Re: Contemporary notation (Re: GSoC projects list)

[David Kastrup]

Jeffery Shivers <address@hidden> writes:

> I've thought about this a lot, and I agree that OLL would be the
> obvious means to implement a *contemporary notation* package with
> LilyPond.
>
> A huge problem we will face with doing this, which will always be a
> problem no matter how accessible/robust the library, is that there
> will very often be some unexpected (and probably illogical) way that a
> composer wants to notate their music. So if our software doesn't
> support what they want, or they have to really *stretch* it to
> accomplish their needs, it makes sense for them to turn to something
> like inkscape for faster and more straightforward results, even though
> that process won't carry all the benefits/flexibility of engraving
> with a tool like LilyPond (for example, increasing the horizontal
> spacing between everything in a multi-page score on a big ole inkscape
> document is a much bigger deal than it is in LilyPond).
>
> This is all to say, "contemporary notation" encapsulates so many
> possibilities, it'll be a tricky and probably exhausting process to
> figure out the best way to make its use available to as many users as
> possible. Not saying that to be discouraging, just realistic.

Man, that sounds to me like making explosives available to as many users
as possible.  I mean, I recognize that there is a need apparently to be
served, but this rather sounds like a call to expanding that need.

-- 
David Kastrup