The Finale upgrade to version 25 saw a number of improvements under the hood, including modernizing the code to be 64-bit. The interface is generally unchanged from recent versions.
While that’s good news for users accustomed to the way the software works already, workflow killers like nested dialog boxes still abound. Two and three are common, and there’s at least one like this that goes four deep:
Fortunately, there are shortcuts to mitigate clicking your way out of these. To OK or accept all open dialog boxes at once, you can hold down the Command key on Mac, or Ctrl key on PC, and click the OK button. Similarly, to cancel all open dialog boxes, hold down the Command key on Mac, or Ctrl key on PC, and click the Cancel button.
You can also use the keyboard on Mac: Command-Return to OK all dialogs and Command-Esc to cancel all dialogs.
There are many more Finale shortcuts for Mac and PC; take a moment to learn the ones for your most common tasks.
Nested dialog boxes are less common in Sibelius, but we do see them occasionally, like when editing an instrument’s properties:
I’m not aware of a way to dismiss dialogs in Sibelius in the same way, but if you know of one, please share in the comments.
Finally, a bit of unrelated Finale news with regard to plug-ins: Robert Patterson has made 64-bit versions of his plug-ins available for compatibility with Finale v.25, and Tobias Giesen now has beta 64-bit versions of TGTools available.
What’s your favorite key command?
Falk
I don´t know if i understand the question exactly, but i use on mac and sibelius the “esc” key or toogle via “tab” and use the “space” key to cancel.
Bob Zawalich
In SIbelius I think the quickest way out is to type Esc in each dialog, which will immediately cancel it, or Return, which is equivalent to clicking OK.
There is no “close multiple dialogs” command I am aware of.
Usually you will want to use Return if you want any action to take place, and the actual change to the score might occur at more than one level, so I usually use Esc only if I do not want to make any changes.