FUTURE-PROOFING SIBELIUS – A PERSONAL SOLUTION
by Andrei Pricope (© April 2015)
Having been a Sibelius user since Ver. 4 (2005), I have over time invested hundreds of hours of my own engraving and many thousands of dollars in out-sourced engraving projects (mostly of the violin, viola, and cello repertoire), not to mention a substantial investment in both hardware and notation software (Sibelius upgrades from Vers. 4 to 7, and for duplicate copies of 7.1).
More recent developments suggest that Sibelius may well be at the whim of its parent entity, and Avid’s corporate vision, priorities, and budget – a situation less than ideal, perhaps, for the Sibelius community and even music-making at large; hence my deep concern about the long-term viability of my investment, and the urgency to future-proof it in an effort to prevent potentially substantial loss.
A SHORT RECENT HISTORY OF SIBELIUS
Sibelius was acquired by Avid on August 2nd, 2006 (during Sibelius Ver. 4). The latest major upgrade, Sibelius Ver. 7 (July 2011), introduced the new ribbon-based user interface (inspired by MS Office), native 64-bit support, a 38GB professional sound library including specialized playing techniques, advanced text and typographic handling, enhanced graphics import/export, and MusicXML import/export.
In the Autumn of 2012 (during Sibelius Ver. 7), Avid terminated Daniel Spreadbury, long-time product manager, and his London-based Sibelius team. Many Sibelius users undoubtedly remember Daniel’s most helpful and timely technical support; he was also the author (mostly) of the comprehensive and sometimes even humorous Sibelius Reference Guide (highly recommended!). Most of the old Sibelius team subsequently began developing a new, from-the-ground-up music notation solution for Steinberg, yet to be released, but highly anticipated. Incidentally, Steinberg, the maker of Cubase and WaveLab, has been a division of Yamaha since October 2004.
Under the new team lead by Sam Butler (senior product manager), Sibelius released:
Most Sibelius users seem to still use Ver. 6 or Ver. 7.1, and have decided to take a wait-and-see approach, given recent developments. Likewise, many users might agree that Sibelius had reached its maturity point by Ver. 6 (May 2009). Personally, I am very happy with Ver. 7.1.3 (released Sept. 2012), the last version upgrade developed by the stellar team headed by the aforementioned Daniel Spreadbury.
In today’s rapid-changing technology environment, and with the more recent dramatic changes at Sibelius, I’ve recently adopted the following system of archival, backup, and redundancy, out of an abundance of caution.
HARDWARE
Since Sibelius’ “new era” started in late 2012, I have acquired five Mac Minis that are specifically dedicated to Sibelius software and files (I’m not taking any chances here).
SOFTWARE
SIBELIUS FILES
In addition to saving my files in Sibelius 7.1.3 (.sib), I plan to save and batch-archive all of my files in MusicXML (.xml) and PDF (.pdf) formats, for redundancy, on a couple of external hard drives and/or USB flash drives, thus ensuring their being able to be read, edited, printed, shared and saved as needed, on and between a multitude of computers.
The MusicXML file format meets the following important criteria related to longevity: it is currently supported by a diverse and hopefully growing group of music programs, and it is essentially ASCII text, therefore platform- and OS-version agnostic.
I hope this may help others to find their own solutions to future-proof their Sibelius investment and capabilities, albeit perhaps less obsessively… I look forward to other ideas, strategies, and welcome any feedback!
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Having been a Sibelius user since Ver. 4 (2005), I have over time invested hundreds of hours of my own engraving and many thousands of dollars in out-sourced engraving projects (mostly of the violin, viola, and cello repertoire), not to mention a substantial investment in both hardware and notation software (Sibelius upgrades from Vers. 4 to 7, and for duplicate copies of 7.1).
More recent developments suggest that Sibelius may well be at the whim of its parent entity, and Avid’s corporate vision, priorities, and budget – a situation less than ideal, perhaps, for the Sibelius community and even music-making at large; hence my deep concern about the long-term viability of my investment, and the urgency to future-proof it in an effort to prevent potentially substantial loss.
A SHORT RECENT HISTORY OF SIBELIUS
Sibelius was acquired by Avid on August 2nd, 2006 (during Sibelius Ver. 4). The latest major upgrade, Sibelius Ver. 7 (July 2011), introduced the new ribbon-based user interface (inspired by MS Office), native 64-bit support, a 38GB professional sound library including specialized playing techniques, advanced text and typographic handling, enhanced graphics import/export, and MusicXML import/export.
In the Autumn of 2012 (during Sibelius Ver. 7), Avid terminated Daniel Spreadbury, long-time product manager, and his London-based Sibelius team. Many Sibelius users undoubtedly remember Daniel’s most helpful and timely technical support; he was also the author (mostly) of the comprehensive and sometimes even humorous Sibelius Reference Guide (highly recommended!). Most of the old Sibelius team subsequently began developing a new, from-the-ground-up music notation solution for Steinberg, yet to be released, but highly anticipated. Incidentally, Steinberg, the maker of Cubase and WaveLab, has been a division of Yamaha since October 2004.
Under the new team lead by Sam Butler (senior product manager), Sibelius released:
- Ver. 7.5 in February 2014 (minor upgrade, evolutionary not revolutionary), and
- Ver. 7.5.1 in July 2014 (mostly bug fixes and improvements).
Most Sibelius users seem to still use Ver. 6 or Ver. 7.1, and have decided to take a wait-and-see approach, given recent developments. Likewise, many users might agree that Sibelius had reached its maturity point by Ver. 6 (May 2009). Personally, I am very happy with Ver. 7.1.3 (released Sept. 2012), the last version upgrade developed by the stellar team headed by the aforementioned Daniel Spreadbury.
In today’s rapid-changing technology environment, and with the more recent dramatic changes at Sibelius, I’ve recently adopted the following system of archival, backup, and redundancy, out of an abundance of caution.
HARDWARE
Since Sibelius’ “new era” started in late 2012, I have acquired five Mac Minis that are specifically dedicated to Sibelius software and files (I’m not taking any chances here).
- all my five Mac Minis are 2011-2012 Intel quad-core (no Core 2 Duos); three have i7 and the other two have i5 Intel processors; three with dual 500GB HDs (“server” Minis), one with 128GB SSD+500 GB HD, and one with just a single 500GB HD. Four of the Minis have 8GB RAM, one has 16GB; these are fast and capacious computers! Average cost was $475/computer, all from CraigsList (Chicago), over time. The Minis can easily be connected to my 28” i-Inc monitor (via HDMI)
- two 27” iMacs (2009 i7 16GB RAM 240GB SSD 1TB HD; 2011 i5 16GB RAM 256GB SSD)
- a 2012 15" MacBook Pro Retina
SOFTWARE
- I have four Sibelius licenses: one COMPETITIVE crossgrade (from Encore, which I used previously), one FULL license, and two ACADEMIC licenses (around $275 each on Amazon), so a total of eight possible computers with Sibelius 7.1.3 installed on them (each license can be installed on two computers simultaneously)
- all five Minis also have Sibelius First 7.1 installed (five-pack for $240 on Amazon), just in case!
- Mac Minis are kept up-to-date to the latest OS (currently Mac OS X Yosemite 10.10.3), as well as the latest Flash, Java, and Acrobat Reader.
- any other software installed on the Minis is held at an absolute minimum to prevent ANY possible problems, conflicts, or incompatibility
SIBELIUS FILES
In addition to saving my files in Sibelius 7.1.3 (.sib), I plan to save and batch-archive all of my files in MusicXML (.xml) and PDF (.pdf) formats, for redundancy, on a couple of external hard drives and/or USB flash drives, thus ensuring their being able to be read, edited, printed, shared and saved as needed, on and between a multitude of computers.
The MusicXML file format meets the following important criteria related to longevity: it is currently supported by a diverse and hopefully growing group of music programs, and it is essentially ASCII text, therefore platform- and OS-version agnostic.
I hope this may help others to find their own solutions to future-proof their Sibelius investment and capabilities, albeit perhaps less obsessively… I look forward to other ideas, strategies, and welcome any feedback!
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