Re: Bar numbers on lines beginning with a partial measure

[Valentin Petzel]

Hello Jean,

in my opinion even if Gould did not specify this it is the most obvious 
solution to this, that is, the one solution everyone would come up with 
immediately.

Thus I think this would be a sensible default. Is there any good reason against 
using this by default?

Best,
Valentin

06.02.2022 10:38:27 Jean Abou Samra <jean@abou-samra.fr>:

> 
>> Le 6 févr. 2022 à 10:16, Aaron Hill <lilypond@hillvisions.com> a écrit :
>> 
>> I have for quite some time just relied on the default behavior where bar 
>> numbers are printed only for the first measure in each line (save the very 
>> first measure).  This works reasonably well as my musicians are able to 
>> locate measures by number fairly quickly.  However, there is an issue when I 
>> opt to split measures over a line break.  (This practice is quite common in 
>> hymnals, though I find it equally effective for modern music to avoid having 
>> pickup/trailing notes/lyrics straddling a line break.)  When the first 
>> measure on a line is a partial measure, no bar number is shown.  This means 
>> some lines in my lead sheets have no bar number for reference.  In some 
>> cases, I end up with no automatic bar numbers at all.
>> 
>> (Some code for context/reference...)
>> 
>> %%%%
>> midMeasureBreak = { \bar "" \break }
>> forceBarNumber =
>> \once \override Score.BarNumber
>> .break-visibility = #all-visible
>> 
>> { R1*4 \break
>> R1*4 r2 r4 \midMeasureBreak r4
>> R1*4 r2 r4 \midMeasureBreak r4
>> \forceBarNumber
>> R1*4 \bar "|." }
>> %%%%
>> 
>> As can be see above, I can manually override the bar number visibility, but 
>> it is not very elegant.  If I opt to reflow music, I would have to revisit 
>> the bar numbers to make sure only the ones I want are there.  It would be 
>> very nice if LilyPond could treat the first full measure as the effective 
>> first measure on the line w.r.t. break visibility settings.
>> 
>> Has anyone else encountered this and come up with a solution?  If not, I 
>> will dig around the existing engraver logic and see about submitting a patch 
>> should folks find the updated behavior desirable.
> 
> 
> Are you aware of the options to print a parenthesized bar number at the start 
> of the line if it's the continuation of a measure? See 
> input/regression/bar-number-visibility-* (sadly missing documentation at the 
> moment). I don't have an opinion on whether that is better practice or not 
> than what you suggest. It is, at any rate, what Gould recommends (Behind Bars 
> p. 490).
> 
> Best,
> Jean