Bob Archer wrote:
>
> At 09:05 PM 26-10-00 +0200, Frank Nordberg wrote:
>
> >Philip Rowe wrote:
>
> >> Is the printed output better than anything the ABC community can
> >> offer?
> >
> >Yes.
>
> That sounds like a challenge to me. In what way is the current output of
> abc programs lacking?
>
> Bob
First, to stop any possible complaints about confusing muscal data with
formatting, we're talking the output from abc programs here, not ABC
itself, so this time the formatting isn't only relevant, it's the main issue.
It's also important to note that I'm talking about music notation in
general. I find many of the abc-graphics programs to very suitable for
certain music styles, the one each was originally made for, and a couple
of others that just happens to fit in.
Finally, the issue here is grpahics "tadpole" notation directly from
ABC. Converting ABC to some high-level notation system like Lilypond is
a completely different issue.
I think I'll simplify it by concentrating on abc2ps and it's many
clones. Seems to me they account for more than 90 % of the graphical
output from ABC files nowadays. (The only other program that comes even
close in volume is BarFly, and nobody has ever claimed that to have high
quality professional graphics output.)
I think I can list six main reasons why I as a professional music
trancriber can't use abc2ps.
1. Lack of features in ABC
This alone would be enough to exclude any ABC-to-graphics converter
from professional high-level work. Apart from my own just-for-fun trad.
music transcriptions, I can't think of a single notation job I've had
that didn't at least require some dynamic markings. I could list other
music notation symbols misiing in ABC too, but I wouldn't know where to
stop, and you wouldn't like to get a 1MB+ e mail message.
2. Lack of fine control
No matter how good algorhihms a program uses for positioning the
various objects, some manual fine tuning is always needed. You might
have to shorten the stem of a ingle note a millimeter or two, a rest may
have to be positioned slightly higher or lower to avoid colliding with
notes in another part on the same staff etc. Most important are the
accentuation and slur problems. You'll almost always need some manual
fine tuning of that.
3. Allotment
The allotment (note spacing) table used by abc2ps is pretty fair. Not
very good (it tenbds to position the notes a bit too close to each
other), but not too bad either. But it's not nearly flexible enough.
It simply isn't possible to create a algorhitm for this that works every
time. Since we're comparing with Finale NoetPad, not the real Finale, I
have to admit that this is one of the major weaknesses of that program
too ;)
4. Notation style
abc2ps uses a very idiosyncratic that shouts out "early 20th century
British traditional music). I find it quite pretty to be honest, but I
can't say it's very appropriate for many other music style. There is
also some general flaws in the abc2ps note symbol design. Most important
is that the note heads are too big - or the lines are too close together...
In addition abc2ps isn't always very conesquent when it comes to style.
The tr trill symbol for example, is in a very "modern classic" style and
doesn't fit the general notation style at all.
(We had a similar discussion at the smt maillist a while ago, btw. Some
person - I don't remember his name - claimed that the even more
idiosyncratic "jazz" notation developed by US studio musicians from the
circuits around Basie's band in the 50s and 60s was *the only* correct
notation style.)
Again, I have to admit that Finale NotePad doesn't perform too well in
this respect either. Unlike the real Finale you are stuck with one music
font. But at least that font (Maestro) is a bit more neutral.
5. Readability.
I've already mentioned some factors that affect readability, such as
the incorrect propotion between note head size and line spacing, and the
slightly cramped allotment, but the overall scaling is far too small
too. I'd hate to be force to sightread complex music printed from
abc2ps. This seems to be a part of the general "early 20th century
British trad. music" style. It seems the trend there was to try to get
as much music as possible onto a page. That was, of course, done to
reduce printing costs, and I'm pretty certain that it was the only way
to publish something like the two O'Neill books at a reasonable price.
It does, however make the notation ahrder to read, and also very
vulnerable to print-quality reducing processes like photcopying,
on-screen viewing and converting to web graphics.
6. Page design
When it comes to adjusting the page design - the font, size and
positioning of titles etc., the space between the staffs, all those text
blocks you need...
Well, there simply is no such thing in abc2ps.
Oh, I suppose there is some obscure %% command that can do some of the
job, but it's not nearly enough - and far too complicated in any case.
-------
After all the complaining I've done recently, people may wonder why I
bother abou ABC at all.
The answer is of course that ABC is *extremely* useful for certain
purposes. You can work with ABC on any computer you have at hand (I did
most of the O'Neill 1001 work on my mother's battered old 386 and on my
Psion 3 pda), it's a useful notation system tiself - regardless of any
"standard notation" output, it's very compact, the ABC files are easily
transferable through e mail etc.
I wouldn't hesitate to claim ABC to be the best entry-level notation
system at the moment.
But if you're talking about ABC as an universally usable "professional"
typesetting system, all I can say is: Get real!
My main arguments for an ABC-to-ETF converter is:
a) it provides a path from ABC to one of the three major high-level
notation systems in use today. Idelly we ought to have such paths to all
three, but Sibelius seems to be impossible - they don't seem to be
interested in cooperating with anyne it seems. As far as I understand
there are already people working on abc2ly, so I suppose that one's
covered already.
b) with the introduction of Finale NotePad, an abc2etf converter would
open up for one more way to print basic ABC, far from perfect, but still
with many advantages over the present ones.
c) whether we like it or not, ETF seems at the moment to be the only
open and actually functioning music notation format on a complexity
level above ABC.
d) I believe an ABC-to-ETF converter would be far easier to make than
any of the other converters we have been talking about. Both are plain
text formats, and most every function in ABC has it's direct equivalent
in ETF. But mind you, I said "I believe". I have to admit I don't have
nearly enough programming knowledge to claim anything like that for
sure. If I had that, there wouldn't have been any such discussion. I
would just have done that job myself.
Frank Nordberg
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