Today we’re introducing a new layout mode for sheet music in Soundslice: Auto layout.

When it comes to laying out music in Soundslice, we previously had three options:

• Fluid automatically calculates the number of measures of music per line to fit your current screen.
• Paged treats the music as if it’s on a static sheet of paper, giving you control over line breaks.
• Horizontal scrolls your music “infinitely” to the right, without any line breaks at all.

Historically we’ve used Fluid layout by default — effectively optimizing for small screens. But we realized that, on larger screens, Paged layout is nicer because it honors intentional line breaks and generally results in music that’s easier to read.

So if Fluid is better for small screens and Paged is better for large screens...why not try to find a compromise? That’s what our new Auto layout does.

In Auto layout, we’ll use Paged if the notation area is large and Fluid if the notation area is small.

In our testing, we’ve found that this feels really nice. Music in Soundslice is readable and “ergonomic” in both large and small screens, depending on context.

Our player now uses Auto layout by default. You can always switch to one of the other layouts explicitly if you prefer those. We’ve redesigned the Layout section of our settings menu to include all four options:

Notes for Soundslice embeds

For those of you who embed Soundslice in your own website via our Licensing plan, note that Soundslice embeds still use the old behavior for the time being — i.e., there is no “Auto” layout available, and the default is still Fluid.

That’s because, for big player changes like this, we have a policy of giving our embed customers a month’s notice, rather than taking you by surprise. This gives you a chance to update any help files, screenshots or other documentation if you choose.

We’ll be making this change to all of our embeds in one month — May 16.