Re: finished second draft?

[Carl D. Sorensen]

On 8/15/08 3:25 AM, "Graham Percival" <address@hidden> wrote:

> On Fri, 15 Aug 2008 11:03:00 +0200
> Mats Bengtsson <address@hidden> wrote:
>
>> Carl D. Sorensen wrote:
>>>
>
>> I would propose to still introduce the <<{...} \\ {...} >> feature
>> first, but with some bells
>> and whistles saying that you might get problems together with lyrics
>> and automatic beaming
>> and telling where to look at that time.
>
> In the LM, definitely.  In the NR, these warnings might be more
> prominent, and/or Carl's suggestion about delaying << {} \\ {}>>
> until later in the chapter might be good -- especially in NR 3.

My model for the Learning Manual is that it answers the question "How do I
do something?"   The Notation Reference tells me "How do I solve problems
with something in the LM?", or "How do I extend what I learned in the LM?".

The shortcuts we learn in the LM are _very_ useful for setting simple music.
However, we often need to move beyond them to set real music.  This is where
the NR can be useful.  Somehow, the NR needs to explain both the full
notation and the shortcut.  The full notation is needed because we need it
to solve some real world problem.  The shortcut is useful because it often
makes things easier.

Explaining a shortcut in terms of "This shortcut notation is a shortcut for
doing 5 different things the long way, and here are the five things you are
doing" is, in my opinion, less useful than saying "Here are the five things
you need to do to accomplish foo.  There is a shortcut notation for
accomplishing these things."

The explicit teaching of both in the NR is, IMO, vital.  It's a matter of
opinion as to which comes first.  But it always seems awkward to explain a
shortcut in terms that have not yet been defined, which is why I prefer to
have the full syntax included before the shortcut *in the NR*.

Carl