Re: Volunteering with LilyPond

[Reilly]

Eyolf,

On Jan 6, 2008, at 12:00 PM, address@hidden wrote:

> example, the problem is not so much knowing what it means -- that can 
> be
> looked up quite easily -- but to know (a) what kind of variations does 
> a
> user expect? does size matter? angle? are different symbols or styles 
> in
> use, and are they informative variations, etc.; (b) figure out how to
> effect all these variations through Lilypond code; (c) choose how much 
> of
> this is really needed in the docs, and how much of it can be written
> meaningfully without violating the "don't comment the examples 
> directly"
> principle.

Perhaps I misunderstand the purpose of Graham's example question. The 
quality and useful of answers would depend on asking the RIGHT 
questions. I partially disagree that things are easy to look up. Easy, 
yes, if the question is simple and you know exactly what it is that you 
are looking up. In my experience, it is almost always more informative 
to ask someone who is an "expert of sorts" in the area I am confused. 
In re your clarification re falls and doits above (a), yes, lots of 
variations, sometimes the length of the gliss indicates length of fall 
or doit. The fall/doit "symbol" is something like a musical font. I 
personally would not tweak this feature much, unless I hated the preset 
symbol. (b) can't help. (c) good question!


> Your suggestion of a group of music consultants is fine, and I intend 
> to
> try to distribute some responsibility along similar lines when we come 
> to
> the Specialist notation chapters (so that Graham would not have to 
> write
> the guitar section), but I fear that such a group would tend to become 
> too
> loose (volunteers come and go), and it would probably be too much of a
> hit-and-miss thing -- can I expect to have a sax player in the group 
> when I
> write about doits? Maybe, maybe not. It is probably more practical if
> people write in with concrete suggestions if something is missing, 
> wrong,
> or unclear in their particular field of expertise.

I think we disagree slightly on how my proposal would work (or, 
perhaps, how people behave). If I have to notate a classical guitar 
passage and I consult the Lilypond documentation and I find it 
inadequate, it is expecting a lot of my --- aka, the casual music 
engraver --- to rewrite the documentation and send it to "somebody." (I 
don't even know to whom I would send it.) On the other hand, if I am a 
subscriber to a Lilypond Resource List and a specific question comes 
along to which I know the answer, I think I would be inclined to answer 
it. I do agree that from the documentation team's point of view it is 
more practical for volunteers to commit to rewrite sections of the 
manual.

Jeremiah

ps: How would an English speaker pronounce your name?