Jon Freeman

The Irish notation I was not aware of has been explained but I think as well as this sort of approach being natural for pen and paper, a number of people independently realised that some form of note + duration text form could provide a method for computer music. Even I had a 1/2 hearted attempt using Turbo Pascal at some point. As far as these computer formats go, the proprietary and pretty much (except the dt database is a big user) obsolete SongWrite format might be worth a mention. It's not too dissimilar to the computer abc. Here is an example: N-Wild Rover S-160 K-D B-3/4 H- M-:W-2 R-2 D-4 D-5 E-8 D-4 D-4 A-4 F-4 F-8 E-5 F-4 G-3_G-2 a-4 a-4 F-4 a-4 G-8 E-5 C-4 A-8 F-5 E-4 D-3_ L- I've been a wild ro-ver for man-y a year, I've spent all my mo-ney on whisk-ey and beer.

No, The first was Chris Walshaw's abc2mtex. It seems abc2win was a very early abc program and that it seems to have contributed a lot to the popularity of abc. See http://www.walshaw.plus.com/abc/history.html

Yes, it is frustrating from my side of trying to provide abc and an abc converter too... I believe, historically abc2win was the worst offender and many will recommend avoiding this program. That said, I believe a lot of abc found on the Internet was produced with it and the newer attempts at standards try to allow other programs to work with its non standard quirks. Other problems came in with extensions and the abcplus project and abcmp2s. As far as I understand it there was no w: for aligned lyrics before and while there are later drafts, there still isn't an agreed standard for these items. My best guess is to consider abcm2ps which is actively developed as the guideline to our abc being to standard - ie. if that output is correct, we are likely to be to standard.

There are others, including ours at folkinfo but the "Convert-A-Matic" might have been the first - I don't know. We certainly decided we could do with something similar to it for our own abc usage though. --- As for abc software, I found BarFly my favourite of the ones I tried but it is a Mac program. I've tended to use 5 line Skink on Windows and then Linux but I do have to adjust some lyrics (w:) to match the abcm2ps (which I use as a "standards guide") output we produce.

I haven't voted. The poll doesn't offer "unchanged" for playing with others. I have cut down a lot on my time spent on the Internet lately and that has led to me spending more time doing other (IMO) more constructive things. Playing music is one of these. That said, I was "overusing" the Internet badly and that asidel, I think it's been a great help. I think the Internet has been useful particularly in the distribution of Songs and tunes to many. A couple of notable examples are: The Digital Tradition Database, the main copy of which is now hosted at Mudcat. This didn't start life as an Internet project but as a floppy disk distribution amongst friends. Obviously the Internet helped a lot in growing into what it is now. The adoption of abc for the distribution of tunes on the internet and the huge collections of tunes contained in that format. The ability to ask questions and find answers from others is also IMO very important.

I do like software to work as documented but I'm pretty much with you there. Opps - LOL.

Have just had a look at the Londonderry Hornpipe (must learn parts 4-6 btw - have 1-2 under another name) which starts: X: 1 T: Londonderry Hornpipe, The M: 4/4 L: 1/8 Q: 300 By my thinking, abcm2ps should be showing 1/8 note=300 (or I suppose 1/4=150) but it shows 1/4 note=300. As far as I can make out abc2midi (or at least later versions) seems to have the same interpretation as abcm2ps. Perhaps one for the abcusers list?? I'd ask there but I've had so much trouble with yahoo groups not accepting mail from me, I've given up trying to use it. The only comment I've found trying to search archives is that some programs may have stopped supporting the Q: 300 format (apparently it is deprecated in 2.0 but not removed).

Using abc, you could try our converter at http://www.folkinfo.org/songs/abcconvert.php. Transpose up 3 semi-tones.

hmm - brains not really in gear here... sorry. To many tunes in a session tonight will be my excuse :-) Playing speed (as in listening to it) is not an abcm2ps issue - tha'ts abc2midi. The most abcm2ps might do is print a symbol indicating the tempo.

I think it unlikely abcmp2s has it wrong. Have we got an example (I'm not following your reference)? Possibly it is an issue with M: ?? From the 2.0 draft: 3.1.7. L: - unit note length Specifies the unit note length, i.e. L:1/4 - quarter note, L:1/8 - eighth note, L:1/16 - sixteenth, L:1/32 - thirty-second. If there is no L: field defined, a unit note length is set by default, based on the meter field M:. This default is calculated by computing the meter as a decimal: if it is less than 0.75 the default unit note length is a sixteenth note; if it is 0.75 or greater, it is an eighth note. For example, 2/4 = 0.5, so, the default unit note length is a sixteenth note, while for 4/4 = 1.0, or 6/8 = 0.75, or 3/4= 0.75, it is an eighth note. For M:C (4/4), M:C| (2/2) and M:none (free meter), the default unit note length is 1/8.

Re the X: In the 1.6 standard and the 1.76 draft, it is referred to just as a reference number which I suppose is a little open to interpretations. In the 2.0 draft (there have only been drafts after 1.6), it is stated that the reference number should be a positive integer. ----- I can offer a view on the MIDI sound suggestion: It is possible to change the instrument in abc (at least some programs including abc2midi supports it) using %%MIDI program channel patch, eg. %%MIDI program 1 21 should make a single voice abc play using an accordion. I don't know how one would set it to use an instrument not in the General MIDI set (and concertina isn't) though. I think there is another problem with the suggestion. That is MIDI's only contain the instructions for a synth (often a sound card) to "perform" the misic and the MIDI can have no control over whether a particular sound font or instrument outside GM is on a particular user's machine. Also, in my experience, sound cards vary tremendously in quality and IMO the most reliable "sound passable on anything" sound is the default, ie. grand piano.

Yes it's possible but methods would vary from system to system. If you want to get the URL from a link, a right click will probably give an option like Firefox's "Copy Link Location". This may save some typing and or copy errors when you need to supply it for the shortcut as you can paste it. The 2 systems I've running at the moment are: Windows Vista. Right click on a blank area of the desktop. Goto: New->Shortcut. Supply the URL when prompted for the location of the item Click Next Supply a name Click Finish KDE on Linux Right click on a blank area of the desktop Goto: Create New->Link To Location(URL) Supply a name for the shortcut where it asks for filename and supply the URL in the other box. Click OK Others are probably very similar.

There is also a sort of yes answer to the downloading. It depends what you want to do and perhaps your computer experience. If you are doing a lot and want to use abcm2ps to the full (something I don't do) it might be worthwhile. The programs that do the work are abcm2ps and abc2midi from the abcmidi. Depending on your system (32 bit Win is OK), you may find binaries on the abc plus pages. The abcplus guide would also be a handy download. On top of this you may need something to display and/or print postscript. Ghostscript is a popular choice for that. The abc programs are command line programs - something you may or may not be familiar with using - and can work with a text file made with any suitable editor like Notepad. I believe some text editors that can create macors to automate some tasks and that there are some more "special purpose" editors around for handling abc. An alternative form of "automation" is the type of conversion utility provided here. You need to install a web server, some scripting language (eg. Appache and php) and have a suitable script(s) for that. Apache/php is easy enough on something like my (Suse) Linux box which has the web programs in the distribution but I can't imagine anyone wanting to do it just to convert abc.

I notice you've written it in C and the web page given had it in F so I guess the original problem was the key. I feel a bit awkward mentioning another converter here but it might help with a problem that I guess crops up occasionally... if you can find an abc for a tune that is in an unsuitable key, a simple online solution would be to try our abc converter. Using the abc (I've cut the W: out for a shorter post) in a later post, transpose up 7 semitones would give: X: 14110 T:Red is the Rose S:Digital Tradition, redrose B:Joe Heaney, via Helen Schneyer & Lucy Simpson O:Irish Z:dt:redrose M:6/8 L:1/8 Q:3/8=100 K:C c3 c2d|e3 d2c|d2e d2c|A3- A2G-|c3 c2c|c2d e2g|a3 g3-|g3 z3| a3 a2g|e3 e2g|f2e d2c|A3 G2-A|c3 c2e|a3 g2e|d6|c6|| (techy note: we run the abc through abc2abc to do this)

I don't know what one of those is, it seems you did find what you were looking for, etc. but this may be useful for Mac (I'm not one btw) users who use abc. Barfly is well worth a look. Amongst other things, it can handle all our Hugill collection for example as one text file and you can scroll through it viewing the notation for the "current song" as well as playing the song. It's kept up to date and is very compatible with abcm2ps (which is used by the tune-o-tron in the production of graphics). I believe more recent versions allow you to run abc2mps from within Barfly making it easier for those who want the better print quality abcm2ps is capable of producing. There are reports of it working well on other platforms using emulators but my own attempts (on a win pc) only had limited success. There is the Java based Skink which some may find useful but I find it less compatible with abcm2ps/current abc where aligned words (w:) are used in the abc.