FAQ layout

I can no longer see the wood for all the trees; there are so many different settings. Which are the most important?: The templates. Under [Options|Templates] you can often get the formatting as intended with a single action.

I am quite satisfied with the layout of a piece of music.

How can I use the formatting of that song for other music?

Create a layout template:

open the track whose layout you want to use for other tracks;
use <F2> or the template button on the buttonbar;
choose the category under which the template should be saved (eg layout);
Create a new template with the button, enter an appropriate name and press [OK]

You now have a layout template that you can apply to other music:

open the track whose format you want to change;
use <F2> or ;
select the previously saved template and press [OK].

Is there a standard order in which you format your music with MusiCAD?: There are, of course, many roads leading to Rome. MusiCAD is designed for adding the format afterwards. If you include too many formatting-related things (line breaks, text formatting / position, etc.) during edit, you often get in trouble getting everything correct. You shouldn't worry about formatting until just before printing.

How do I get the layout of my sheet music right?

Well. Of course that depends a lot on the music. Of course, 100 three-quarter measures with many three-beat notes require much less space than measures with only 1/16 notes. It is also difficult to give a fixed rule for it.

Horizontal and vertical scaling are the first knobs to 'turn'. By making it a bit bigger, the notes get bigger and the page gets fuller.
Notes closer together or further apart can be achieved with the note distances.
For some types of music it is usual to record a fixed number of measures per line and possibly a fixed number of lines per page. Usually you will also want to adjust the line justification to prevent a ragged right margin.
Page justification controls the remaining 'white' at the bottom of the page. If a page is only half filled with page justification at 100%, it will be used completely at 50% (with a lot of white between the lines).
With line spacing, bar spacing, heading heights and page margins you can finally 'play' a bit to get rid of a last page with 1 line on it, for example. Just try what works best and gives the best result. Tastes differ greatly in this one.

I notated music with an earlier version of MusiCAD, where the layout was exactly as I intended it to be. When I reopen these files, the layout appears to have changed! Can I do something about this?: Maybe. The layout algorithm is subject to improvement, so the layout is not guaranteed to remain exactly the same with new MusiCAD versions... Be sure to read the section about design philosophy.

There is (much too) much white between the beams. What am I doing wrong?: Probably [Options|Format|PageJustification] is too low. A normal value for PageJustification is about 80% Also check the value of [...|Bar height] (about 20 or 0 for automatic) and [...|Line spacing] (about 4)

There is too much white between the notes. What should I change?: Probably [Options|Format|LineJustification] is too low. A normal value for line justification is about 65% Also check the value of [...|MinNote Spacing] (50-100%) and [...|MaxNote Spacing] (about 100-400%)

I want to leave unjustified lines blank. How do you do that?: Turn on [Options|Format|Blank Bar].

I want to omit beams with only rests. Is that possible?: In the part where staffs should be hidden if they only consist of rests, you set [Part|Part properties|OmitRestBars].

I always want to see the first line, whether it consists of only rests or not. How do you do that?: Make sure that a 'dummy' text, for example a space, is included in that part.

I want to (not) indent the first line. How?: Set [Options|Format|Indentation 1st] to about 15 (or 0 for no indentation) If the part titles should be printed before the bar, [Options|Text format|Part titles] must be set and the text size greater than 0.

I want to insert a line of text as a subheading for a piece of music that consists of several parts. Is that possible?: Of course. On the notation bar use [Edit|Insert|Section text]

I want to indent certain lines. How?: Those lines that need to be indented differently need a hard line break. Shifting to the right with <alt> indents that line in page view.

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