Bill Mooney wrote:
Greetings All,
I am a newcomer to the list, and to Lilypond. Notwithstanding this I am
finding LP very satisfying to use and am currently setting some
hand-notation music for a friend - from which activity rises my query.
Would it be worthwhile to consider changing the way LP 'reads' its input
files to allow the use of UpperCase letters for the notes?
It seems to me, in my innocence, that this would allow, amongst other
things, a change to the way sharps/flats etc are dealt with ( eg Aa =
A-sharp, aA = A-flat, and other one-key-strokes for quarter-tones, etc,
etc... ), and might lead to dropping the need for the various 'language'
include files. It would also make global replacements of one particular
note very easy (if perhaps in notating handwritten score by someone who
is not very accurate in their note placement! ).
Regards
Bill
I'm hardly an expert in these matters but some things do occur to me
regarding your question.
As for eliminating the 'need' for language include files; These were
created, I presume, to facilitate note entry for people who learned
different note naming conventions. I'm American and learned B-flat,
C-sharp, etc. I also lived in Spain for a year and had to learn the
Spanish note names. Now I find myself in Iceland where the note naming
convention is the same as in German for the most part (one school
teaches what is, essentially, the Dutch naming convention). I simply
use the Dutch naming convention because I find it very compact and
consistent.* Having these language options eliminates the need for a
user to learn a different note naming convention.
As for changing the input note naming convention; I see no reason why
you couldn't create your own 'language' file based on your desire to use
upper-case note names. Simply open one of the language input files
(~\LilyPond\usr\share\lilypond\current\ly\) and make a new copy and then
edit it to suit your needs. In fact, even the default (Dutch) is a
'language include' file. It's simply the default. I would be surprised
if it were not possible to change the default.
As for easing global replacements of errors I'm not convinced it would
offer much of an improvement. There would doubtless be instances of
other text which could be affected by global replacements.
Hope this helps,
David
*Dutch and German differ in the naming of the B's:
English Dutch German
B-flat bes b
B b h
B-sharp bis his
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