How to effectively manage beaming patterns?

[metallissimus]

Hello there,

I finally bought N4 (couldn't resist the sale) and am currently working on my first project. I'm transferring an old piece initially written in Finale 2003 to Notion via MusicXML.
The piece has a part in which the beaming pattern in a 7/8 signature alternates between 2+2+3 and 3+2+2 every other measure, and somehow after import the beaming pattern is lost. What is the best way to restore this? The only way I found by now is setting a time signature for every single measure and then deleting it again, since the beaming pattern is preserved even after deleting it. But that's not really comfortable, I guess there must be a better way?

[Migot]

Hit -Shift M-
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9iuj71rtycpji ... .27.02.png

Hope to help
Alain

[metallissimus]

Thank you Alain, I already know that shortcut. Maybe I did not make my problem clear enough:
I can't find a way to assign a beaming pattern without assigning a time signature. But since the time-signature is the same (7/8) in every measure, I don't want to assign one over and over again, I just want to change the beaming pattern from 2+2+3 to 3+2+2 in every second measure.

[tubatimberinger]

There is a beaming tool you can use to manually beam notes (in the pallet). I found it to be a little clunky in how it works. Other than that, I don't think you can do it in one or two clicks as you seem to want.

-t

[metallissimus]

Thanks Tim, I guess then I'll have to stick to my solution I described above...
That's a little letdown, I hoped there would be a way to select multiple measures and set their beaming pattern at once.

[Admin]

Shift-B is the shortcut that brings up the beam tool. You can click on beams to make them go away, or you can click where there is not a beam to make one appear.

-Admin

[metallissimus]

My first reaction to the beam tool suggestion was: No, I don't want to use that on a full orchestral score for dozens of measures! But thinking about it I realized that in this specific case it's probably faster (it's just a matter of one ore two beams per voice) than my other solution.
Anyways, maybe you could think of a dedicated beaming pattern tool for the future? Something working like this:
Highlight (a) measure(s), open the tool (since this is something probably not used too often, it wouldn't even need a shortcut), enter the beaming pattern just like in the time signature tool now, and (all) the selected measure(s) is/are set to this pattern.