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Windows installation

Installing JW Lua

To use these JW Lua scripts, you first need to install JW Lua. Luckily, this is a one-time process.

  1. Download the most recent version of JW Lua for your version of Finale.
  2. Double-click the downloaded file to unzip it. This will create three files. Unlike installing most programs, you will not need to run or open these files file. Instead, we just need to move them into your Finale plug-ins folder (see next steps).
  3. Find your Finale plug-ins folder (If you’re not sure where it is, you can always check in the Folders section of your Finale > Preferences > Folders).
  4. In that folder, create a new JW Lua folder.
  5. Move the unzipped files into the newly created folder and restart Finale.

Congratulations, you're all set!

Installing scripts

Once you've installed JW Lua, you can now install and run the JW Lua scripts.

  1. Find the script you want and click "download". This will download a .lua file. You can search for and find scripts on the homepage of this site.
  2. Save the downloaded script. You can save it anywhere on your computer, though make sure you can keep it there permenantly. The two most common places to save these JW Lua scripts are in the same folder as the three unzipped files from installing JW Lua, or a cloud-synced folder (like for Dropbox or Google Drive).
  3. Open Finale and open a document. The plug-in menu does not appear unlesss a document is opened.
  4. Go to Plug-ins > JW Lua > JW Lua… to open the JW Lua plug-in.
  5. Go to the manager tab and click on the [menu] plug-in group.
  6. Click "open" next to the Plug-in Groups section. Note that there are two "open" buttons. You want to click the top one.
  7. Find the saved .lua and select it. Click "open", and the file should now be listed under Items in Group.
  8. Close JW Lua. You may also get a warning that the changes will not be reflected until you restart Finale, you can close this warning.
  9. Restart Finale and view the new script under Plug-ins > JW Lua. You can now run this script!