I implemented abcsound by reference to Steve Mansfield's abc tutorial[1]. But upon reading the actual abc specification[2], I found that I had got a couple of things wrong. I have fixed two fairly major problems:
- The broken-rhythm notation "A>B", which should be interpreted as "A3/2B/2", is now working properly.
- Repeats should now be working properly, including alternate endings, which were hideously broken in the inital release.
As usual, abcsound can be found here: http://www.kneuro.net/ezscore/
Future work:
- Within the next day or so I intend to implement abc's basic n-let (triplet etc) notation. The general "(x:y:z" n-let notation may not happen for a while.
- I intend to implement a mechanism for abc's "decoration" notation to allow either in-line or out-of-line manipulation of each instrument's p-fields. Something like:
|abc{p5=100,p6=>}def|, or alternatively,|abc{?12}def|, where?12is a reference to list of p-field values defined elsewhere:csound ?12 p5=100,pg=>
I hope to have all this done, and a demo score written, by the end of this week.
Keep up the good work.
Keep up the good work. I did some small scale experiments with abcsound, using some relatively simple tunes from Folkinfo.org. If you're looking for material to test the system, I recommend developing a test suite of tunes from around the 'net. At first add some dunkers, ones that can't fail, then expand them one by one until you've conquered them all. Further, with a repertoire of standard tunes that worked at least once, you'll be able to tell if a later change breaks something by accident.
By the way, I use the Kate editor to edit Csound files . . . and wouldn't you know, it speaks abc fluently! (It comes with abc syntax highlighting ability already enabled.)
PS. The number one problem appears to be having to go to the original abc file and insert a Q: line for tempo . . . maybe default to something sensible (like 60), so that someone can edit the score file with a 't 0 xxx' line to set the beat. Also there seems to be a problem with the default instrument name.
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Thanks!
Will implement default tempo soonest. And yeah, I really don't know what to do with the default instrument... I guess it would be reasonable to have abcsound write a simple default .csd to wrap around the score, when the user doesn't supply one.
Default tempo is implemented...
... and it's 60, as suggested.
Also, triplets etc work now (though only the basic notation: "(3abc" or "(5dz^FGA)", but not "(3x:y:z" ).