Music Software & Bad Interface Design: Avid’s Sibelius by Tantacrul (not mine)
YouTube description: "In this video, I take a detailed look at the design of Avid’s Sibelius - a popular music notation application. Sibelius is the embodiment of what not to do as a user experience designer and this video covers a range of examples of inappropriate design patterns and bad user interface choices. Then I go insane.
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This really is one of the great examples of breaking all UI design principles and every UX design principle too. It’s like a design bull in a musical china shop."
I have raged at Sibelius numerous times when I was told “It’s the best music notation software out there.” Finale, the other big corporate music notation software, touting itself as more user friendly, has a garbage UI. It’s because of this YouTuber that I found out about MuseScore (for which he’s worked on the UI), and I was psyched to see he’s part of Audacity as well. I’m fully switched over to MuseScore now, and I’m staying there. Plus it’s FOSS!
MuseScore’s reaction to his criticism was incredible, and they have made incredble strides recently.
I agree with you about Finale’s UI just being, well, unattractive. All things considered, if I get into composing again, I would love to take Dorico out for a spin.
I agree about MuseScore’s reaction. I really like the way MuseScore 4 feels, and the MuseHub is pretty useful. Check out Tantacrul’s video on Dorico. I found it informative.
As someone who is in software development world, I can say not everything is to be blamed on developers. Many times companies will downright refuse to hire people to design user interfaces properly or invest time into tidying up existing interfaces. Managers often only look at graphs and ignore the users. User’s don’t matter, their money does.
Now am not defending this company, but still…