Re: Contemporary bar layout [was Re: Horizontal spacing bug?]

[Aaron Hill]

On 2019-10-03 5:49 pm, Andrew Bernard wrote:
> On 4/10/2019 3:34 am, Aaron Hill wrote:
> > How standardized is this so-called "modernist" music?
>
>
> Not in any way at all. There's no ISO standard! :-) Every composer is
> different. I am curious that you refer to modernism as 'so-called'. 
> Modernism has been a major art movement for over 100 years. It's not
> something new or strange. The term has been applied to music likewise
> since mid last century.

It isn't that I am calling modernism "so-called", but rather that I have 
no idea what *you* specifically meant by "modernist" in the first place. 
 I accept that it may be a valid term in music; but as I already stated, 
such music engraving would very much be "new and strange" to me.  I have 
caught brief glimpses given the examples you have posted to the list, 
but that gives me no basis to assume such examples are authoritative on 
the matter.

> All I have ever asked is that the measure layout engine be able have
> its nice variable barline position attribute turned off when people
> want fixed length bars. I am well aware of the massive code and
> architectural issues this may present and it appears to be impossible.

I would need to dig into the code base to verify how it applies to 
measure layout in particular, but a number of LilyPond's decisions are 
made by assessing the "ugliness" of scores with numeric penalties.  When 
two or more constraints conflict with one another, the ones with the 
higher penalty are given priority.  And ultimately the system tries to 
minimize the total heuristic cost.

Assuming the penalties assessed for bar lines lining up are not 
hard-coded, would it be as simple as removing them or even possibly 
inverting them so that non-aligned bar lines are considered bad?  
Perhaps this could be resolved more easily than originally thought from 
a technical perspective; however, if there is a *philosophical* barrier, 
that may take more work to get such changes pushed through.

My own take is that LilyPond should help you try to make beautiful 
typeset music, but also provide enough flexibility to let you break the 
"rules" should you need to.  In that way, I understand your frustration 
with what currently appears to be an intentional lack of flexibility.


-- Aaron Hill