daveny5


Sonar was never intended to be a notation program. Notation is there merely to assist in editing MIDI tracks. If you want notation, Finale Print Music is an inexpensive solution. 

I'm not certain where you got that from... Notation was an important feature of Cakewalk... back when. I've been using it for many many years, and did write quite a bit of music on Cakewalk Pro Audio 6.

bsteven

Sonar was never intended to be a notation program. Notation is there merely to assist in editing MIDI tracks.

 
Actually, before Pro Audio and Sonar, Cakewalk was a notion program designed to compose by manually editing notes on the staff.  That was why I bought it many years ago and largely how I have used it to date.  Yes, they have changed direction (a few times, it seems as many of you have noted on the forum), but that doesn't excuse them for their half-*ssed execution of staff view to date. 
 
I am a hobbyist (as are most of us who don't earn our living solely creating music --whether we admit it or not) but since I spent the time and the money, I'd like the program to work as it was designed.  My OP was just a solution that works for me until X1 gets there--if indeed it does.  For the money, I was impressed with Guitar Pro 6 as an inexpensive composition tool, so I thought I'd share it.
 
I guess what was really impressive about the program was that the one time it crashed, the next time I loaded the program it went automatically to a problem report screen where I could describe the problem and upload the file that caused the crash.  That told me they were serious about their product living up its promise. 

In what way was notation editing better in Cakewalk before it became Cakewalk Pro Audio or Sonar?  Or am I misunderstanding your post?
 
 

Actually, before Pro Audio and Sonar, Cakewalk was a notion program designed to compose by manually editing notes on the staff.  That was why I bought it many years ago and largely how I have used it to date.  Yes, they have changed direction (a few times, it seems as many of you have noted on the forum), but that doesn't excuse them for their half-*ssed execution of staff view to date. 

Sorry, but I disagree.  I bought Cakewalk (under DOS!) back in the early 90's and it was a MIDI sequencer program with absolutely no notation capabilities.  I had to buy Finale Allegro (Windows 3.1 - ugh!) to get notation.


Wikipedia says:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cakewalk_(sequencer)

Slightly OT, sorry - this is kind of cool history/background from Cakewalk's founder:  http://createdigitalmusic.com/2007/11/interview-cakewalk-founder-greg-hendershott-20-years-on/

backwoods


The "Staff" views on all DAWs are only suitable for "semi pro" "hobbyist". If you are dead serious you will fork out for Sibeliuis or Finale. 

That's true but misleading.   The use of the Staff View in Sonar and other DAWs has nothing to do with a score-producing package like Sibelius or Finale - it's totally different.  In Sonar it's main purpose is (or should be) as a music inputting tool, useful to those comfortable with notation for entering MIDI data, not really a tool for producing readable printed notation.    Any function it has as the latter is a bonus at best.    It's nowhere near Sibelius or Finale in that respect but nor should it be expected to be.   (And true, only a hobbyist would use Sonar's Staff View for that purpose).
 
I don't care if the notation produced is unreadable as printed out sheet music as long as it does the job of entering accurate musical information to the DAW.  As an inputting tool it's key to what many people do, but in that respect has gone backwards in X1.

Every time this subject comes up there is a parade of people crying "it's not supposed to be a notation program".  It's so tiring.  These people should read the hundreds of pages of posts on this subject so they won't speak out of total ignorance.

vintagevibe


Every time this subject comes up there is a parade of people crying "it's not supposed to be a notation program".  It's so tiring.  These people should read the hundreds of pages of posts on this subject so they won't speak out of total ignorance.

So there's a 'parade' of people who disagree with you ("crying" ffs) and they're all speaking 'out of total ignorance'?   I've read all the threads and seen all the arguments.  They haven't changed my views on this and won't.     You're right though it's tiring, I've said my bit I can ignore these threads now for a month or two.
 

sdpate


Which program do you use to notate from the guitar. I tried Guitar Pro before on my midi guitar but it didn't work reliably.

I have a Godin Multiac Nylon and Axon AX 100 MKll but have not tried it for notation yet. I'm pretty sure you can't notate in GP in real time but rather it enters the current note duration currently selected. At least that was my experience using keyboard. Also, I reported a bug to GP that notes would not play back when entered via keyboard until modified (select all and shift a pitch then shift back). The new Sibelius looks great for entering notes real time but I don't do enough notation to justify the upgrade from the student version I have.
 
Just curious what midi guitar system you have and how it tracks? As far as playing the Multiac with Axon is pretty good but definitely not perfect. You have to really concentrate on keeping playing very clean. I have used it to track using an the Korg M3 keyboard sequencer and it works good. But again, you have to really try to play everything very clean. My guess it's just the nature of midi guitar. I also wonder if the nylon strings work as well as steel? 
 
As far as print from Sonar, I don't see why Cakewalk wouldn't make formatting look nice. I think the frustration from people supporting Staff View development comes from the fact that most the functionality is there but there are some problems and it hasn't been updated that I know of since using Cakewalk ProAudio9. Most of use probably would love to ditch the other programs and just work in Sonar and are not looking to create a professional prints for books. Just something that doesn't span 20 wasted pages with tons of white space and text on top of text.

In what way was notation editing better in Cakewalk before it became Cakewalk Pro Audio or Sonar?

 
It has basically stayed the same and it was good enough for the way I used the program, but around Home Studio 6, I started having problems on the staff with lyrics and notes (unless they were on a single clip throughout out the track) there would likely be problems with the score.  That may have finally been fixed or at least improved with X1b.  Now, with X1 snap to doesn't work always work when placing notes on the staff manually.  When I reported it, they said put in a feature request.  That was the last straw for me, because until X1, snap to/by has always worked in staff view when inputting notes manually.
 

Sorry, but I disagree. I bought Cakewalk (under DOS!) back in the early 90's and it was a MIDI sequencer program with absolutely no notation capabilities.

 
I don't remember when staff view was introduced, but I believe it was soon after Cakewalk went to Windows, and  I do believe it was before audio was introduced, but I could be wrong. 
 
Perhaps, I'm the only one out there who does a lot composing by manually by entering notes on the staff.  If I'm not, then then you may understand why the feature can be so frustrating on X1 and easier on GP6.
 
So many of your are right.  Staff View is a dead horse.  That's why I'm trying something else.  I liked the experience with GP6 (which in no way could replace X1) so I thought I'd share it.  If it doesn't apply to you--more power to you.  
 
 

I understand your frustration.  I think we're just trying to answer to statement that "its notation isn't fully functional".  Sonar has some notation, sure, but it's not supposed to be an all-encompassing notation tool.  It's like saying the my 4-door family car doesn't have room to haul a load of dirt.  Sure, it has a trunk.  But its primary function isn't to haul big loads of things :-)