On April 11th 2015, we announced the new vision and on-going plans for Sibelius that include more regular upgrade releases along with an upgrade and support plan for existing users, allowing you to always have access to the latest version of Sibelius and have access to support too. To help clarify how it will affect you and to what to expect in the coming year, I've put together the following hotly discussed areas of the recent announcements:
When will we see new features?
The next version of Sibelius will be released later in this quarter (i.e. before July). We'll the continue to release new features and functionality regularly after this. It's a change from our previous release cycle, which was every two years, so we'll be releasing features when they are ready rather than making you wait for other features to be ready at the same time.
How will this work with larger features that would normally take a long time to develop?
We regularly split the development team onto different tasks, allowing them to work in isolation from the rest of the team so aren't bound by the same release schedules. Their work can then be merged on to the main branch to be released when it's ready along with other improvements.
I already own Sibelius, how much will it cost me?
As an existing user of Sibelius 1 through to 7.5, you can upgrade for just $89. This gives you access to the latest version of Sibelius and a year of support and upgrades from that date. So, for example, if you have Sibelius 3, you receive all the features form 4, 5, 6, 7, 7.5 for just $89, plus a year of upgrades after that! The upgrades for the year thereafter work like this: say you upgrade in March 2016, you'll receive the version of Sibelius that is out then (under the hood it'll be 8.2, for example) and then receive upgrades through to March 2017, along with access to support in case you need it. When the time comes, to get the next year of support and upgrades, until March 2018, it's just another $89.
What happens if I don't renew the upgrade and support plan?
Your license will continue working so you'll never be without access to Sibelius. We'll have a grace period of a month for you to renew so you'll hopefully have enough time. If you miss it, you can get in touch with our support team and we can help you out and advise what the best course is. If you wait a longer time to renew, the best option would be to take out an annual subscription (costing $19.99/month). This will give you access to the latest version of Sibelius and support too.
Will you be doing minor updates too and who will be eligible for them?
Yes, as with previous releases, we'll likely to be releasing smaller updates that include bug fixes and other minor tweaks. These will be available to anyone on a subscription or upgrade plan and will likely also be available to those who may have just dropped off an upgrade and support plan.
I'm an existing Sibelius user, what options are available to me?
You can upgrade to the latest version of Sibelius at any time after we release, up until the end of June 2016, for individuals, and to the end of September 2016 for those from educational institutions with multiseat licenses. So, if you aren't in a position to upgrade straight away, you can wait and upgrade at a later date.
What features are coming?
Firstly, you'll see improvements to Sibelius that take advantage of new technology. The Surface devices from Microsoft combine the best of tablet and laptop and bring new capabilities with the Pen. You'll be able to tap in notes and edit them with the keypad, which we've given a fresh look too. To add to the reviewing features in Sibelius, we are introducing a new feature called 'Annotate', allowing you to write directly on the score with the Pen and mouse; useful for adding reminders in the score, marking up some edits or for making suggestions to a student's composition. The Surface devices come with an amazing multi-touch screen, so we now support multi-touch gestures to pinch-zoom on this and other laptop trackpads too.
We've also made Sibelius aware of DPI scaling on Windows. A number of years ago, we added support for Retina displays on Mac and it's time for Windows to get the same refresh. For now, the dialogs and floating panels look the same but you'll see updates in this area as we continue to make improvements. The trend is towards higher pixel density displays for devices running Windows and Sibelius now takes advantage of those running at 150% and upwards.
We're introducing a new way to activate Sibelius. You can now simply sign in, and you're done. No more manually copying and pasting serial numbers, IDs and codes to get activated. We're continuing to provide a solution for those machines that are offline too. Sibelius now comes with our Application Manager that combines the handling of your license, renewal, update notification, news and support information.
With Sibelius, we're bundling the latest version of PhotoScore and AudioScore. AudioScore now comes with a brand new recognition engine with improvements to MusicXML export, allowing for greater accuracy when converting audio to notation. PhotoScore now includes the new NotateMe 3 engine, allowing you to handwrite music directly onto the screen. Sibelius will come with the Lite versions of these apps, allowing you to try these features out. If you like what you see, you can then buy the full 'Ultimate' versions of these apps
We'll be posting more details about all these new improvements in due course
When can I get these features?
We're aiming to release these new features in the next month or so (by the end of June). We're wanting to make sure the features are in the best shape possible before releasing so please bear with us. We'll be bringing more news on the new features with workflow tips and tricks to help you get the most out of Sibelius.
So, what's next for Sibelius?
We have a strong plan for the next few years for the Sibelius family of products that include Sibelius, Sibelius | First, Sibelius | Cloud Publishing, Avid Scorch (our iPad app) and some new and exciting solutions too. We're aiming for a steady release of features for Sibelius itself, including some much needed technical work under the hood as well as some attention to the notation and user experience side of the application, which we'll announce these as they come around.
If you have any questions or want to know more about the new offers and features, please don't hesitate to get in touch (details below).
Sam
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Sam Butler | Product Manager | Sibelius
[email protected] | @avid_sam | @AvidSibelius
Contact the Sibelius support team:
www.sibelius.com/documents/contact_form.html
KB and other resources:
www.sibelius.com/support |