cparmerlee
To try to match Finale or Sibelius in capability would be a vast undertaking, and a very expensive one, both in terms of money and in terms of the focus it would take away from the current product, which still needs to move forward.  The Spreadbury project at Steinberg definitely intends to take on head-on the best of the notation products, but they are probably spending well over $20 million, and that would initially just yield a stand-alone notation product, not improved notation in Cubase.  Of course, one assumes that they would marry those functions eventually, but we're probably talking 2020 for something like that.
 
While the notation world should welcome the Steinberg project (given the limited pace of development on both Finale and Sibelius), it would be insane for Gibson to try to do that.  But fixing some basic bugs and weak features in the Sonar notation engine doesn't seem like an impossible task, nor one that requires an exceptional amount of expertise in the notation field.  It is a limited thing.
 
OTOH, nobody understands MIDI better than Cakewalk.  All the high-grade notation products can export and import MIDI.  And many of them can export and import MusicXML in a comprehensive way.  Even if you don't have MusicXML experts on staff, nearly all competent programmers today are knowledgeable of working in XML, and the MusicXML schema is well defined.  It isn't that complicated, and you would be able to ignore 80% of it anyway.  With a strategy of more seamless interoperability with the major notation products, you would have access to most of what Steinberg might be able to do by 2020, and I bet an import/export process could be built a lot faster than building a whole new notation product. Such a project would give you greatly improved interopberability with all the important notation products out there.  As a strategic planner, I would think that such integration would be a minimum requirement for competing against Steinberg as they do begin to bring their new notation product to market.  (Hint: the Spreadbury product will undoubtedly support MusicXML and MIDI interfaces.)

pbognar
I'm hoping the "final solution" is a combination of a few fixes to the existing SV as well as a robust MXML interface.
 
SV fixes for MIDI entry / editing / basic lead sheets or part printing within Sonar.
 
MXML export for those who require engraving quality printing using dedicated notation programs and MXML MIDI import for those who compose in Finale / Sibelius type programs.

swamptooth

Anderton
Don't people do that already with Notion or some other program?

 
I sure do...

swamptooth
Well i do it inside sonar as well, mostly for building textures and chord structures. If I need easy access to articulations I rewire Sibelius.

cparmerlee
Daniel Spreadbury, formerly of Sibelius, now heading Steinberg's development of a new notation product, has written a very interesting series of blog articles.  The latest is here:
http://blog.steinberg.net/2015/03/development-diary-part-10/#more-928
 
The point I want to emphasize is that notation needs can range from minimal (lead sheets, or simple arrangements for a band rehearsal) to extremely elaborate published scores.  Spreadbury's diaries emphasize just how extreme the engraving requirements can be.  It is not plausible that Cakewalk will ever have internal notation capabilities anywhere close to the level of sophistication that Spreadbury describes.  It is doubtful that StudioOne / Notion will ever be in that ballpark either.  And it is doubtful that Sibelius, while owned by Avid, will ever integrate with ProTools to the degree that is expected of the Spreadbury project vis-a-vis Cubase.
 
Clearly the major DAW players see some intersection between DAW and advanced notation.  It seems very clear to me that Cakewalk's best strategy is to embrace interoperability  with the best notation products rather than to try to develop such a capability internally.

cparmerlee
I think you may be the one who does not understand.  All of Cakewalk's major competitors have made an investment in high-end notation.  There is a reason for that.
 
Many people may be perfectly happy using their DAWs for laying down tracks of their own creations.  That's terrific.  All DAWs are pretty good at that.  But increasingly, professional musicians, composers, and educators are integrating the DAW with the performance, either as live use of the DAW or through publication of the music created in the DAW.  Many universities have formal curricula on "Music Technology".  Some universities even offer majors in that field, and it includes synthesis, recording, and notation.
 
There is a convergence ahead, not unlike when recording hardware merged with sequencing software to become what we now know as the DAW.  It is a question whether Cakewalk will be a player or not.  I would suggest the companies that excel in this convergence will attract the professional musicians and producers and the other products will find themselves more in the garage band tier.  Nothing wrong with that, but it seems to me the Platinum is well above "garage band" level today and Cakewalk ought to be thinking about a strategy that will allow them to thrive as this next convergence takes place.
 
In simple terms, the convergence is composers who orchestrate in the notation world will seamlessly render their music using the most powerful DAW technology.  And people who compose interactively within the DAW will have a seamless pathway to publish their work as a high-quality manuscript.  That convergence opens the door to a whole new market of customers.

jsg
I suspect Cakewalk's user base consists of a small number of people who actually read and write music, so they've probably abandoned support for those who do use the staff view.  I wish I were wrong about this, but I don't think I am.  It's a difficult decision for me; Cubase and Digital Performer have better notation but they don't have a color coded event list, which is just as important to me, and there are other things that cause me to much prefer Sonar.  So I may be stuck with Sonar for the rest of my life, although I realize the staff view leaves a lot to be desired.  It's too bad Cakewalk doesn't have enough pride of craftsmanship to care enough to fix the long-standing issues with notation.  
 
Jerry
www.jerrygerber.com