Re: XML anatomy

[Bric]

On January 9, 2020 at 4:19 AM Richard Shann < rich...@rshann.plus.com> wrote:

On Wed, 2020-01-08 at 21:56 -0500, Bric wrote:

In the denemo XML I am seeing the <rhythms>...</rhythms> section (no

pun intended)  which contains three <rhythm... > ... </rhythm>

nodes.  I can't figure out what this represents.

Its the internal name for what is presented to the user as "Snippets" -

originally music snippets were intended only to hold short rhythmic

sequences to be used for entering music (and this is still the main

purpose, having set up a snippet pitches sequentially played in on a

MIDI keyboard are entered in with durations taken sequentially from the

current snippet). The <rhythms>...</rhythms> holds any snippets defined

for the current score.

Sorry - i don't fully understand, but get the gist.

  (Is there any documentation elaborating on the XML structure?)  :]

Not as far as I know. If you are exploring the structure of Denemo's

file format with the idea that it might be useful in connection with

creating MusicXML from Denemo then I think that wouldn't be profitable

- it's just a coincidence that they are both using the XML markup, the

whole purpose is quite different. Only the very basic music information

(pitches, durations, a little bit of staff/voice structure etc) is

explicitly present in Denemo, a large part of the final score

appearance is created by LilyPond from chunks of LilyPond syntax stored

inside Denemo (as part of the Denemo Directive structures). So you

would search in vain for anything like <composer>...</composer> in a

Denemo score. Instead you would be looking for some LilyPond syntax of

the form "composer = /markup ..." stored inside a suitable Denemo

Directive.

I'm not too surprised that you have found that the lily2musicxml idea

is not well developed - there are two basic problems:

1) MusicXML is not fundamentally sound: it was developed (AFAIK) by a

commercial score editor company with a hazy notion of what they might

be trying to represent (music? music notation?) and ended up as a rat's

nest of fields whose meaning is really only defined by the MusicXML

output of that program. It is accompanied by an automated documentation

system which gives the impression that the whole thing has been

designed. It is the only show in town, however, as MIDI is nearly

useless - quicker to re-enter music than use MIDI.

2) LilyPond syntax is not intended to describe the meaning of a musical

score. It only does so incidentally - "cis" means a C sharp, but the

"composer = ..." is not LilyPond syntax for the composer of the score,

its just telling the LilyPond typesetter to place some markup somewhere

on the page - it does that via a standard LilyPond include file which

is not part of the LilyPond language, but written *in* the LilyPond

language. So, to write a lily2musicxml program you would have to settle

on some commonly used LilyPond syntax and try and output some XML

syntax that would get read in by Sibelius, Finale et al to give a

starting point for editing into a musical score. A soul-destroying task

as you have no control over what those programs will make of someone

else's musicXML syntax.

Well, it is conceivable to me that someone codes an exporter at some point, which interprets both the xml elements /and/ the lilypond snippets sprinkled all throughout denemo xml, to generate a more homogeneous format..  Such as MusicXML, for instance, consisting *only* of markup.  But that, of course, looks like a monumental task at this point.

The real question I guess though is "what is it that you are trying to

do?" ...

I'm trying to export/import out of curiosity and exploration mostly, but there are some practical reasons that compel me.  For example, i've been making do without swing playback in denemo (for many years), and just realized that MuseScore offers swing playback.

I really really really (that's not repeated enough) hate MuseScore's input methods. After using denemo's super-intelligent, configurable input design, one's jaw can only drop in bewilderment over the heinous imposition of rests in Musescore, to compensate for incomplete duration in a measure, clunky, clumsy, near-impossible note duration editing, and other UI defects.

And yet, I can listen to what I generate (or import!) into MuseScore, in swing rhythm.

But beyond that, i'm also exploring this out of curiosity ... there is a plethora of editors out there, with a variety of playback options.

(For input and final rendering/typesetting i haven't seen anything more powerful than the denemo+lilypond combo)

Richard