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| From: | Kris Shaffer |
| Subject: | Re: User Experience Engineering |
| Date: | Sat, 07 Jan 2006 23:37:44 -0500 |
| User-agent: | Opera M2/8.5 (MacPPC, build 2173) |
On Sun, 8 Jan 2006, Joshua Koo wrote:I have no say in Lilypond development, but I do have similar thoughts I would like to share (well as maybe a more bias windows user).It seems to me that part of the issue that's at play in this thread is a matter of porting software from a Unix-based environment to Windows. Unix/Linux philosophy is very accepting of finding whatever editor works best for the user for the given application (in this case, creating lilypond files), where the Windows philosophy seems to be that if it
If after all the purpose of lilypond is produce beautiful scores, why cant the input be visual? I dont have the answer. For me, if I wanted to compose, in my mind would be thinking where the notes on the score for entry, rather than what are the pitch names.Not being the sort who can compose at a computer (I'm a pen(cil) and paper man), I can't really understand this sentiment. I can respect it in others, but I can't understand it. Typesetting software, in my opinion, is not the best environment for composing; it is, however, an ideal environment for taking something that's already composed and making it look professional. I'm very comfortable using Finale, at least as comfortable as I am with Lilypond. I still can't compose in it, in spite of the fact that it is a (more) visually-based entry system.
As a composer, I don't prefer using the mouse or the text keyboard when "composing at a computer." My current preferred method is a MIDI keyboard and Digital Performer, using simultaneously the MIDI (like a piano roll) and QuickScribe (staff notation) viewers, but focusing mostly on the MIDI view. While, as Joshua points out, there are limitations to using text to represent music while composing, there are also limitations to staff notation, both in its description of the musical sounds (for example, staff notation requires decisions regarding chromatic and rhythmic spelling, where MIDI representation in DP is spelling-independent and visual distances are consistent for any spelling of an interval or duration) and in the efficiency of entering the music, particularly when armed with nothing but a mouse. Thus, I have found Sibelius, and especially Finale, to be limiting when composing, especially during the experimental stages, where I move things around a lot. A final manifestation of a passage I compose in Sibelius ends up with a ton of ties and double-sharps and the like after all the transpositions, inversions, and moves. The MIDI representation in DP is not that way, nor is the QuickScribe notation which is derived from it. Sibelius and Finale are least problematic when the piece is finished and I am creating a final score. However, at that point, Lilypond is more intuitive, faster, and produces a better score, so I use it instead. And, as others have mentioned, typesetting from scratch in Lilypond (after composing a piece in DP) is as fast or faster than cleaning up a MIDI import from DP into Lilypond, Finale, or Sibelius.
I think this process I use is another example of the UNIX/Linux way of doing things. Some have mentioned the ability to use one of many programs for the same task, depending on the task or the user; but I think another aspect is choosing a different combination of single-task programs depending on the overall task and the user. For theory graphics, I combine Lilypond with Adobe Illustrator. For composing, I use Digital Performer and Lilypond. For typesetting parts and doing Schenker graphs, just Lilypond.
The contrast is the typical Windows user who wants one program to do it all. I think that many believe that will be cheaper and easier to learn; however, my work has been more efficient since splitting up the tasks into the programs which perform them best, and I think the programs have been easier to manage when I have less to remember about each particular interface. Additionally, Digital Performer + Lilypond costs about the same as Finale or Sibelius (academic), and Lilypond + Illustrator is less than $100 (academic), for those who don't need MIDI, but want more advanced GUI graphics than is easily done with Lilypond alone. So, the a la carte way of doing things is not more expensive, or more difficult; but it produces better results. It also will allow some to apply a "visual" way of doing things to Lilypond's beautiful notation, without changing the typesetting environment for other users.
In my opinion, Lilypond, Digital Performer, and Adobe Illustrator are all the best at what they do; or at least the best at what I use them for. All of them have an efficient and useful interface, even if they all take some time to learn. And they work together well enough that there is no good reason to make Lilypond try to do what DP, Illustrator, or Sibelius do well. Development efforts will be better spent in improving Lilypond further, or at making it interface better with some of these other applications, which seems to be the way it is already going.
Incidentally, some aspects of this issue has also been recently discussed on the Society for Music Theory mailing list, and as a response to that, I put together a short essay and some graphical examples on my website: www.shaffermusic.com/graphics.html. Hopefully some will find it helpful.
-- Kris Shaffer graduate student in music theory, Yale University co-editor-in-chief for music theory, AmSteg.org www.shaffermusic.com
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