Re: how to make decisions?

[Francisco Vila]

2012/9/4 Trevor Daniels <address@hidden>:
> So what problems do the users have, exactly?  We should address this
> question first.  Janek apparently has his list, which would be a good start.
> But we should not invent problems where they don't exist.  I've probably
> read every email on the user list for the last 4 years, and inconsistent 
> parser
> rules have not figured prominently.  Another example is the considerable
> discussion so far about pre- and post-fix notation.  Again, has this been a
> problem prominent on the user list?  I don't think so.  So why try to solve 
> it?
> Especially in ways that would screw all existing code.  In fact, I don't think
> /users/ have any serious problems with the syntax as it currently exists,
> other than getting to grips with it initially.

Very true, in my opinion.

For newcomers, the whole paradigm is a challenge. However, once they
have the basics, musicians can learn the rules.

\offtopic {
New Spanish users find it difficult to get used to very common
keystrokes which are only under AltGr in Spanish keyboards. So, lesson
zero for the language from a practical POV is:

  {{{{
  }}}}
  \\\\
  {}{}{}{}
  \{} \{} \{}

Now you are prepared to write \relative f { c }.

What I once found embarrassing was to try \key d (and no \major or
\minor afterwards) and fail to compile because, in my mind, "in D"
means \key d \major with \major by default. Then I learned that \key
has two non-optional arguments and now I think optional arguments are
problematic.

Regarding \relative optional_pitch {}, I think the optional pitch is
very problematic and now it's time to mandate a pitch argument, forbid
the obsolete form "\relative {}" and convert-ly it into "\relative f
{}".

New non-English users often complain for having to remember the
keywords, of course. In my opinion, if you know the keyword by heart,
you also know whether it is prefix or postfix, and its number of
arguments. For me as an user, it would be a disaster to change the
beautiful, consistent, unique backslash character to three different
characters for prefix, postfix and neutral commands. It would generate
by itself more errors that the current status.

Sorry for the

} % off-topic.
-- 
Francisco Vila. Badajoz (Spain)
www.paconet.org , www.csmbadajoz.com