Re: [Denemo-devel] Sibelius 7 to LilyPond Conversion!

[Thomas Wilmot]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Richard Shann
> Sent: Thursday October 29, 2015 6:14 p.m.
> To: Thomas Wilmot
> Cc: address@hidden
> Subject: Re: [Denemo-devel] Sibelius 7 to LilyPond Conversion!
> 
> 
> On Thu, 2015-10-29 at 16:07 -0300, Thomas Wilmot wrote:
> > > -----Original Message-----
> [...]
> > Yes, the big and boring part, all those notes are the most 
> important 
> > part that I think most would be concerned with. I'd have agree that 
> > lyrics aren't the highest priority!
> 
> Well, if people have spent a lot of time dividing some lyrics 
> into syllables for some program (like Sibelius) and can't get 
> those divided syllables out as a pastable bit of text then 
> there would be mileage in it... in Denemo a verse is just a 
> length of text with bits of LilyPond syntax for things like 
> verse numbers or bold, italic ... [...]

That is true, but I personally don't use lyrics that often and I'm just saying 
that notes would of course be above them in importance!

> > > Did you try the scripts to fix Sibelius's output? Do you need
> > > help running them? Did you try File->Export As->Quick 
> > > LilyPond Part to get just the music of the current part 
> into a file?

I have been scratching my head regarding this feature since I first saw it.
I tried exporting the full score from Sibelius, then importing it into Denemo 
and trying the "Quick LilyPond Part" option.  I thought it might try to export 
just whichever part was selected, but it exported the entire thing as it 
normally would.  I still don't understand what it's supposed to do.  It's great 
to have so many tooltips, but the program would be a lot easier to learn if 
they were more explicit.  Also there are random windows popping up when I do 
certain things like selecting a measure.

> > 
> > Yes the scripts to fix Sibelius's output would likely be 
> useful as I'm
> > pretty sure every single error fixed by it is in my score!  
>  I haven't tried
> > them as I do need help running them.  I've been using Frescobaldi 
> > since last month but only installed Denemo yesterday so 
> have no idea 
> > about scripting!
> 
> Well in brief, you open the window View->Scheme past the 
> script in and click the Execute button.
> 

So I tried this.  I got the window open, and wasn't sure which text field to 
paste the code in, so I tried both.  There was no indication that anything was 
happening.  I also wasn't sure whether or not the <8>s were supposed to be part 
of the code or not so I tried running it with and without them and still it 
didn't seem like anything happened.  I tried re-setting the score by clicking a 
button in the Print window and it didn't look any different.  The most 
noticeable thing is that there are a bunch of empty measures, some of them with 
rests in them, some of them not.  This is a multi-measure rest in the original 
score and not at all big deal to clean up by hand but I thought the script 
might fix it.
> 
> > > 
> > > Perhaps you are thinking you would like to do this operation
> > > repeatedly
> > > - that is, you are thinking of entering the music using 
> > > Sibelius and then typesetting it with LilyPond? Denemo is 
> > > seriously quicker and more musical for entering music; it is 
> > > just that - a music inputting program, with everything 
> > > tailored to getting music into the computer in the most 
> > > convenient and least tedious way possible.
> > 
> > I need to do this operation repeatedly because I have 
> multiple parts 
> > in my score (I thought it would be best to do each part seperately, 
> > then re-assemble the entire project using Frescobaldi's Wizard for 
> > score
> > structure.)
> 
> Well that is not what I would call repeatedly, since when you 
> are done with this you won't be creating yet more Sibelius 
> files to be transferred. And certainly, if you are going to 
> end up with it all in Frescobaldi you can wait till then and 
> transform it all to \relative with a single mouse-click.
> 
Yes that is very handy; I'm glad to know about it now!
> 
> > I have been using LilyPond since about 2011 and I 
> absolutely love it!  
> > The only reason I am using Sibelius is because I have to transfer a 
> > friend's Sibelius score into LilyPond and re-engrave it for 
> a project.
> > 
> > I really like Frescobaldi though I just kind of discovered it,
> 
> yes, it is a really good program, and very nice to look at too.
> 
> >  but I might
> > look into Denemo more seriously later on.
> > I just say it's bizzare because it's a very unusual way of 
> inputting 
> > music
> 
> this would be the most interesting contribution you may have 
> for Denemo
> - describing other ways of entering music which might be 
> good. Denemo is highly configurable so if there is a way of 
> entering music that people would immediately feel comfortable 
> with and is not hopelessly inefficient it would be a good 
> idea to make it available in Denemo.
> 

Yes!  I have watched a few videos on input with Denemo at it seems fascinating, 
but just very different. Just like how LilyPond would seem to the average 
musician used to Sibelius or what have you!

> > (though I suppose many people would say that about LilyPond 
> too) and 
> > because the interface is kind of rough hewn (it doesn't 
> even have its 
> > own application icon),
> that's just a Windows installation bug, the icon is there but 
> in the wrong place ... part of that rough hewn look :)
> 
LOL!
I browsed through the installation folder a bit and found a PNG in <C:\Program 
Files\GNU Denemo\usr\share\pixmaps>, but it was 60x60 pixels and also not an 
icon of course!
I am using my own custom made icon for the shortcut now but the icon in the 
taskbar is just a cube that says GTK on it.

> >  and completely non-native to Windows which makes the text 
> render kind 
> > of blurry since it doesn't seem to use system fonts
> it comes with its own font so as to be able to write note 
> glyphs in sentences and have them be easily read - you can 
> change the font via the preferences but you may find it 
> difficult to read the difference between
> 𝅗𝅥 and 𝅘𝅥 for example.

I saw a setting for "default font specification" which had a text field with 
"Denemo 9" written in it.
Is that how you change the font?  I typed a different font name in the field 
but it is strange it wouldn't have a list to choose from.

My problem is not with the font the music itself is set in in the main 
windowpane. My big problem is with the font displaying the rest of the 
interface such as the menus and tooltips.  I expect it to be MS Sans Serif in 
every single program everywhere, since that is what I have it set to!
To be fair, sometimes even Microsoft's programs override this user system 
preference (which is awful) but they always replace it with something while 
still inferior, still hinted and NEVER anti-aliased!
This is a HUGE deal for me when using any program or Web site.  Microsoft 
released a number of Web fonts for everyone, well hinted at all small sizes 
which became a standard since they were free for everyone, and now so many 
sites are using these plug-in Google fonts, some of which are pretty darn good 
(like the one YouTube is using everywhere now), and others of which look 
horrifically blurry!
The one on the Denemo site is one of the better ones, except for the two-story 
lower-case italic g, which looks ridiculous!
That is a small offense however!

> >  or respect
> > settings like disabling font smoothing, as well as being generally 
> > slow. Maybe it's because it uses GTK instead of Qt. Also I 
> didn't like 
> > how the installer installs its own special version of 
> LilyPond (which 
> > seems to be the development 2.19 or some reason) even when 
> the latest 
> > stable version LilyPond is already installed instead of asking the 
> > user.
> 
> this is a misunderstanding on your part, Denemo does not 
> install LilyPond but rather has a version built-in. Your own 
> installed version is untouched and you can tell Denemo to use 
> it via the preferences. Having a built-in version has obvious 
> benefits for the naive user and it means there will 
> definitely be a compatible version of LilyPond available. 
> (Don't try to use a ten-year-old version of LilyPond, the 
> syntax has changed too much!)

Ahahaha, well it does install LilyPond as I see it, but it's just inside of the 
Denemo installation folder!
(Unless you're distinguishing between a "real installation" and "portable-style 
installation")
Of course it doesn't intefere with any other version of LilyPond the user might 
have installed since it's in a different folder, and I definitely agree it's 
nice to have it installed by default to make life easier for the new user, 
(defaults are important!) but I'm just arguing that I think it should be an 
option in the installer that can be un-ticked for those of us who are seasoned 
LilyPond users but are just trying out Denemo.  The "built-in" LilyPond is 
obviously not essential since there is an option in the preferences to change 
to a different version elsewhere!
The other thing is that the link to Denemo on LilyPond's "easier editing" page 
where I found out about it has no indication that a copy of LilyPond comes with 
the program (or that it doesn't with any of the others.)
> > 
> > I hate to sound so negative
> 
> not at all, it is nice to have feedback...
> 
> >  and I don't have time to test the upcoming
> > version 2 at the moment but those things just really turn me off of 
> > using programs. </unnecessary_rant>

> yes - I think you are by no means alone, commercial programs 
> concentrate on appearance because that is what gets people to 
> use them.
> 
> > On the positive side, the toolbar icons are actually nicer than 
> > Frescobaldi's
> 
> Hmm, "toolbar icons" are those the ones like New, Open, Save 
> ...? I'm not sure what set you get on windows, but that is 
> one of the first toolbars that I get rid of as it wastes 
> space and you can use the keyboard for the tasks more quickly :)

Yes those toolbar icons!  I suppose they might not be that useful all the time 
when we have keyboard shortcuts, but they are the nicest-looking thing about 
the program IMHO!
Now that I look at it again, I suppose they do take up a lot of room.
The entire toolbar just for the "Create Snippet" button is certainly a waste of 
space however.
> 
> > and it is nice how it just uses LilyPond to compile in the 
> background 
> > when you're not paying attention!  :)
> 
> Once you are using Denemo for seriously entering music you 
> will turn it off as you can enter music so fast that it 
> causes hiccups. I turn it on when doing tweaks such as 
> re-shaping slurs or dragging rehearsal marks (yes, LilyPond 
> does *sometimes* misplace things), and even in that case if 
> the score is a large one I reduce the re-drawing just to the 
> cursor context so that it is done quickly enough.

I can see that.

> 
> Thank you for the feedback.
> 
> Richard
> 
> 
> 
Thank you for the assistance!