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.  

gusfmm

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.

You can use the staff view to enter notation to some degree, but it never ever had full functionality. You can't even enter rests! You can only enter notes and it figures out where to put the rests. It has no capability for 1st and 2nd endings, Segno, Coda, triplets, tuplets, repeats, etc. Cakewalk started out as a SEQUENCING program and then it added RECORDING capability when audio recording capability came to computers. I know because I've been using Cakewalk and Sonar since the first version. If they added full notation function, then you could expect to pay a higher price, so instead, if you want notation, go buy or download a notation program. Its as simple as that. 

@daveny5 - this is not a response to your post - I was writing while you were writing your post...
 
The intent of Staff View in Cakewalk / Sonar has always been about inputting and editing MIDI data on a staff, otherwise why would it exist?  With the latest hot fix to X1b, the duration function bug introduced in X1b appears to have been fixed, however the staff view duration key bindings are still broken in X1b, so even with Cakewalk having removed the musical note duration icons in the staff view, they have even made it impossible for Sonar Plus to bring back this functionality which existed in 8.5.3.  Nevermind that one no longer have different snap to grid settings for the various views is X1.  Currently in X1, we have actually taken a step backward in Staff View Land.  Hopefully there will be a hot fix to at least get us back to the sub par Staff View which existed from early Cakewalk Windows days right up to 8.5.3.
 
Now, with regard to printing scores - how can anyone say that function was never intended to be part of Cakewalk or Sonar, when there was a function to do so?  Why not just say Cakewalk and Sonar had/have basic score printing functions?
 
People:  if you want improvements in staff editing and / or printing, don't give up.  Let Cakewalk know that this is an important function for you.
 
If you are a user who uses neither staff editing nor printing, your input that you can live without it is like one of us saying that we can live without one of the features you feel is important.  My tolerance for some say "well, I never user staff view" gets on my nerves.  I never use Beatscape either.
 
Frankly, I'm pulling my hair out (I can't afford to lose any more).  How can anyone minimize the written language of music? 
 
I can understand if Sonar is unable to produce engraving quality notation, but the staff view is just as valid as the piano roll view.

A combination of Sonar and Guitar pro is my dream, I wish some port was available to make the staff view - guitar pro or guitar-pro-ish :)

zoobooboozoo


A combination of Sonar and Guitar pro is my dream, I wish some port was available to make the staff view - guitar pro or guitar-pro-ish :)

Hey look at us on Easter ranting about the staff view
 
I forgot to add something to may long winded post earlier - Personally, I am not an score exclusive composer.  Far from it.  I use hybrid approaches.  Most times songs will start out with either MIDI / audio played in or generated somehow (even an idea plopped on to the staff) - so I prefer to have all my tools available to me in one environment.  I don't want to be converting data between different programs.
 
This may well be different from a person whose main tool is notation.  For these people, perhaps a dedicated notation tool with playback capability might be the best place to start.  Then, at some point, the MIDI data could be brought into Sonar and audio could be added.  Finally, when the piece is finished, the MIDI could be exported back into the notation program for final printing.

pbognar


@daveny5 - this is not a response to your post - I was writing while you were writing your post...
 
The intent of Staff View in Cakewalk / Sonar has always been about inputting and editing MIDI data on a staff, otherwise why would it exist?  With the latest hot fix to X1b, the duration function bug introduced in X1b appears to have been fixed, however the staff view duration key bindings are still broken in X1b, so even with Cakewalk having removed the musical note duration icons in the staff view, they have even made it impossible for Sonar Plus to bring back this functionality which existed in 8.5.3.  Nevermind that one no longer have different snap to grid settings for the various views is X1.  Currently in X1, we have actually taken a step backward in Staff View Land.  Hopefully there will be a hot fix to at least get us back to the sub par Staff View which existed from early Cakewalk Windows days right up to 8.5.3.
 
Now, with regard to printing scores - how can anyone say that function was never intended to be part of Cakewalk or Sonar, when there was a function to do so?  Why not just say Cakewalk and Sonar had/have basic score printing functions?
 
People:  if you want improvements in staff editing and / or printing, don't give up.  Let Cakewalk know that this is an important function for you.
 
If you are a user who uses neither staff editing nor printing, your input that you can live without it is like one of us saying that we can live without one of the features you feel is important.  My tolerance for some say "well, I never user staff view" gets on my nerves.  I never use Beatscape either.
 
Frankly, I'm pulling my hair out (I can't afford to lose any more).  How can anyone minimize the written language of music? 
 
I can understand if Sonar is unable to produce engraving quality notation, but the staff view is just as valid as the piano roll view.

Well said. There are many of us that totally sympathize.
 
And just to reiterate/clarify, it's been said many other times, we are not asking for a full blown Notation/Printing software a la Finale or Sibelius, we're just asking for a decent staff music writing feature. It is about time.

Combo

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.
 

Combo, my post was aimed at people who think we are asking for Sonar to be Notation program instead of having notation on par with Cubase, Logic or Protools.

Care to tell me how X1 has gone backwards in regard to Staff View?  I use the staff view extensively and always have (currently running Sonar 7) and need it not as a notation program, I have Sibelius for that, but for composition and inputting.  Is X1 not capable of doing everything in the staff view that Sonar 7 can?

Thanks!

Jerry Gerber
www.jerrygerber.com

vintagevibe

Combo

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.

Combo, my post was aimed at people who think we are asking for Sonar to be Notation program instead of having notation on par with Cubase, Logic or Protools.

+1000

"notation on par with Cubase, Logic or Protools." - it can't be any more succinct.  If only we could make this a sticky on the forum.

Well - I agree the notation in Sonar must work just as good as the previous version. I do not disagree with that a bit.

However - if you bring notation up to par with Cubase, just expect to pay as much for Sonar as for Cubase. Do not underestimate the complexity of programming of a full scale notation (complete with ornamentation and typesetting) including translating to MIDI. So - adding full scale notation would bring Sonar probably in the same price range as Cubase etc. That would increase the price with about $200,- or even more. Now - I do not use noatation in Sonar a lot, so for me it is just not worth the price increase. Personally (and this is really strictly personal) If I want to do notation only I use a simple free program like LillyPond: http://lilypond.org/ or a cheap program like Harmony Assistant: http://www.myriad-online...en/products/harmony.htm

I rather have Sonar for a lower price than Cubase etc., and let the people that really need a full blown notation pay $200,- for the "notation expansion". In practice however, it is just as easy to buy Sonar and -if you need it- buy a notation program on top of it.

As I said - notation in X1 has to be up to par with previous versions, but I just do not want to pay more for Sonar for something I rarely use. I do think that there are more users like me.

I agree with you JClosed except I'd go further and say that they might as well dump it all together as far as I'm concerned. And yes, I can read music.