Revising "Transcribing Gregorian chant" (was Re: Setting Gregorian chant...)

[Aaron Hill]

On 2020-10-04 11:27 pm, Werner LEMBERG wrote:
> > I disagree with the approach the NR demonstrates. [...]
>
> Could you submit a patch that improves that?

A quick review shows that the entire section in question is likely in 
need of revision and updating.  As the workload at my church job is 
ramping up, I am uncertain I can commit the time to give this text the 
attention it deserves.  I feel like the spare time I do have is better 
spent addressing issues on the mailing list, so I apologize I cannot 
contribute more.

Some observations I can offer if it helps:

- There was a recent (as of 2.20) change to relocate some text closer to 
the supporting example.  This actually confuses the matter because 
material is no longer logically organized.  The subsection on "Stems" 
now only talks about \removing the engraver.  It used to additionally 
talk about \hiding the grob, but that content now appears sandwiched 
in-between two examples talking about timing issues.  Someone looking 
through the new docs might miss that \hide Stem is an option.  If it is 
desired to keep text and example co-located, then the subsections 
"Stems" and "Timing" likely do not need to be called out as such.

- Interestingly, one has to go back to 2.14 documentation to find the 
first snippet in the timing subsection properly fitting to a single line 
as described in the text.  Obviously something in 2.16+ changed the 
spacing and/or size of elements so that the "tens" syllable no longer 
comfortably fits on the line.  If I had to guess, it is that the word 
spacing within the reciting tones is wider than how individual 
LyricTexts can be spaced.

- Speaking of the above, the comment that text cannot span a line break 
only applies to the reciting tone text when it is combined as a single 
\markup.  However, neither the preceding snippet nor the following 
demonstrate this properly because they use the same lyric content that 
just about fits on a single line.  Perhaps an alternate text source or 
an artificial constraint on line-width would more clearly demonstrates 
the pros and cons.

- Aside from the fact that lying about X-extent is perilous, I am 
curious why the \override for LyricText.X-extent occurs within the 
\spiritus music variable and not the \spirLyr variable that is already 
within the Lyrics context.


-- Aaron Hill