Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Do you typeset your scores on Linux? Share your thoughts, tips, and tricks here.

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nathan
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Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

Okay, here's the thing. My wife (a total non-techie) is never going to learn Lilypond for typesetting scores, but as a professional music educator and masters student in music, she has to be able to produce pro-quality music notation. Currently, MuseScore is still just too buggy, and NtEd lacks the features she needs.

While I might be able to go to Lily for formatting, etc, I prefer to compose with immediate aural feedback, etc...and I'm beginning to lose a lot time trying to complete my assignments in MuseScore/NtEd/NoteEdit and then export to Lily, and then edit some more, etc.

I have no doubt that in probably less than a year, MuseScore and NtEd especially will be pretty much ready for primetime, if development continues as it is now.

But I need a productive experience with professional output now. So I think I"m going to try to run Finale or Sibelius via wine or virtual machine.

Any thoughts, suggestions, or advice?
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nils »

Yes. www.denemo.org

Its the one tool which is purely designed for making lilypond easier.
It has direct visual respond (of course) and the next release will feature direct audio output, even on other things than notes, if you wish.

Plus there will be some features concerning midi input with a few tricks that ar, as far as I know, unique in the Notation world.
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

Thanks for the tip! I have checked out Denemo and I think it's a unique and useful project. It would probably work okay for me, but for the non-techie it will probably be a bit intimidating (since it's not truly WYSIWIG). I will definitely install the latest version and play with it some more though.
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nils »

Great. If there is anything you don't like or a point which makes you say "I can not use this for real" then please say it :)
studio32

Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by studio32 »

and please let the people of nted know what it lacks... so it can be improved!

edit: denemo looks good...


but got an error:

Code: Select all

# dpkg -i denemo_0.8.0-1_i386.deb
(Reading database ... 256790 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking denemo (from denemo_0.8.0-1_i386.deb) ...
dpkg: error processing denemo_0.8.0-1_i386.deb (--install):
 unable to create `./etc/denemo/denemo.conf': No such file or directory
Errors were encountered while processing:
 denemo_0.8.0-1_i386.deb
debian testing
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

@Studio32 I got that same error trying from the deb! I'll try to compile later.

I'm definitely going to stay in communication with the devs of NtEd, etc, and continue to submit bug reports. But unfortunately it is "crunch time" for me and my wife at university, and she especially is typesetting/arranging large-scale works that must be submitted with virtually perfect notation.
studio32

Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by studio32 »

I think both Finale and Sibelius works pretty ok with wine (but is never a perfect combi imho)...

Maybe you can try a demo version or otherwise download your own not so legal version and buy the one which is best. or try http://www.finalemusic.com/notepad/

and read:
http://musescore.org/en/blog/2008/09/07 ... re-feature
http://musescore.org/en/blog/2008/09/05 ... tepad-2009

;)

Thumps up for open source software! :)
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

Good idea on trying the demos first!
studio32 wrote:
Thumps up for open source software! :)
Heck yes! I always advocate OSS first. Many of Linux's notation apps are almost there...I can't wait!! For many people NtEd and MuseScore will be fine...they're just not quite there for professional implementation by non-techies yet.
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by sciurius »

nathan wrote:... I prefer to compose with immediate aural feedback,
Yes, aural feedback would be fine a nice job for a LP frontend. Personally I use LilyPondTool (a JEdit plugin) for editing LP scores. It should not be that hard to add aural feedback. For example, when it does its barcheck, it could play the measure. That would be a great help.
Occasionally I (have to) use Sibelius and I find it very hard to use...
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

For what it's worth, I have the Finale 2009 Demo working fairly well in Ubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex and Wine 1.0.1. I've experienced on a minimal amount of bugs, and every feature I can test in the demo works, including playback. I have not purchased the full version yet (that stuff is expensive!!) but I may have to in the next few months. The good news is that my wife will be able to use the university computer lab to get most of her stuff in Sibelius, so I won't have to buy either one right now. In the mean time, I'll be working with my usual amalgamation of NtEd/MuseScore/NoteEdit/Lilypond/ABC.

I'm checking in to the latest Denemo right now.
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by ntnunk »

Nathan:

Have you seen Canorus? It's the successor to NoteEdit (which is apparently not going to be developed any farther) and it looks like it might be pretty interesting in the end. It's at version 0.5 right now, with 0.6 due to be released after the new year and 1.0 sometime in 2009. It probably won't help you right now but it might be one to add to your list of software you're following the development of.

Check it out here: https://canorus.berlios.de/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

Yes, I'm definitely keeping my eye on Canorus...it looks to be a great project, similar in some ways to Denemo, I think. Doesn't Canorus also aim for direct editing of Lily files?

Speaking of Denemo, has anyone had success installing the deb from the website? It still gives me errors, and I've also had no luck compiling from source. I'd really like to give the latest version an honest go...
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by Pablo »

Hi Nathan :).
Just in case it helps:
Compiling Denemo from source can be a bit tricky because of a configure error that keeps on saying you haven't guile-1.8 when you do have it (the -dev, I mean). Otherwise, compiling has been very easy in my 64studio box (debian based). The trick is documented in the README file but I think it can be easily missed.
Regards
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by studio32 »

Hey Nathan,

About that aural feedback... and lilypond. Why not buy a cheapo midi keyboard and use the new lilykde > frescobaldi with rumor. You can connect your midi keyboard (or use a virtual keyboard or zynaddsubfx) to a sound module (soft or hardware) and use it with rumor to put your songs in lilypond by playing the notes on your keyboard. You can hear the result by clicking the play midi option after runned lilypond preview (to run this as quick as possible you can eventually cut the song in small parts...).
For a quick song setup you can use nice templates which are available in lilypondtool or frescobaldi...

You could also use the new midi entry tool for Jedit:
http://linuxmusicians.com/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=792
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Re: Finale vs. Sibelius on Linux :(

Post by nathan »

Thanks for those suggestions, Studio32! I'm particularly interested in Frescobaldi, but I'm running into some issue satisfying all the dependencies to compile. Hopefully I will get that worked out so I can give it a whirl.
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