> there is no reason to reject ::| and :::| notation as far as I see.
You go on to suggest a more powerful formalism, so one reason would be
that we simply don't need it.
[Simon's message rearranged...]
> Additive complementary constructs (intriguing to me) could be:
> :<numeral>|
This looks good, but perhaps it would help to do the same as staff
notation here: use paired bracketing signs.
|<numeral>: ... :<numeral>|
Where the numerals must match. With a construct like this you don't
want people invoking it accidentally by a single miskeying; it might
not be obvious you'd made a mistake and you could perpetrate persistent
misinformation.
How this gets displayed is up to the staff notation software and maybe
the user. It could print "|::" and "::|" signs or "(3x)" above the
staff depending on what the programmer likes, or the user might be
given a choice. They mean the same, it's just a presentation issue.
Maybe we could add some free choice constructs the same way:
|2-: ... :2-| repeat at most once if you want
|2+: ... :2+| repeat at least once
No tearing hurry for that, I guess.
> :<"text">|
> the <"text"> construct would allow to specify freely any text that gives
> information on the number of repeats.
> examples:
> :"repeat this bit as often as you feel like"|
> :"3 times"|
> :"(3x)"|
> :"add one repeatation every time through"|
> by chance existing programs may accept this '"text"' like any other text
> in quotes, and only those who have such a feature implemented will
> recognize a '"text"' within the repeat sign as being a special text for
> describing the number of repeatations.
> In extention to this clever playback programms eventually could filter
> through the :'"text"'| and search for numerals and even numbers in words
> and use these for playback.
This sounds like a recipe for trouble:
... :"repeated only on the 1930 recording"|
but probably not repeated 1930 times, as an over-helpful player program
might conclude.
> As a final extention-extention :<numeral><"text">| could be allowed
> where the numeral defines the number of repeats for playback and the
> '"text"' is displayed. This may be usefull if the '"text"' does *not*
> contain computer-readable information, and the transcriber wants to
> suggest that the section should be repeated by the playback program
> three or maybe nine times exemplarily.
I much prefer this, it separates the bits computers and people are
expected to understand. Text should rarely be needed: only the last
of your examples is something a computer implementation would have
real trouble with (in fact I've seen a program that played cumulative
song tunes from a grammar rule specification some 20 years ago, but
the notation it interpreted wasn't as general as ABC).
Most often you'd want these textual instructions to be printed at the
start of the repeated section, so they might be better placed there in
the ABC as well.
=================== <http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/> ===================
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