Re: lilypond-book: filename option

[John Williams]

On Mon, 4 Apr 2005, Han-Wen Nienhuys wrote:

> address@hidden writes:
> > This resurrects the filename option and makes it do something useful.
> >
> > If <lilypond filename="bach"> is given, "bach" will be used as the
> > basename for the files (instead of "lily-12345678").
> >
> > This allows the files to have friendlier names, and for the snippets
> > to be managed better.
>
> Can you explain this in more detail?

Having predictable filenames for the music snippets in a project makes
them a whole lot easier to manage, especially if it turns out that you
need to do something which the lilypond authors did not think of for you.

For example, say lilypond-book chokes on your source file because python's
regexp engine could not handle a file that large.  You might pull the
sections with music snippets into a smaller file or files, in order to run
lilypond-book on them.  But keeping the main file in sync with the music
snippets is going to be a disaster if the .png you need to link to has a
new unpredictable random name every time you tweak the music.

Or maybe you would like some of the music images to link to midi files
instead of lilypond source files.  (For example, if you are *not* trying
to educate your readers on how to use lilypond.)  Creating the midi files
and linking to them is a lot easier if you know what the names of the the
.ly and .midi files will be.  Especially if you do not want to link to
_all_ of them because some are rather trivial, like a single quarter note.

Or maybe you would just prefer that your user see "bach-cantata-1.png" in
the browser or html source instead of "lily-394747432.png".

~ John Williams