New customizable XML file for chord symbols!
As described here, I have been working on making it easier to customize the use of chord symbols (called "chordnames" or "harmony" in MuseScore). I have attached a file called customchords.xml that you can install in your MuseScore "styles" folder and use in place of stdchords.xml or jazzchords.xml. While there are a number of customizations made easier using this file, the most important is the ability to specify what symbols you like to use for major, minor, and diminished, and half diminished (aka minor seventh flat five). Changing just a couple of lines at the top of the file will cause *all* chords that use those symbols to be parsed and displayed the way you like. This includes the ability to use a triangle for major or circle-with-a-slash for half-diminished, and you can specify what you would like to type in order to produce those symbols.
There is a lot more that is possible to customize too, including the ability to control whether parentheses are displayed around chord alterations, whether suspended fourth chords are displayed as "sus" or "sus4", whether that symbol comes before or after other alterations, whether you like the symbols for major, minor, and diminished to be superscripted or not, etc. These customizations are somewhat more difficult to make than the basic ones are, but I've tried to document it well, and in any case, it's definitely much easier than it would have been in jazzchords.xml.
I've also attached a short chart that shows some important chords as they are displayed using the defaults. It's not the full list because that is overwhelmingly large, but it shows you what you need to start entering chords using the default settings. It may also give you ideas for customization. So I've also included a second version of the same chord chart, which was the result of just a few quick changes at the top of customchords.xml.
I'd would like to hear feedback on how this works out for people who deal in chord symbols. Even if you already have your own customized XML files using your favorite fonts, I'd still love it if you could give my XML file a test drive.
Hopefully coming "soonish" - a plug-in (or similar utility) to allow you to make the most common customizations using simple controls in a dialog box rather than requiring you to edit the XML file by hand. But I'd like to get feedback first on the basic system I am employing here.
| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
| chordsymbols-1.png | 149.71 KB |
| chordsymbols2-1.png | 148.68 KB |
| customchords.xml | 38.86 KB |
Comments
Just realized the original attachments were 300dpi - way too big for easy on screen reading. So check out these instead.
In reply to Updated sample chord charts by Marc Sabatella
In my experience, the "1/2 Diminished" sign is a superscript rather than a subscript.
Is your file available? I'd be glad to try it.
Regards,
In reply to Great work. by xavierjazz
You're right about the superscript. I forgot to make that change when I edited the XML file from mi7b5 to oslash, but sure, that's doable.
And the file *is* available - see the attachment customchords.xml in the original post!
In reply to You're right about the by Marc Sabatella
Thanks.
thx a lot!
I've been hearing from some people via email, but I'm wondering if others have been using this customchords.xml and have any feedback for me. I'm preparing to check it in to make it available in future MuseScore builds. I've made a few small changes in response to the feedback I've received, including adding additional suggested in response to another thread (eg, ma7sus4). I still need to figure out if Comic Sans MS is really an acceptable choice for a font to use for some of the "missing" symbols like triangle, circle and circle-with-a-slash, and the letters of the alphabet not already included in MuseJazz. I mean, I think it is visually the best match for MuseJazz among the fonts that are supposedly available on Windows, Mac, and Linux, but I know its use is controversial in some circles, and I don't know what other issues might come up if we rely on it.
I am attaching my latest and greatest of customchords.xml. Installing it will, unfortunately, wipe out any customizations you have already made. This will be an ongoing problem until I come up with some sort of scheme to separate out the customizations themselves, which I hope to somehow do for the next *major* release. But the attached version is what I am proposing including with the upcoming *minor* release.
If you have feedback that can be incorporated within the current architecture, please send it along soon!
In reply to I've been hearing from by Marc Sabatella
It took me some time this morning to understand the directions in the XML file, but this works great. Thanks a lot man.
On usage: one has to manually re-select and re-load the XML file after each edit, to see if things works as desired. This process is quite tedious. Maybe it's possible to have the XML file automatically reloaded, once it has been changed.
In reply to This works great by JoachimKruyswijk
I believe this may already be fixed in 1.1, coming "soon". But do see my comment in the other thread you responded to before spending a lot of time on these customizations. You may find further customization unnecessary.. And in any event, I ended up making enough changes to how all this works that any customization work will have to be updated for 1.1 (sorry, but I think the improvements will be worth it).
In reply to I believe this may already be by Marc Sabatella
No need to say sorry... Musescore is such a great program already, and it will even get better.
See my post regarding MuseScore 1.1 here: http://musescore.org/en/node/11581
Bottom line: anyone with customized versions of my customchords.xml file (or any similar custom chord description file based on MuseJazz) will need to take action for 1.1, and even those who haven't actually done their own customizations but have an interest in the appearance of chord symbols will probably want to check out my post referenced above.