Re: convert-ly problem

[Han-Wen Nienhuys]

Laura Conrad wrote:
> I don't think that's exactly what I'm asking for.  Of course I love
> being able to go back to any LaTeX file I or anyone else has ever
> written and use it to figure out how to do something this year.  But
> for lilypond, I'd just like to know that when my code becomes useless
> someone has:
>
>         Realized that they were making the change.  
>
>         Discussed the benefits of the change with someone who
>         is going to lose by the change.
>
>         Done some kind of cost/benefit analysis that says that the
>         change is worth the problems it will cause.
>
> Right now, I don't see that kind of discussion happening, which
> suggests that if it's happening anywhere, it isn't on the
> lilypond-user or lilypond-devel lists.  And if I'd paid for a feature
> that was going to be changed or discontinued, I would certainly want
> to be included in such discussions.

Discussing decisions beforehand is a nice democratic tradition, but Lily 
is not a democracy. If you disagree with a change, you're welcome to 
pose questions, but I am not going to solicit feedback beforehand. As 
one of more brilliant math profs explained to me: "if you have a good 
idea, just do it.  Getting permission beforehand is always more trouble 
than apologizing afterwards"

I have the impression that you think that I break stuff just for the 
pleasure of it. This is not true. I improve stuff for the pleasure of 
it, and I do think about compatibility repercussions, but some things 
just have to be fixed, and better be early than late. "Soft healers make 
stinking wounds," or so the Dutch saying goes.

> To take an example that isn't a major problem for anyone, what led to
> the choice of lyrics font in 2.6?  Did anyone who actually publishes
> vocal music have any input into that selection, what other fonts were
> considered, and why was this one decided on?  It seems to me that

See my other mail.

> there are enough lilypond users affected by this that it should have
> been discussed.  I know any experienced user who doesn't like it can
> probably figure out how to change it to something else, but it is the
> public face of what you can do with lilypond, and these hordes of
> potential new users you're trying to attract will be making their
> decision based on what the default looks like.

Funny that you should mention this.  I am not convinced that NCSB is the 
best font that we have (there is no bold-condensed version, which is 
what I want for lyrics), but I recall we also had several people 
applauding the move.

>     >> If I
>     >> manage to get a working lilypond development environment again,
>     >> I'll look at it.
>
>     HN> I recommend you to use the autopackages; they're less fuss to
>     HN> install, and they're made from snapshots that are known to
>     HN> work - somethign which can't be said of CVS.
>
> I seem to have better luck with CVS.  I haven't reported my
> autopackage failures because it seemed that other people were
> reporting similar problems, but I will if you think you've fixed all
> the problems that were reported before yesterday.

there has been a problem with libstdc++ , which has been fixed in the 
2.7 AP; I'm going to release a 2.6.2 with the same fix soonish.

>     >> At the moment, lilypond isn't really promising that, or if it is, it
>     >> isn't delivering very well.
>
>     HN> Also, "At the moment" is a bit of a misnomer if you are
>     HN> complaining of upgrading out of files which you entered over 4
>     HN> years ago.
>
> "At the moment" may have been a poor choice of words, but it does seem
> that the syntax changes over the last year have been more fundamental
> and far-reaching than previous changes.  That is, previously, I've had
> to deal with issues like "How do I tell lilypond not to automatically
> assume melisma in some circumstances?", now I have to deal with "How

> do I find the start of the note entry given that there's no longer a
> '\notes' statement?"

Frankly, I don't understand this remark. We just made the \notes mode 
the default, so it is no longer necessary.

--
 Han-Wen Nienhuys - address@hidden - http://www.xs4all.nl/~hanwen