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A few days ago I again heard of a friend who didn't achieve to download a score: he clicked on "PDF File" and didn't understand why he only got an explanation about different file formats...

I don't understand the utility, not of this page, but of its link at this place and size on the work page. It mainly speaks of deprecated file formats... why not deprecate it?!
At least − this link, and the information about the uploader etc., is of about no interest for the common user, and especially for newbies. Why not set it in small prints, like the other technical data on the left (# of DL etc.)?
(This would fix a minor layout problem: when the scanner or uploader name is more than a dozen of characters long, it is split unto one more line)

I edited the file entry template to try to fix this, but I'm not sure that what I've done so far is really an improvement. I moved the text to the line of small text underneath the download link. What do you think?

Since we've been discussing this over at Feldmahler's page on the wiki, I thought I'd bring up the question here: Do we really need to have a mention of the file format for scores at all? The huge majority of files on the site are PDFs, and the other formats we originally allowed (DJVU, Finale and Sibelius as I recall) have been deprecated at least unofficially. We're packing a lot of info into that second line, which is generating considerably more line-breaks than previously. This can start to be a problem on some of the longer pages (like those with orchestra parts, multiple arrangements) just in terms of user-navigability.

I originally wondered if having a very small PDF icon might serve our purpose here, but KGill helpfully reminded me that CPDL uses those icons to indicate a PDF download. Come to think of it, there are some other places where it is used for that purpose - so that idea would appear to be counterproductive.

As no one else seems to have any strong opinions, I think it might be good to change the second line back to what it was, and leave out the file formats link entirely (making it a curiosity to be accessed from the Contributor Portal). Audio files, the ones which should have their format displayed in some form, will not be affected (different template) - which leaves the question of what to do with their corresponding link. I think it would be preferable to keep the format of the second line uniform between the two filetype groups, so where should the link go for audio? (since the old location of the link will probably not be used)

Go ahead and change it back (though keep the little tweaks I made). I talked to Feldmahler about this issue. He wants to wait until we actually locate and get rid of the few odd non-PDF score files (there are less than 50 altogether) before eliminating the symbol/link altogether. There is an upgrade to the file-layout design in the near future, so moving the "PDF" back to the top line where it was before is probably best in light of the changes he will be making.

By 'little tweaks', do you mean specifically the changes in spacing you made?

Yes, since that line gets pretty crowded on files for parts where there are 8 horn parts in a single file, etc. I closed up the space a bit to allow for the more expansive pagination descriptions.