [video] [1] https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4 https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4
  - ArchieMaclean 6y ago
    [1] should be https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4 https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4
    - app4soft 6y ago
      Fixed already, thanks.
  - Kelteseth 6y ago
    The new version looks spotless and clean to me. Disclaimer: I'm a QML programmer and would do the same :)
    - app4soft 6y ago
      Ups, thanks for correction. Just fixed it in my comment as well. P.S. JFTR, Why You changed the order of links in your comment?
      - Kelteseth 6y ago
        My bad. Removed the links from my comment :)
  - ArchieMaclean 6y ago
    I'm a bit worried about performance with QML since already the UI is a bit slow (not much, but noticeable) and switching to JavaScript might negatively impact that. We'll see.
    - app4soft 6y ago
      That is what I'm worried about too.
    - floatboth 6y ago
      QML is generally faster, especially on high resolution screens, as it's rendered with the GPU.
      - app4soft 6y ago
        Of course, for latest PC with powerful GPU, 16+ cores CPU & 16GB+ of RAM performance may be increased... But, as I has an 10 y/o laptop with integrated, any heavy JavaScript GUI apps (based on QML/Electron) just slowed down performance instead of increasing, in comparison to Qt-based or native GUI apps.
        detaro 6y ago
        QML is commonly used on <1 GHz embedded devices. Equating QML to bad Electron examples doesn't make sense. (Although Electron/Chromium also have a large range depending on how they are used, in my experience they have a way harder time scaling down to smaller devices)
        app4soft 6y ago
        > QML is commonly used on <1 GHz embedded devices. Yes, I know as an owner of Symbian 9.x device ;) But, here I literally means that actual QML coding style stuck to requirement of modern GPU with OpenGL 2.x (GL ES 2.x) even OpenGL 3/4 support. My laptop has integrated GPU mostly limited to OpenGL 1.x, so all those CSS/QSS animations, which depends on higher OpenGL features, just blows my CPU/GPU into flame.
  - pwgentleman 6y ago
    I was quite skeptical when you said "2nd place, after Blender". That was 20 minutes before. I just finished writing down a full score, including lyrics, without ever using this before. This is amazing software, both in looks and usability. I'm just sad I didn't discover this earlier.
    - app4soft 6y ago
      > That was 20 minutes before. :) JFTR, My actual Top5 list of FLOSS apps is: 1. MuseScore 2. Blender 3. SolveSpace 4. AzPainter 5. OpenOrienteering Mapper
      - ognarb 6y ago
        I think you forgot to add Krita.
        app4soft 6y ago
        > I think you forgot to add Krita. No, I'm NOT forgot to add it ;P I just use AzPainter[0,1] for painting, due to it is much faster & much more compact in comparison to Krita, even to GIMP. And that is why AzPainter is on my Top list ;) [0] https://git.io/azpainter https://git.io/azpainter [1] https://github.com/Symbian9/azpainter https://github.com/Symbian9/azpainter
      - haberman 6y ago
        Wow, what makes you prefer SolveSpace to FreeCAD or programmatic cad like CadQuery? What do you use it for?
        app4soft 6y ago
        > what makes you prefer SolveSpace to FreeCAD or programmatic cad like CadQuery? I prefer GUI apps over CLI/scripting. SolveSpace is my main 2D/3D CAD since SolveSpace 2.0 became[0] FLOSS. (previously used KOMPAS-3D, but it is proprietary) Now I'm QA (tester) & i18n (localization) contributor to the SolveSpace development for 6 years now, so you may ask me anything about it. Itself I'm a teacher of design and technology, with a bachelor degree in technical drawing & CGI + master degree in PM, so really like to take part in FLOSS development as UI/UX QA & PM, see my profile on GitHub[1] In last 20 years for curious reasons also I use OpenSCAD QCAD/LibreCAD, FreeCAD and a lot of other FLOSS CAx & GIS apps from-time-to-time (mostly for testing & bug reporting). > What do you use it for? For all CAD-related works (see my #DailySolveSpace[1] resources): solid 3D modeling & producing 2D drawings, simple CAE analyzing, etc. JFTR, I'm moderator of /r/SolveSpace sub on Reddit too. [0] https://librearts.org/2013/08/solvespace-released-under-gpl/ https://librearts.org/2013/08/solvespace-released-under-gpl/ [1] https://github.com/Symbian9 https://github.com/Symbian9 [2] https://git.io/DailySolveSpace https://git.io/DailySolveSpace
  - detaro 6y ago
    Describing QML as "Javascript" is not necessarily all that useful. Yes, you can use JS in QML, but that doesn't mean it's actually done by the app in meaningful amounts, or has a meaningful performance impact. And the Musescore devs, from what I've seen, know what they are doing.
tomcam 6y ago
Tantacrul is a treasure. He’s the Fabrice Bellard of music composition software.
- app4soft 6y ago
  > He’s the Fabrice Bellard of music composition software. Also, he's like George W. Williams of font editing software ;)
reffaelwallen 6y ago
They need to fix their iOS app also
- app4soft 6y ago
  Please, report any issues to MuseScore devs via GitHub.[0] [0] https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/issues https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/issues
  - quadrangle 6y ago
    That's not the iOS or Android app. Confusingly, they (who's they, not 100% clear) publish proprietary read-only apps for mobile which are not the same as the main Musescore. Also, the playback at Musescore.com uses some proprietary web tools (built on FLO ones in part I think) which are themselves separate from Musescore the main software.
    - app4soft 6y ago
      > Confusingly, they (who's they, not 100% clear) publish proprietary read-only apps for mobile which are not the same as the main Musescore. If so, report details about those iOS/Android apps to MuseScore devs team on Twitter[0,1] [0] https://twitter.com/Tantacrul https://twitter.com/Tantacrul [1] https://twitter.com/musescore https://twitter.com/musescore
meibo 6y ago
They've been doing some stellar work, good job. I hope that they are considering to build a sheet music hosting platform as an open alternative to the now "rogue" MuseScore. Sorely missed.
- PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
  Can you explain what you mean by "the now "rogue" MuseScore" ?
  - meibo 6y ago
    MuseScore.com, the sheet hosting site tied to the app, has been acquired by a bigger, paid sheet hosting site in 2018[1] and has recently changed its subscription model, monetizing the massive amount of community created content by not allowing free downloads anymore. I'm not in any position to judge them for wanting to make more money but it sure feels like a way to kill off your userbase. [1] https://www.scoringnotes.com/news/ultimate-guitar-acquires-musescore/ https://www.scoringnotes.com/news/ultimate-guitar-acquires-m...
    - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
      AFAIK, that purchase is also what is paying for the core developer group of musescore.org to work on the software. So I'm not sure there's much of a distinction at this point.
    - mkr-hn 6y ago
      This post suggests the company owns the software too: https://blog.musescore.com/post/171048786232/ultimate-guitar-welcomes-musescore https://blog.musescore.com/post/171048786232/ultimate-guitar... >> "We are also building up the MuseScore development team to help the developer community improve MuseScore’s desktop and mobile products quicker. The improvements we work on will continue to be based on the community’s feedback. For example, among other things, there have been numerous requests to improve the functionality of the mobile apps and the quality of the soundfont’s audio. As a result, we have already established a dedicated mobile development team and hired a soundfont specialist to focus on improving these areas. And in case you’re wondering, yes, of course the notation editor will continue to be open source and free." And this appears to grant the company rights to any code people contribute in case they decide to close the source going forward: https://musescore.org/en/cla https://musescore.org/en/cla
adamnemecek 6y ago
I've been working on an IDE for music composition. I'll be launching soon http://ngrid.io http://ngrid.io I setup a discord channel for the project https://discord.gg/a5ttYuG https://discord.gg/a5ttYuG
- app4soft 6y ago
  > I'll be launching soon It would be better if You would just create separate "Show HN" thread to highlight you project, see[0] [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - adamnemecek 6y ago
    Where does it say that?
jameshart 6y ago
Tantacrul’s video about the creation of the new engraving font (https://youtu.be/XGo4PJd1lng https://youtu.be/XGo4PJd1lng) is also an important story about the MS-DOS Score program, software obsolescence and stewardship, and the loss of value that can happen when an industry relies on proprietary software. Without polemics or politics, this ends up presenting one of the strongest moral arguments for open source licensing.
- Ericson2314 6y ago
  It also shows how the oldest proprietary software helped experts, vs today's race to the bottom / ease of learning vs actual use mindset. I guess only free software can buck the commercial mandate enough to do that now.
  - app4soft 6y ago
    > I guess only free software can buck the commercial mandate enough to do that now. [spoiler] Here is fresh story to learn: OCAD (commercial app) VS OpenOrienteering Mapper (FLOSS alternative to OCAD).[0,1] TL;DR: If you are trying to create fully free alternative to proprietary software, be ready to the situation where original proprietary software devs would decide to clone[2] unique/original features[3] from your FLOSS app. [0] https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1347209330089717760 https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1347209330089717760 [1] https://twitter.com/zerbembasqwibo/status/1349467329009225734 https://twitter.com/zerbembasqwibo/status/134946732900922573... [2] https://www.ocad.com/wiki/ocad/en/index.php?title=Sketch&action=history https://www.ocad.com/wiki/ocad/en/index.php?title=Sketch&act... [3] https://www.openorienteering.org/news/2012/colors-and-sketching https://www.openorienteering.org/news/2012/colors-and-sketch...
    - danShumway 6y ago
      Is this a problem? First, it is good that software feature ideas aren't copyrightable. Arguably many of them shouldn't even be patentable. That means that yes, proprietary apps can look at your software and say, "that's cool, we should do that too." But it also means that people can write Open Source software that takes lessons from proprietary apps. We want software devs working on productivity tools and practical software to copy each other, we don't want everyone to reinvent the wheel all the time. I mean, heck, can you imagine if Finale came out with a new feature and that was just it, no other competitors or Open Source apps like MuseScore were allowed to offer that feature? Can you imagine trying to build a piece of software like Blender in that world, where Autodesk had a monopoly on "things that a 3D editor can do?" Second, 9 years to clone a feature in the world of software is a really long time. If you can launch a piece of software and you have 9 years before other people start building similar things... I mean, what else do you even want at that point? If it takes 9 years for a dev to capitalize on a unique feature in their app, I don't think it's the eventual imitators that are the problem.
enriquto 6y ago
Being a deeply entrenched user of lilypond, I would love if MS could read/write lilypond scores natively.
- jcelerier 6y ago
  is that problem even solvable ? lilypond's language is turing-complete, no ?
  - enriquto 6y ago
    Hey, dreaming is free! At the very least it could output lilypond files that you could tweak by hand.
  - zozbot234 6y ago
    lilypond does have MusicXML import/export converters, and MusicXML is also supported by MuseScore.
    - prvc 6y ago
      Last time I checked, I could find no MusicXML exporter that supported the latest syntax.
- Ericson2314 6y ago
  I thought lilypond was a somewhat lower level abstraction, like the score tool they talk about? It would definitely be cool to export, but import sounds inherently lossy if what I said above is true.
- JasonFruit 6y ago
  I don't understand why, as an entrenched user of LilyPond, you'd want to use MuseScore either direction. LilyPond has been such a perfect tool for me that I can create better-looking scores with it faster than anything else; a GUI would just get in the way.
  - filmor 6y ago
baldfat 6y ago
MuseScore 4.0 I hope will help my workflow. I usually am working with just a keyboard, bass and I handle the rythmn seperately. To do my melody I find Muse Score to be way slower at producing MIDI. I actually use ABC Notation in VIM. I can do a whole song in under 5 minutes after using this for years. Its all texted based and as a old programmer I prefer the text to the GUI. I don't have an symphony and so that is why it is over kill for me. ABCNotion is just a text based notation program. Once I have that I can just move it to whatever format I want. http://abcnotation.com/ http://abcnotation.com/
- skybrian 6y ago
  It looks like MuseScore has a plugin for importing ABC notation: https://musescore.org/en/project/abc-import https://musescore.org/en/project/abc-import
zaroth 6y ago
They have a very interesting monetization strategy, musescore.org vs musescore.com where you pay to access the sheet music library. Another program I am greatly enjoying is Synthesia particularly because I can drop in any MIDI file exported from MuseScore and learn to play it there. Sythesia’s keyboard and note tracking is much better than the MuseScore app, and it’s $8 once to fully unlock which is pricing I love. The other app I’ve used is Noteflight, which I’ve used to simplify some songs that my daughter really wanted to play, to make them easier but still sound mostly right.
- skybrian 6y ago
  Musescore.com seems to be a different organization than the free software project at musescore.org. There is a relationship between them, but it's a bit mysterious exactly what it is. The boundaries are somewhat blurred. For example, there is a search box on musescore.org that goes to musescore.com. It's also not clear whether paying for musescore.com funds the open source project.
fsflover 6y ago
By the way MuseScore works fine on a Pinephone: https://twitter.com/roiredim/status/1349083339085541376 https://twitter.com/roiredim/status/1349083339085541376
- comex 6y ago
  Is it actually usable on a touchscreen? Can you pinch to zoom?
Tokkemon 6y ago
I'm a professional music engraver so I always view these programs in a different light than your average musician. MuseScore has always been the inferior option based on features and quality of output. I'm glad they are actually focusing on engraving improvements though, as it is really the core point of a program like this, to make the notation accurate and beautiful. Whether this new font lives up to the hype we'll see. Dorico's new font (Bravura) has certainly seen a lot of usage in the professional space, even if Dorico itself is struggling to capture that market.
- rectang 6y ago
  What tools are appropriate for professional engravers these days? I was a theory and comp major back in the early 90s, and I used Finale to do a few small engraving commissions and to make big band and wind ensemble charts back then. It took a long time, but with work I was able to achieve pretty much what I wanted. Some of the other tools I checked out, I immediately thought, "I can't do that? No way, that's totally unacceptable."
  - lukeh 6y ago
    The two people I use for engraving/part preparation are both using Dorico. I also use it for composition. It's occasionally a bit sluggish (on a loaded 2019 Mac Pro) but otherwise great.
  - Tokkemon 6y ago
    Sibelius and Finale for the most part. There's a few that use Dorico, but it's not widespread as a professional tool yet. The people using it are not using it as engravers, mostly as composers.
michaelpb 6y ago
I'm actually a little foggy on this -- is this completely unrelated to the free software MusE DAW (https://github.com/muse-sequencer/muse https://github.com/muse-sequencer/muse), that also includes a sheet music editor as well? I'm happy to see that the MusE DAW seems also to have resumed development after a very long hiatus / dry-spell. While not as feature-filled in most respects as bigger free software DAWs like Ardour, it has a more conventional piano roll interface with a few QoL features, which is why I preferred it for some time before switching to Ardour and getting over Ardour's sub-standard piano-roll.
- app4soft 6y ago
  > I'm actually a little foggy on this -- is this completely unrelated to the free software MusE DAW, that also includes a sheet music editor as well? Until 2002 MuseScore was just a part of MusE.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MuseScore#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MuseScore#History
syastrov 6y ago
I’m glad to have contributed to MuseScore 13 (time flies!) years ago. Haven’t tried it in awhile, but glad to see it still going and from what it seems, thriving. The authors are very dedicated.
turtlebits 6y ago
I use Noteflight for music notation but tried out MuseScore, and could not get it working with my digital piano, I could only input one note, then it wouldn't recognize any more. From limited experience, notation programs require you to enter exact note duration without the ability to go back and make changes. (ie if you change a 1/2 note to a 1/4 note, you will be left with an extra 1/4 rest with no way of removing it.) I wonder if there is a music notation woftware which allows you to just enter all the notes first, then you can go back and edit the duration- then it will calculate the measures for you.
- motogpjimbo 6y ago
  > I wonder if there is a music notation woftware which allows you to just enter all the notes first, then you can go back and edit the duration MuseScore supports the reverse of that workflow - you can enter the durations of notes and rests initially, then go back and "repitch" the notes in a second pass. I remember many years ago using a Windows scorewriter (possibly this one? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoteWorthy_Composer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoteWorthy_Composer) which placed notes into bars itself, based on their duration. If you went back and deleted, inserted or modified a note, the whole score would then reflow accordingly, much like wordwrap in a word processor.
- adrianh 6y ago
  > I wonder if there is a music notation woftware which allows you to just enter all the notes first, then you can go back and edit the duration- then it will calculate the measures for you. Dorico works like that. It automatically rebars the music so you don't have to think about it. My own music-notation editor, Soundslice, doesn't automatically rebar, but it has a "we're all consenting adults" attitude about note durations within a bar, allowing you to add a lot of notes in a bar and worry about their durations later.

MuseScore 3.6

236 points by app4soft 6y ago

lagolinguini 6y ago

I really enjoy Tantacrul's videos on UX. I hope that he finds time to do some videos on Gnome or KDE someday.

app4soft 6y ago
Yeah, yesterday I played with MuseScore 3.6 a little bit — a lot of fun![0] As for me, MuseScore now took 2nd place (just after Blender, which keep 1st place) on my Top FLOSS software projects lists. P.S. The only issue, as for me, that MuseScore 4[1] (WIP) UI would be switched to QML (JavaScript). I tried its latest nightly builds — it looks like common Electron apps & for me its UI/UX looks horrible. Guess, I would stuck to MuseScore 3.x forever. [0] https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1350904572450123778 https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1350904572450123778 [video] [1] https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4 https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4
- ArchieMaclean 6y ago
  [1] should be https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4 https://musescore.org/en/MuseScore4
  - app4soft 6y ago
    Fixed already, thanks.
- Kelteseth 6y ago
  The new version looks spotless and clean to me. Disclaimer: I'm a QML programmer and would do the same :)
  - app4soft 6y ago
    Ups, thanks for correction. Just fixed it in my comment as well. P.S. JFTR, Why You changed the order of links in your comment?
    - Kelteseth 6y ago
      My bad. Removed the links from my comment :)
- ArchieMaclean 6y ago
  I'm a bit worried about performance with QML since already the UI is a bit slow (not much, but noticeable) and switching to JavaScript might negatively impact that. We'll see.
  - app4soft 6y ago
    That is what I'm worried about too.
  - floatboth 6y ago
    QML is generally faster, especially on high resolution screens, as it's rendered with the GPU.
    - app4soft 6y ago
      Of course, for latest PC with powerful GPU, 16+ cores CPU & 16GB+ of RAM performance may be increased... But, as I has an 10 y/o laptop with integrated, any heavy JavaScript GUI apps (based on QML/Electron) just slowed down performance instead of increasing, in comparison to Qt-based or native GUI apps.
      - detaro 6y ago
        QML is commonly used on <1 GHz embedded devices. Equating QML to bad Electron examples doesn't make sense. (Although Electron/Chromium also have a large range depending on how they are used, in my experience they have a way harder time scaling down to smaller devices)
        app4soft 6y ago
        > QML is commonly used on <1 GHz embedded devices. Yes, I know as an owner of Symbian 9.x device ;) But, here I literally means that actual QML coding style stuck to requirement of modern GPU with OpenGL 2.x (GL ES 2.x) even OpenGL 3/4 support. My laptop has integrated GPU mostly limited to OpenGL 1.x, so all those CSS/QSS animations, which depends on higher OpenGL features, just blows my CPU/GPU into flame.
- pwgentleman 6y ago
  I was quite skeptical when you said "2nd place, after Blender". That was 20 minutes before. I just finished writing down a full score, including lyrics, without ever using this before. This is amazing software, both in looks and usability. I'm just sad I didn't discover this earlier.
  - app4soft 6y ago
    > That was 20 minutes before. :) JFTR, My actual Top5 list of FLOSS apps is: 1. MuseScore 2. Blender 3. SolveSpace 4. AzPainter 5. OpenOrienteering Mapper
    - ognarb 6y ago
      I think you forgot to add Krita.
      - app4soft 6y ago
        > I think you forgot to add Krita. No, I'm NOT forgot to add it ;P I just use AzPainter[0,1] for painting, due to it is much faster & much more compact in comparison to Krita, even to GIMP. And that is why AzPainter is on my Top list ;) [0] https://git.io/azpainter https://git.io/azpainter [1] https://github.com/Symbian9/azpainter https://github.com/Symbian9/azpainter
    - haberman 6y ago
      Wow, what makes you prefer SolveSpace to FreeCAD or programmatic cad like CadQuery? What do you use it for?
      - app4soft 6y ago
        > what makes you prefer SolveSpace to FreeCAD or programmatic cad like CadQuery? I prefer GUI apps over CLI/scripting. SolveSpace is my main 2D/3D CAD since SolveSpace 2.0 became[0] FLOSS. (previously used KOMPAS-3D, but it is proprietary) Now I'm QA (tester) & i18n (localization) contributor to the SolveSpace development for 6 years now, so you may ask me anything about it. Itself I'm a teacher of design and technology, with a bachelor degree in technical drawing & CGI + master degree in PM, so really like to take part in FLOSS development as UI/UX QA & PM, see my profile on GitHub[1] In last 20 years for curious reasons also I use OpenSCAD QCAD/LibreCAD, FreeCAD and a lot of other FLOSS CAx & GIS apps from-time-to-time (mostly for testing & bug reporting). > What do you use it for? For all CAD-related works (see my #DailySolveSpace[1] resources): solid 3D modeling & producing 2D drawings, simple CAE analyzing, etc. JFTR, I'm moderator of /r/SolveSpace sub on Reddit too. [0] https://librearts.org/2013/08/solvespace-released-under-gpl/ https://librearts.org/2013/08/solvespace-released-under-gpl/ [1] https://github.com/Symbian9 https://github.com/Symbian9 [2] https://git.io/DailySolveSpace https://git.io/DailySolveSpace
- detaro 6y ago
  Describing QML as "Javascript" is not necessarily all that useful. Yes, you can use JS in QML, but that doesn't mean it's actually done by the app in meaningful amounts, or has a meaningful performance impact. And the Musescore devs, from what I've seen, know what they are doing.

tomcam 6y ago

Tantacrul is a treasure. He’s the Fabrice Bellard of music composition software.

app4soft 6y ago
> He’s the Fabrice Bellard of music composition software. Also, he's like George W. Williams of font editing software ;)

reffaelwallen 6y ago

They need to fix their iOS app also

app4soft 6y ago
Please, report any issues to MuseScore devs via GitHub.[0] [0] https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/issues https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/issues
- quadrangle 6y ago
  That's not the iOS or Android app. Confusingly, they (who's they, not 100% clear) publish proprietary read-only apps for mobile which are not the same as the main Musescore. Also, the playback at Musescore.com uses some proprietary web tools (built on FLO ones in part I think) which are themselves separate from Musescore the main software.
  - app4soft 6y ago
    > Confusingly, they (who's they, not 100% clear) publish proprietary read-only apps for mobile which are not the same as the main Musescore. If so, report details about those iOS/Android apps to MuseScore devs team on Twitter[0,1] [0] https://twitter.com/Tantacrul https://twitter.com/Tantacrul [1] https://twitter.com/musescore https://twitter.com/musescore

meibo 6y ago

They've been doing some stellar work, good job. I hope that they are considering to build a sheet music hosting platform as an open alternative to the now "rogue" MuseScore. Sorely missed.

PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
Can you explain what you mean by "the now "rogue" MuseScore" ?
- meibo 6y ago
  MuseScore.com, the sheet hosting site tied to the app, has been acquired by a bigger, paid sheet hosting site in 2018[1] and has recently changed its subscription model, monetizing the massive amount of community created content by not allowing free downloads anymore. I'm not in any position to judge them for wanting to make more money but it sure feels like a way to kill off your userbase. [1] https://www.scoringnotes.com/news/ultimate-guitar-acquires-musescore/ https://www.scoringnotes.com/news/ultimate-guitar-acquires-m...
  - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
    AFAIK, that purchase is also what is paying for the core developer group of musescore.org to work on the software. So I'm not sure there's much of a distinction at this point.
  - mkr-hn 6y ago
    This post suggests the company owns the software too: https://blog.musescore.com/post/171048786232/ultimate-guitar-welcomes-musescore https://blog.musescore.com/post/171048786232/ultimate-guitar... >> "We are also building up the MuseScore development team to help the developer community improve MuseScore’s desktop and mobile products quicker. The improvements we work on will continue to be based on the community’s feedback. For example, among other things, there have been numerous requests to improve the functionality of the mobile apps and the quality of the soundfont’s audio. As a result, we have already established a dedicated mobile development team and hired a soundfont specialist to focus on improving these areas. And in case you’re wondering, yes, of course the notation editor will continue to be open source and free." And this appears to grant the company rights to any code people contribute in case they decide to close the source going forward: https://musescore.org/en/cla https://musescore.org/en/cla

adamnemecek 6y ago

I've been working on an IDE for music composition. I'll be launching soon http://ngrid.io http://ngrid.io I setup a discord channel for the project https://discord.gg/a5ttYuG https://discord.gg/a5ttYuG

app4soft 6y ago
> I'll be launching soon It would be better if You would just create separate "Show HN" thread to highlight you project, see[0] [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- adamnemecek 6y ago
  Where does it say that?

jameshart 6y ago

Tantacrul’s video about the creation of the new engraving font (https://youtu.be/XGo4PJd1lng https://youtu.be/XGo4PJd1lng) is also an important story about the MS-DOS Score program, software obsolescence and stewardship, and the loss of value that can happen when an industry relies on proprietary software. Without polemics or politics, this ends up presenting one of the strongest moral arguments for open source licensing.

Ericson2314 6y ago
It also shows how the oldest proprietary software helped experts, vs today's race to the bottom / ease of learning vs actual use mindset. I guess only free software can buck the commercial mandate enough to do that now.
- app4soft 6y ago
  > I guess only free software can buck the commercial mandate enough to do that now. [spoiler] Here is fresh story to learn: OCAD (commercial app) VS OpenOrienteering Mapper (FLOSS alternative to OCAD).[0,1] TL;DR: If you are trying to create fully free alternative to proprietary software, be ready to the situation where original proprietary software devs would decide to clone[2] unique/original features[3] from your FLOSS app. [0] https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1347209330089717760 https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1347209330089717760 [1] https://twitter.com/zerbembasqwibo/status/1349467329009225734 https://twitter.com/zerbembasqwibo/status/134946732900922573... [2] https://www.ocad.com/wiki/ocad/en/index.php?title=Sketch&action=history https://www.ocad.com/wiki/ocad/en/index.php?title=Sketch&act... [3] https://www.openorienteering.org/news/2012/colors-and-sketching https://www.openorienteering.org/news/2012/colors-and-sketch...
  - danShumway 6y ago
    Is this a problem? First, it is good that software feature ideas aren't copyrightable. Arguably many of them shouldn't even be patentable. That means that yes, proprietary apps can look at your software and say, "that's cool, we should do that too." But it also means that people can write Open Source software that takes lessons from proprietary apps. We want software devs working on productivity tools and practical software to copy each other, we don't want everyone to reinvent the wheel all the time. I mean, heck, can you imagine if Finale came out with a new feature and that was just it, no other competitors or Open Source apps like MuseScore were allowed to offer that feature? Can you imagine trying to build a piece of software like Blender in that world, where Autodesk had a monopoly on "things that a 3D editor can do?" Second, 9 years to clone a feature in the world of software is a really long time. If you can launch a piece of software and you have 9 years before other people start building similar things... I mean, what else do you even want at that point? If it takes 9 years for a dev to capitalize on a unique feature in their app, I don't think it's the eventual imitators that are the problem.

enriquto 6y ago

Being a deeply entrenched user of lilypond, I would love if MS could read/write lilypond scores natively.

jcelerier 6y ago
is that problem even solvable ? lilypond's language is turing-complete, no ?
- enriquto 6y ago
  Hey, dreaming is free! At the very least it could output lilypond files that you could tweak by hand.
- zozbot234 6y ago
  lilypond does have MusicXML import/export converters, and MusicXML is also supported by MuseScore.
  - prvc 6y ago
    Last time I checked, I could find no MusicXML exporter that supported the latest syntax.
Ericson2314 6y ago
I thought lilypond was a somewhat lower level abstraction, like the score tool they talk about? It would definitely be cool to export, but import sounds inherently lossy if what I said above is true.
JasonFruit 6y ago
I don't understand why, as an entrenched user of LilyPond, you'd want to use MuseScore either direction. LilyPond has been such a perfect tool for me that I can create better-looking scores with it faster than anything else; a GUI would just get in the way.
- filmor 6y ago

baldfat 6y ago

MuseScore 4.0 I hope will help my workflow. I usually am working with just a keyboard, bass and I handle the rythmn seperately. To do my melody I find Muse Score to be way slower at producing MIDI. I actually use ABC Notation in VIM. I can do a whole song in under 5 minutes after using this for years. Its all texted based and as a old programmer I prefer the text to the GUI. I don't have an symphony and so that is why it is over kill for me. ABCNotion is just a text based notation program. Once I have that I can just move it to whatever format I want. http://abcnotation.com/ http://abcnotation.com/

skybrian 6y ago
It looks like MuseScore has a plugin for importing ABC notation: https://musescore.org/en/project/abc-import https://musescore.org/en/project/abc-import

zaroth 6y ago

They have a very interesting monetization strategy, musescore.org vs musescore.com where you pay to access the sheet music library. Another program I am greatly enjoying is Synthesia particularly because I can drop in any MIDI file exported from MuseScore and learn to play it there. Sythesia’s keyboard and note tracking is much better than the MuseScore app, and it’s $8 once to fully unlock which is pricing I love. The other app I’ve used is Noteflight, which I’ve used to simplify some songs that my daughter really wanted to play, to make them easier but still sound mostly right.

skybrian 6y ago
Musescore.com seems to be a different organization than the free software project at musescore.org. There is a relationship between them, but it's a bit mysterious exactly what it is. The boundaries are somewhat blurred. For example, there is a search box on musescore.org that goes to musescore.com. It's also not clear whether paying for musescore.com funds the open source project.

fsflover 6y ago

By the way MuseScore works fine on a Pinephone: https://twitter.com/roiredim/status/1349083339085541376 https://twitter.com/roiredim/status/1349083339085541376

comex 6y ago
Is it actually usable on a touchscreen? Can you pinch to zoom?

Tokkemon 6y ago

I'm a professional music engraver so I always view these programs in a different light than your average musician. MuseScore has always been the inferior option based on features and quality of output. I'm glad they are actually focusing on engraving improvements though, as it is really the core point of a program like this, to make the notation accurate and beautiful. Whether this new font lives up to the hype we'll see. Dorico's new font (Bravura) has certainly seen a lot of usage in the professional space, even if Dorico itself is struggling to capture that market.

rectang 6y ago
What tools are appropriate for professional engravers these days? I was a theory and comp major back in the early 90s, and I used Finale to do a few small engraving commissions and to make big band and wind ensemble charts back then. It took a long time, but with work I was able to achieve pretty much what I wanted. Some of the other tools I checked out, I immediately thought, "I can't do that? No way, that's totally unacceptable."
- lukeh 6y ago
  The two people I use for engraving/part preparation are both using Dorico. I also use it for composition. It's occasionally a bit sluggish (on a loaded 2019 Mac Pro) but otherwise great.
- Tokkemon 6y ago
  Sibelius and Finale for the most part. There's a few that use Dorico, but it's not widespread as a professional tool yet. The people using it are not using it as engravers, mostly as composers.

michaelpb 6y ago

I'm actually a little foggy on this -- is this completely unrelated to the free software MusE DAW (https://github.com/muse-sequencer/muse https://github.com/muse-sequencer/muse), that also includes a sheet music editor as well? I'm happy to see that the MusE DAW seems also to have resumed development after a very long hiatus / dry-spell. While not as feature-filled in most respects as bigger free software DAWs like Ardour, it has a more conventional piano roll interface with a few QoL features, which is why I preferred it for some time before switching to Ardour and getting over Ardour's sub-standard piano-roll.

app4soft 6y ago
> I'm actually a little foggy on this -- is this completely unrelated to the free software MusE DAW, that also includes a sheet music editor as well? Until 2002 MuseScore was just a part of MusE.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MuseScore#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MuseScore#History

syastrov 6y ago

I’m glad to have contributed to MuseScore 13 (time flies!) years ago. Haven’t tried it in awhile, but glad to see it still going and from what it seems, thriving. The authors are very dedicated.

turtlebits 6y ago

I use Noteflight for music notation but tried out MuseScore, and could not get it working with my digital piano, I could only input one note, then it wouldn't recognize any more. From limited experience, notation programs require you to enter exact note duration without the ability to go back and make changes. (ie if you change a 1/2 note to a 1/4 note, you will be left with an extra 1/4 rest with no way of removing it.) I wonder if there is a music notation woftware which allows you to just enter all the notes first, then you can go back and edit the duration- then it will calculate the measures for you.

motogpjimbo 6y ago
> I wonder if there is a music notation woftware which allows you to just enter all the notes first, then you can go back and edit the duration MuseScore supports the reverse of that workflow - you can enter the durations of notes and rests initially, then go back and "repitch" the notes in a second pass. I remember many years ago using a Windows scorewriter (possibly this one? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoteWorthy_Composer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoteWorthy_Composer) which placed notes into bars itself, based on their duration. If you went back and deleted, inserted or modified a note, the whole score would then reflow accordingly, much like wordwrap in a word processor.
adrianh 6y ago
> I wonder if there is a music notation woftware which allows you to just enter all the notes first, then you can go back and edit the duration- then it will calculate the measures for you. Dorico works like that. It automatically rebars the music so you don't have to think about it. My own music-notation editor, Soundslice, doesn't automatically rebar, but it has a "we're all consenting adults" attitude about note durations within a bar, allowing you to add a lot of notes in a bar and worry about their durations later.