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Topic: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-) (Read 24264 times) previous topic - next topic

Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Thank you NoteWorthySoftware team!!
We have a new version of our preferred software, new features to play with, hence new possibilities!!
I'm sure the new features will make us gain a lot of time --though writing scores with NWC is already rather quick!

Finally, it was a good idea to visit the web site at midnight and half (Paris time) :) I'll have nice dreams this night!

Wishing you all the best,
NWCly yours,`
Dominique

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #1
A new file format, too! Does that mean that older versions of NWC won't be able to read files written using this version?
I'm sure the new staff features will be useful to some people. To me, the ability to mute individual notes, rather than the entire staff, will be very handy. When learning multi-part harmonies, I can mute out the other parts when I need to hear mine, but play them when I'm not singing. Previously, to do this, I had to put the bits I did want to hear, and those I didn't, on to separate staves.

Thanks Noteworthy! As a reward, I've decided it's time to get a new copy on CD, since my old one is 1.55 on floppy disk, plus lots of downloaded updates.

Robin

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #2
Well, I just wrote an NWC file with the 1.75 version.
I love it :) (the version, not the file)
The possibility to have 1-line staves leaded me to write "tablatures" scores; and the "Find" tool helped me to find items easily (for example, to find *any* rest, type "|Rest|" in the "by Expression" item (without '"'))

Please let me know what you think of this version of Fernando Sor's study.
To give credits where due, Thanks go to Fred Nachbaur for allowing me to modify one of his wonderful guitar files.
My work in that piece was just adding the 6 tablatures staves. I didn't change anything in the existing staves, except the "D.C.§ al Coda" properties for better printing (A4 portrait).
Probably this could be done some other way(s); the things I added could be placed on the hidden staves, but I didn't want to change the existing staves. I'll release another version if I find it better, but this way was simpler and quicker. However, it requires extra staves, though I could use the existing ones.
It took me less than one hour to do this with the original file (you can find it on the Scriptorium).

As Multimania is currently unavailable, I uploaded it to my old Angelfire site. How it will download fine (it does for me).

Please feel free to send me some comments :)

Hope this will gives you more ideas ;)

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #3
marsu,

Unfortunately "Angelfire does not allow direct linking
from offsite, non-Angelfire pages, to files hosted on Angelfire." Oh well...

There isn't a link to the file from the front page either, could you do that? I'd love to see the file...

Fred

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #4
Oh :(
Sorry for this.
I just made a small page that should allow you to access the file.
It's there .

Hope it will work this time :)

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #5
NoteWorthy, nice new features! Unfortunately, "Ability to make staff invisible, so text can be added without having to belong to a visible stave (can use a 0 line staff with mark whole rests/notes and bar lines not to print)" isn't quite true. You still have the verticle line running between saves on the very left...

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #6
Oh, oh, I've got another one: When you set the staff to more than five lines, and insert a note that is out of the five line range but on this new staff, NWC extends the stem until it reaches from the notehead to where it would normally hit if it were the higest note (or lowest note) on the regular five line staff. An example is here . (Sorry I put the image twice.)

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #7
This is a rule of standard notation. NWC follow the rule, regardless of how many staff lines you assign to the staff.

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #8
Really, on the staff like that? Well I guess I stand (well, sit at the computer, really) corrected!

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #9
Finally got home and had a chance to have a look at marsu's file... Wow! Brilliant! I'd highly recommend anyone interested in guitar notation to study what he's done here. Since the tab numbers are entered as lyrics, they even highlight whilst playing (the effect is especially dramatic when using Player or the NW Browser Plugin).

Terrific work!

Fred

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #10
Methinks reply 7 is slightly disingenuous. If you change the note colour then it becomes obvious that the note drawing mechanism is independent of the number of lines, so you get extended note stems, ledger lines and all.

And if you have fewer than normal staff lines you don't get extra ledger lines to compensate!

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #11
Well, Francis, IMHO it's useful to have stems long like that. It allows me to read this easily. But BTW, I wonder who really uses *this* number of lines?? Boulez, maybe?

Fred, the "terrific work" has mainly been done by NWC software AND you (string splitting). I just used what was available :)

BTW, is there somewhere an NWC reference file indicating the notes per string of string instruments?
Not piano nor harps, though ;)
I'm only insterested in "fretted" strings instruments, on that subject. I don't know where to find this. If it could be posted on the NG... I'm sure Ertuðrul would have something to say about exotic instruments :) As Andrew, probably!

Another thing: Where can I find the "drum clef", since I've read recently there is a specific one? When I learned drums, I learned to rea it with a bass clef on a normal staff, but it seems that other notation (with 1, 2 or 3 lines) is used too. I'd like to add this clef in boxmark2 beta 4...

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #12
disingenuous?

>obvious that the note drawing mechanism is independent
>of the number of lines

This was exactly my point.

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #13
Only slightly ;-)

It was your comment that it was the standard rule of notation that puzzled me on two counts:

1. I doubt if there is a standard rule for anything other than the standard staff, so your approach of not changing anything is not incorrect, and, the point I was gently making, is the easy reliable option.

2. If there were a rule then it could just as well be:
a. Extend stems only for notes off the staff itself.
b. Put in ledger lines if and only if appropriate.
in which case the mechanism would indeed have to be changed.

In truth I can only think of uses for one staff line (for a rhythm instrument in e.g. a choral work) and no staff lines (for highlighting lyrics on playback without having a visible staff - a bouncing ball effect) and in neither of those instances would stem length be be a problem.

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #14
>> a. Extend stems only for notes off the staff itself.

One problem with this: extend them to where? The standard rule says "the center line of the staff", but you'd obviously have to throw this out. Otherwise you'd get not only a sudden increase in stem length for notes off the staff, but also the anomalous behavior that stems of off-staff notes actually extended farther into the staff than stems of on-staff notes - which, if not objectively wrong, would (IMHO) look very, very strange. Another (and probably better) possibility would be "the third staff line from the notehead's current position", which would have the advantage of both (1) replicating standard behavior on a 5-line staff and (2) preventing the stem length anomaly.

I actually don't have much of a quarrel with current behavior on larger-than-standard staves, though. I'd be much more likely to get exercised over the opposite problem of missing ledger lines on reduced staves, which (again IMHO) really *should* be fixed.

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #15
Being a run-of-the-mill choral singer, I cannot imagine why one would want a 6 or 7 line staff. But it's a great idea for a prank.

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #16
I'm with Robert on this one, I can't think of staves with more than five lines being of particular use for notation per se. For tablature, where you might indeed have six or more lines, it doesn't matter since you'd normally hide the notes anyway.

Going the other way to less than five lines, I agree that it would be handy to have the missing leger lines fixed; however, 'til then it could possibly be worked around using an em-dash in a suitable font.
Fred

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #17
There was not a clear justification for providing so much control over staff lines, but in the end, we opted to allow it (as opposed to artifàë –lly restricting it), just in case someone finds a use for it.

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #18
Yes, we sometimes add features to our software for just this reason. And, sometimes to our dismay, someone almost always does ;-)

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #19
I just listened to Marsu's music file (see link above). Magnificent. But I am curious: What is the purpose of hiding the notes, and using numerals, on the lower staff?

If this is something that I don't know simply because I do not play the guitar, then just reply with "Fold your hands and sing." (This is the reverse of Frank Zappa's album, "Shut up and play your guitar.")

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #20
The lower staff is what's called "tablature." It's often touted as an "easy" way to play guitar instead of learning standard notation. ("Now! You TOO can learn to shut up and play your guitar in five minutes!") That being said, it *can* also be useful as an adjunct to standard notation, since it's a pictorial representation of the guitar strings themselves.

Historically, tablature for fretted instruments actually precedes standard notation, and used to be the "standard" way of presenting music for lute and similar instruments.

The six lines of the staff represent the six strings, and the numbers indicate which fret on the string is played for that note.

Fred

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #21
Just got a chance to download 1.75 and check marsu's file. Very, very neat!

These things sometimes get lost in the forum. I wonder if the technique might be added to the User Tips (creation of Tablature?)

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #22
Thanks for the explanation, Fred. Now it's obvious. Indeed, the six-line staff looks like a better way of doing that than the traditional waffle-grid fingerboard (although I don't play guitar, I know what those symbols mean).

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #23
It says 6 line or 4 line or any number of lines per staff. I think I've seen percussion lines written with just one line. If NWC 1.75 supports that, it might be useful?

Re: Thank you! NWC 1.75 is available :-)

Reply #24
Indeed. In fact, Marsu's tab example uses six staves of one line each. You can even have no lines at all, which could be useful for something...

An unpublicised new feature of NWC1.75 is that you now also have complete control over staff spacing, and no longer are restricted to a minimum of 8 points upper and lower staff size. This is another thing that makes the cool tab effects possible.

Fred