why Kieren is a \relative evangelist [was “Re: Nested transposition"]

[Kieren MacMillan]

Hi Davids,

>> One might wonder why the subject of \relative, a textual input
>> method, should concern you so much.

1. I lament how much struggle I went through for the decade that I used 
\relative, and how much struggle I see other newbies go through — posting about 
it, over and over — because they are using it. I personally believe that 
struggle is totally unnecessary. It’s worth noting the relative [ha!] dearth of 
posts about absolute music giving anyone trouble when transposing, reusing 
code, etc.

2. The obstacles and confusion generated by the use of \relative compound 
quickly when one uses Lilypond for more complicated scores, or tries to reuse 
code (ostensibly to increase efficiency), etc. We are (I thought?) trying to 
make Lilypond *more* user-friendly, not *less*. It frustrates me when I see 
newbies being led up the already-not-easy early learning curve via the 
\relative path, because I know that most of those who get beyond simple scores 
will hit these \relative-only problems, and that will [unnecessarily!] make it 
seem like Lilypond is “even more complicated and fussy” than they first 
imagined.

3. The *single* serious argument against absolute music — that it requires 
extra typing [of apostrophes and commas] — is essentially eliminated by using 
an IDE like Frescobaldi: using MIDI input means I avoid typing note code 
(including octavation symbols) almost entirely, and the transposition functions 
let me instantaneously re-octavate large sections of code if that’s ever 
required (which it basically never is). I believe we should be encouraging 
users to use tools like Frescobaldi — because I believe their coding lives 
would be made easier in *so* many ways — and the “crutch” of \relative means 
there’s less incentive to do so in the early stages of the learning curve 
(which is exactly when habits, good or bad, tend to be formed).

Perhaps “back then”, if someone had clearly explained how to get around some of 
the bigger problems (e.g., by always making sure there’s a \relative inside 
\transpose), I might not have been driven to such a point of frustration by 
\relative that I found no alternative but to abandon it and become an \absolute 
evangelist…? That being said, the fact that it’s STILL clearly a problem YET 
ANOTHER decade later apparently justifies my choice.

> a majority of traffic on this list is generated by people doing
> their best to be helpful, making other people's lives easier.
> 
> Is there a reason you think that this isn't what Kieren is doing?

Making other people’s (especially newbies’) lives easier *is* ultimately what 
I’m trying to do.

Cheers,
Kieren.
________________________________

Kieren MacMillan, composer (he/him/his)
‣ website: www.kierenmacmillan.info
‣ email: kieren@kierenmacmillan.info