A fork of Rosegarden with new Matrix Editor, and Loop, Marker, and Chord Name Ruler, features and improvements.
- License
- Acknowledgment and motivation
- Build and installation
- New features
- Screenshots
- Further information
- Future work
Rosegarden is a MIDI sequencer and musical notation editor for Linux.
Copyright 2000-2022 The Rosegarden Development Team
Modifications and additions Copyright © 2022 Mark R. Rubin aka "thanks4opensource" aka "thanks4opensrc"
This file is part of Rosegarden.
The Rosegarden program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
The Rosegarden program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License, version 2 along with the Rosegarden program. If not, see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html
This is a fork of Rosegarden, the official source code, documentation, and downloads for which is available at:
- https://rosegardenmusic.com/
- https://sourceforge.net/projects/rosegarden/
- https://sourceforge.net/p/rosegarden/git/ci/master/tree/
- https://github.com/tedfelix/rosegarden-official
Although the fork has many new features and improvements, the vast majority of the code is unchanged from the official sources. Rosegarden has an incredibly long and deep history (see Origin of a Legend) representing literally many man-centuries of work by dozens if not hundreds of developers, several of whom (in particular the current lead maintainer) have each devoted over a decade's worth of tireless effort to Rosegarden. Their work is acknowledged and greatly appreciated.
Note also that the fork's changes were submitted (and will continue to be available) for merge into the official project. As of this writing this has not happened, and in fact it seems unlikely that it will, either in the foreseeable future or in fact if ever. This author can only speculate as to why this is the case, but it has been hinted that changes to Rosegarden's user interface and/or workflow (beyond the most trivial) are unlikely to be approved based on a belief that a large user base exists, the majority of whom would not accept such changes regardless of whether they represent improvements or not. There also seems to be a premium placed on program stability (an understandable position, although in this case possibly taken to an extreme) and changes of the magnitude as those included here obviously risk undermining that.
Wherever possible, the forked code offers options to use its new
features or revert to the official version's UI and workflows. But
attempts to implement this were impractical in several cases, such as
when already overly complex code would have become too convoluted
(excessive if (official_compatibility == true) conditionals
scattered everywhere) or when doing so would have made no sense (e.g.
maintaining a separate/vestigal/duplicate Percussion Matrix Editor
identical to the new unified Matrix
Editor).
Caution: As of this writing the fork has had testing solely by the author, and doubtless contains many bugs. The intent is to fix them as they are discovered and/or reported (within the caveats of the NO WARRANTY disclaimers contained in the license). However ...
Important: Do not report any bugs in the fork to the official Rosegarden sites listed above. The fork is the sole responsibility its author and and failures in it in no way reflect upon the official version's maintainers and developers. The only exception is for bugs that have been separately, independently, and definitively demonstrated as occurring in the official Rosegarden versions.
In any case, it is the author's belief that the fork may benefit others (as it has him), and it is therefor offered for use herein.
The process of building and installing the code is almost identical to the procedure described in README-official.md.
The only change is that the local repository must first be switched
to the thanks4opensrc-devel branch, i.e.:
$ git checkout thanks4opensrc-devel
before continuing with:
$ mkdir build
$ cd build
$ cmake ..
$ make
For further information, see README-official.md.
As per this repository's description above, the majority of the new features pertain to the Matrix Editor. Users who do not, or only infrequently, use that facet of Rosegarden will reap less advantage than those who do, although they may benefit from the included improvements to the Loop Ruler, Marker Ruler, and/or Chord/Key Ruler.
Many of the features are more complex to describe than they are to actually use in practice. It is probably better to use the following documentation as a starting point for exploration and experimentation rather than reading it in isolation. Users not familiar with (official) Rosegarden may want to try the matching actions (if any) in that version -- either before, after, or simultaneously -- if curious about the differences.
Note: Full usage documentation for almost all new features (limited only by Qt restrictions) is available via hover/pop-up help and/or the context help area at the bottom of the Matrix Editor window.
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The separate "Percussion Matrix Editor" has been eliminated, as the improved Matrix Editor correctly displays either normal or percussion segments without requiring the user to explicitly choose between the two.
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More importantly, the new version correctly displays and allows editing a mixture of normal and percussion segments when editing multiple segments simultaneously.
- Note that Rosegarden creates percussion "notes" with automatically determined "durations" (time between MIDI Note On and Note Off events), either until the next note on the same percussion instrument or a whole note, whichever is shorter. Percussion note durations usually only matter for instruments such as Standard MIDI's "Whistle", "Long Guiro", etc., but for edge cases where viewing/editing the durations is required, the Matrix Editor's "View -> Notes -> Show percussion durations" checkbox can be turned on.
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This forked version of Rosegarden uses color more extensively than the official one. A new Main Window "Edit -> Segment colors" menu allows automatic setting of some or all segment colors without having to manually change each one individually. Several coloring algorithms are available via sub-menu choices.
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Additionally, the same menu's "Display" sub-options allow a choice of showing segment colors in the main window in the previous "Selected dark" mode (in which selected segments are darkened while non-selected ones show their correct color) vs the new, more logical, "Selected bright" mode (selected segments visually stand out in their full/normal/bright colors while non-selected ones are shown with subdued hatched color lines to indicate their current lower priority).
- A new "Tracks -> Delete Empty Tracks" menu is useful when loading a MIDI file for inspection/analysis. Many such files contain superfluous tracks (titles, etc.) which clutter the interface and in particular interfere with the automatic coloring of segments (the short supply of visually contrasting colors is "wasted" on the empty segments). If a track contains only segments without notes, this menu option deletes them, saving a time-consuming search through the entire composition's time range to see if any off-screen, late occurring notes exist.
In addition to the Percussion Matrix Editor unification described above, most of the fork's features pertain to the Matrix Editor.
There are multiple new options/modes for displaying notes.
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The "View -> Notes -> Color" options allow showing notes with color based on velocity (the only option in official Rosegarden), or in the the note's segment's color (as set in the main window) . This latter option greatly aids editing multiple segments/instruments simultaneously. There is also a somewhat less useful "Segment+velocity" mode which displays the segment color but with lightness based on velocity, and an "Only active" checkbox for displaying notes in non-active segments without color (potentially useful for directing special attention to the segment being edited, at the cost of losing information regarding what voices the other notes belong to).
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Update: "View -> Notes -> Color -> Pitch" mode. Notes colored according to scale degree (solid color) or pattern of alternating colors from adjacent diatonic notes for out-of-key accidentals. Colors were chosen in an attempt to visually imply the relative importance and musical function of each scale degree:
1st/tonic bright green 2nd dim blue 3rd dim cyan 4th dim orange 5th yellow 6th dim red 7th dim magenta -
The "Show percussion durations" menu was described above.
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The "View -> Notes -> Note names" menu contains a large selection of note naming options. Some are are dependent on the composition's key at the time of the note, such as "In-key scale degree" (1-7 plus sharps/flats), "Movable-do solfege" (do- or la-based), and "In-key integers" (12-tone). Others are key-independent: "Concert pitch" (standard letter names), "Fixed-do solfege", "Integer" (12-tone) (all with MIDI octave number), velocity, and raw MIDI note numbers.
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If the Chord/Key Ruler is active and a note belongs to a chord, it can also be labeled with an optional suffix describing the note's function within the chord (enabling the suffix also automatically activates the ruler if not currently checked "on" in "View -> Rulers"). The chord note functions can be labeled with either chord degrees (1 to 7 plus possible "#" or "b"), or 12-tone integers.
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There are several more label variation options, including whether accidentals in the ambiguous key of C major should be shown as sharps vs flats. Additionally, observant users may notice subtle and not-so-subtle changes and improvements such as the scaling of note label text at extreme horizontal scales, and in the graphical indication of selected notes.
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The Matrix Editor's "tools" -- MultiTool (formerly Select), Draw, Erase, Move, Resize, and Velocity -- have been extensively redesigned and enhanced.
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Complete/comprehensive/accurate help text is displayed at the bottom of the Matrix Editor window for all tools, describing options available in the current context (e.g. whether the mouse pointer is on a note or not, and the state of the mouse buttons and current in-progress editing task). Additionally, the onscreen mouse cursor changes to indicate the current editing mode/context.
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Active segment selection: As per mainstream Rosegarden, only notes in the current active segment can be selected, modified, created, or erased. The active segment selector roller widget is still available in the lower left hand corner of the Matrix Editor window, but the active segment may also be changed via the menu displayed when right-clicking if not over an existing note, or even more easily by clicking any note in the segment to be activated. (Exception: The control key must be held down when doing so in the Draw tool in order to differentiate segment activation from note creation.) Note that this is an example of when segment colors (enabled via "View -> Notes -> Color -> Segment" or "Segment+velocity") greatly aid ease of use.
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"Alternate" tools: Each tool has an associated "alternate tool" which can be used for a single operation, or toggled on until released back to the original. The expectation is that experienced users will do almost all editing either in the MultiTool or the Draw tool, each of which is an alternate for the other. All editing tasks can be achieved with the combination of these two tools, with the choice between which one to use as the "main" tool and which the alternate driven by whether currently/primarily modifying existing notes vs creating new ones.
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Regardless the above, the special purpose and now somewhat superfluous Erase, Move, Resize, and Velocity tools are still available for ease of use (or simply user preference) when doing editing specifically tailored to their particular capabilities. Example: The MultiTool can move, resize, or adjust the velocity of notes depending on what part of the note is initially clicked, but when "small" notes (either due to duration, horizontal zoom scaling of the Matrix Editor, or both) are being edited it is sometimes hard to click precisely enough to select the desired action. In that situation and others (e.g. using the Erase Tool's single-click erase instead of the double-click available in all tools when erasing many notes) the single-purpose individual tools are easier to use.
The following capabilites are available in any/all tools:
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Selecting note(s):
- Click a note to select (replaces any previous selection).
- Shift-click note to add to selection, or remove if already in selection.
- Click-drag to select multiple notes (replaces any previous selection).
- Shift-click-drag to add multiple notes to selection, or remove from selection if all notes in drag area are already in selection. (Exception: Must hold Control key in Draw tool to differentiate from normal note drawing.)
- Double-click to delete note(s)
- Delete clicked note if no existing selection or note not in selection. Also deselects any existing selected notes.
- Delete all notes in selection if clicked note is in selection.
- Right-click
- If not over note brings up menu with options to switch to another tool), plus undo/redo, plus change active segment.
- If over note brings up Event Properties dialog. Shift-click for Intrinsics dialog.
- Click non-active segment note to change active segment. Exception: Must hold Control key in Draw tool to differentiate from normal note drawing.
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Alternate tools:
- Each tool has an associated "alternate tool" which can be
switched to temporarily or semi-permanently.
- Middle-click performs a single right-click action in alternate tool.
- CapsLock toggles alternate tool on and off.
- Alternate tools:
- MultiTool --> Draw
- Draw --> MultiTool
- Erase --> Draw
- Move --> Resize
- Resize --> Move
- Velocity --> Resize
- Each tool has an associated "alternate tool" which can be
switched to temporarily or semi-permanently.
- MultiTool (formerly "Select and Edit"):
- Move, resize, or change velocity of note depending on whether mouse is in middle 70%, right 15%, or left 15% of note, respectively.
- If percussion segment (and "View -> Notes -> Show percussion durations" is not checked "on"), move or change velocity depending on whether mouse is in lower 80% or upper 20% of note, respectively.
- Hold Control to duplicate note(s) before moving.
- Hold Shift while moving (normal or with Control/duplicate) to disable snap to matrix grid.
- Draw tool:
- Click to create note, drag to resize.
- Hold Shift to disable snap to matrix grid.
- Control-click on non-active segment note to disable note drawing and perform normal non-draw-tool change of active segment.
- Control-click-drag when not over note to disable note drawing and perform normal non-draw-tool click-drag select.
- Erase tool:
- Click to delete single note if not in selection.
- Delete selection if clicked note in selection.
- Tool largely superfluous given double-click delete available in all tools, but convenient (single- vs double-click) if interactively deleting large numbers of notes not easily click-drag-selectable.
- Move tool:
- Same as MultiTool click in middle of note.
- Largely superfluous given the above, but convenient for moving "small" (short duration) notes without necessitating large horizontal zoom size.
- Resize tool:
- Same as MultiTool click in rightmost 15% of note.
- Similarly superfluous as per comments on Move tool, above.
- Will only resize last of tied notes, and only resize those to right (later music time).
- Velocity tool:
- Same as MultiTool click in leftmost 15% of note.
- Similarly superfluous as per comments on Move tool, above.
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New menu with actions to zoom/pan matrix grid to optimally "fit" notes, i.e. display all onscreen but without any wasted extra space.
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Choice of fitting notes in currently displayed range of measures, all notes in composition, or notes in loop range. Last only enabled if loop range is defined and is active.
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Optionally/additionally zoom horizontally to fit loop range, or entire composition, to full window grid width. ("Entire composition" option fairly useless as panner and main window already display full composition, but included for completeness).
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"Ignore percussion" option. Useful both because MIDI percussion "note" numbers cover large range of values unrelated to composition's pitch range (see Future work, below), but also because percussion notes have invisible durations (unless View -> Notes -> Show Percussion Durations is checked on) and can produce unintuitive "fit" results.
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Panner displays context help.
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Matrix editor "zoom" wheels use scaling value of 4th root of 2 (so 4 "clicks" result in 2x size change).
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New highlight ("stripe") modes: In-key vs accidental, and alternating light/dark (for percussion segments).
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Visual distinction between vertical lines indicating measures, beats, and inter-beat grid timing.
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Percussion "notes" are created on the nearest vertical measure/beat/grid line instead of the nearest earlier time (matches semantics that drum hits occur on the beat, not between beats).
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"Extant key" display of key in effect at first visible measure (left side of matrix grid). Shown to left of Chord/Key ruler if active, or to left of Marker and Loop Rulers if not. Similar to printed sheet music (but not Rosegarden's notation editor) which has key signature at beginning of each staff and only small number of measures in each. Shows key when Chord/Key Ruler not active or when no key change in currently displayed range of measures (e.g. canonical case of single key for entire composition).
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Mouse scrollwheel in main grid area, with None/Ctrl/Shift/Alt key modifiers, singly or in various combinations, allows all possible pan and zoom movements (vertical, horizontal, both),
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Matrix editor marker (timeline) ruler and note grid correctly update when time signature is inserted or removed, even if done externally in main window or notation editor.
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The vertical piano keyboard at the left of the Matrix Editor window more accurately aligns with the note grid.
The following changes/improvements to the Rosegarden "rulers": Loop, Marker, and Chord Name -- are available (with minor differences) in the matrix and notation editors, and the main window.
The loop ruler has been extended/enhanced in comparison to both the longstanding implementation in official Rosegarden 21.12 and prior, and also the as-of-this-writing upcoming changes in 22.12.
The changes largely center around separating loop range definition from looped playback, and are partially motivated by the fact that the loop range is additionally used for purposes other than looping (e.g. selecting notes by time range in the Matrix Editor).
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Looped playback (or or off) is controlled independently by the "Loop" toggle buttons (keyboard "@" hotkey/accelerator) in the Main, Transport, Matrix, and Notation Windows. (The buttons are synchronized together.)
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If a loop range is defined and is active (see immediately below), looped playback is confined within the range. If not, looped playback applies to the combined min/max time ranges of the composition's segments.
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The loop range is defined via mouse right-click-drag in the loop ruler. It can be adjusted via right-click-drag close to its beginning or end points
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The range is active immediately after being defined. When active, its time span is displayed in green. Times before the range are displayed in red crosshatch, and times after in blue crosshatch. This aids in knowing whether an offscreen loop range is before or after the currently zoomed/panned view.
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The loop range is toggled active/displayed vs inactive/invisible via mouse right-click without drag. If an attempt is made to toggle it active without first defining the range a warning dialog appears. (Note the dialog has an option to disable repeated warnings.)
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The loop range is automatically clipped to the min/max range of the compostion's segments, both during range definition and afterwards if segments are modified or removed.
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Playback cursor movement (click, or click-drag) and playback stop/start (double-click) remains unchanged or slightly improved (bug fixes).
Loop range playback with the loop range defined and active behaves as follows:
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Starting playback (play button, double click, spacebar hotkey/accelerator, etc) starts at the current cursor time if within the loop range.
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If current time cursor is before the loop range start time, or at or after its end time, playback jumps to start time before beginning.
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Stopping playback (play button, double click, etc) leaves the time cursor at its current position.
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If the looping button is toggled "on", playback continues to loop indefinitely. If not, playback stops at the end of the loop range. The latter allows repeated single playback of the loop range under manual control (once per playback start).
Several bugs in the Marker Ruler have been fixed, existing capabilities improved, and new features added.
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If markers have been defined (newly created or loaded along with composition from file), they are listed in time-sorted order in the Marker Ruler's right-click menu and can thus be accessed (jumped to) with a single mouse right-click and menu choice. This is as compared to official Rosegarden's requirement to double-click to bring up the "Manage Markers" dialog box, moving the mouse into it, and then clicking the marker there (all of which is still supported). Of course clicking on a marker that is currently visible onscreen (pan/zoom of window) is also still supported but is less frequently useful (one could simply move the playback cursor via the Loop Ruler, but neither method is applicable in the canonical case when the desired marker is not currently visible).
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New markers are created with a default name of "M:B" or "M:B+NT" where "M" is measure, "B" is beat, and "NT" is musical note time past the beat if not exactly on it. Compare to official Rosegarden's "new marker" default name, which is indistinguishable when used for multiple markers.
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Because the intended use of markers is to allow quick access to meaningful places in composition ("2nd chorus", "movement #3, Allegro", "horn section enters here"), when adding a new marker the marker editor is immediately popped up to change the above-described default time-based name. Keyboard focus is in the name field to allow immediate editing without an additional mouse click. If the default "M:B+NT" name is acceptable, clicking "OK", "Cancel", or pressing the "enter" key pops editor down without change, so this feature requires only one extra click or keypress when creating a default-named marker. Regardless, if this workflow is not desired (e.g. a user who frequently accepts the default time-based name without change, possibly editing it later via double-click) the feature can be disabled by unchecking the "Edit immediately after insert" box in the menu.
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Several bug fixes, including:
- The Main Window's "Composition -> Jump to Next Marker" (and "Previous") used order of creation instead of time order for newly created (vs loaded from file) markers.
- "Shift-click to set a range between markers" was similarly broken (incorrect order, not time-sorted).
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Markers have easily visible down-pointing arrow graphic to left of text indicating exact time position of marker instead of a difficult-to-see thin vertical line.
The Chord/Key Ruler has been completely rewritten and extended, along with its underlying chord analysis engine. New features and changes include:
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Greatly increased number/types of chords: Extended chords through 13ths, augmented/suspended/sixth/altered chords, omit note chords, etc.
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Show chords, key changes, or both (only key changes in main window). Key changes overwrite chords -- hold middle button to temporarily hide.
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Right-click menu action to insert key change (at playback position) in matrix and notation editors. (Was previously only possible via unrelated "Segment" menu or using the Event List Editor.)
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Two different chord analysis modes: When notes on/off, or all notes in a specified time range (supports analyzing arpeggios as chords). Can specify quantization time for notes on/off mode.
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Extensive user menu/preferences for chord naming (concert pitch letters, roman numeral scale degrees), ("m"/"min", "aug"/"+", "maj7"/triangle7), (minor chord roman numerals "IIm" vs "ii"), etc.
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Optional "slash chord" analysis/naming with several menu/preferences options (non-chord bass notes, chord or key/pitch relative bass note names, simplified chord plus added bass vs extended chord).
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Simplistic/primitive bass note disambiguation of enharmonic chords (C6 vs Am7, etc).
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Dialog to choose of subset of segments in matrix or notation editor to use for notes in chord analysis. Allows limiting excessive reporting of extended chords by e.g. disabling melody instrument segments.
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Usage suggestion: Add a segment to control chord analyses (add missing notes, add bass notes for enharmonic disambiguation, etc.) The segment can be set "unvoiced" by creating its notes with zero velocity (or later adjusting them) and/or muting segment's track.
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Chord name ruler action (mouse double-click) to delete key changes (previously only possible via the Event List Editor).
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"No chord" ("n/c") labels.
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New option in the Notation Editor's chord name ruler to copy chord name ruler chords to text annotations (automatic lead sheet generation). Does not overwrite existing text, so individual chords can be hand-edited as desired. Or multiple/all chords can be drag-selected and deleted, chord analysis options changed, and the new chords copied to text in the missing positions.
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"Extant key" label (see above) displayed in main window if chord/key ruler enabled.
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Choice of flats or sharps in key of C major.
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Chord label to right of tick mark (formerly only for key changes). Rationale: Chords start at time and continue for their note's durations vs sounding only for one instant.
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Chord and key names are always displayed at correct time in ruler (previously were "pushed" to right if not enough space). Rationale: Better to omit information than present false information.
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Right-click menu action to disable display of key changes (useful if key change overwriting chord name at same time).
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Visual distinction between time tick marks for chords vs key changes.
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Both playback and time cursor motion ("Rewind to Beginning", "Fast Forward to End") stop and move, respectively, to the combined min/max limits of the composition's segments instead of to the compostion's maximum measure number (default 100).
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With default settings for "Track Parameters -> Thru Routing" and "Instrument Parameters -> Receive external", incoming MIDI notes always play using the currently selected track's instrument in whichever window (main, matrix, or notation) currently has mouse focus.
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New Preferences -> General -> Behavior option to save .rg files uncompressed. Useful for RCS/CVS version tracking of compositions. Note that using
gitprovides few benefits because .rg files are both standalone and normally already compressed, so git's sophisticated multi-file versioning isn't applicable, and the RCS/CVS "diff" approach is more effective than attempting to re-compress already compressed files. -
True unicode sharp and flat symbols instead of ASCII "#" and "b".
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Auto-save does not remove "dirty" flag ("*" in window title bar indicating that changes have been made since last save). Prevents losing changes if exit without save (because no warning, because auto-save happened) if offer to restore auto-save at next startup is ignored. (Auto-save is additional safety, not replacement for, manual saving.)
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The playback time cursor vertical line's visibility has been increased in the main window and the matrix editor.
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Codebase cleanup, simplification, and rationalization. First steps at adding finer-grained internal messaging (Qt signals, Composition and Segment Observers), and partial removal of excessive/gratuitous uses of the Qt signal/slot mechanism.
The following screenshots illustrate some of the fork's features, particularly ones that are missing or differ from those in rosegarden-official. Note that the images are intended to illustrate a single feature each but several options and settings may vary between them in an attempt to best do so. The important point is that the features are orthogonal/independent and need not be used in the combinations shown.
Click on any thumbnail to see the full-sized original screenshot.
For full documentation see color, above.
The new "bright when selected" color mode:
compared to the classic official Rosegarden scheme:
The new option to automatically color segments by type of instrument (or alternately with random colors or a set chosen for maximum visual differentiation).
For full documentation see matrix/percussion editor unification, above.
The single main window button to bring up the matrix editor:
The new unified matrix editor simultaneously/correctly displaying percussion segment "notes" vs normal, pitched instrument notes:
For full documentation see loop ruler and features in all editing tools, above.
Loop ruler showing loop range in green, times before/after in brown/blue, plus matrix tools right-click menu:
For full documentation see note display, above.
Notes with concert pitch letter names, colored by segment:
Notes labeled with key/scale degree, colored by segment:
Notes labeled (and colored) with key-relative pitch:
Notes labeled and colored with MIDI velocity:
For full documentation see chord/key ruler, above.
Chord analysis can be limited to notes from a subset of the displayed segments:
Various chord analysis/naming options ...
Concert pitch letter names:
In-key roman numerals:
For full documentation see marker ruler, above.
Creating a new marker:
Jumping to a marker and/or editing markers:
Automatic zoom/pan of matrix grid. For full documentation see matrix editor panner features, above.
For further information see README-official.md and/or the official Rosegarden links listed above.
- "See-thru" matrix editor notes for View -> Notes -> Color -> Segment mode to show mulitple notes at same pitch from different segments/instruments ("doubled" notes).
- Replace current main window "Segment Parameters, Color" chooser with Qt QColorDialog and internal indexed ColourMap class with direct Qt QColor RGB (or other, more generalized) (16 bit or float values, better color space) values. May require revving ".rg" file format.
- User remapping of MIDI percussion notes to vertical position in matrix editor grid and notation editor staves. Would allow grouping of percussion instruments together and placement (in matrix editor) directly above or below composition's pitched instruments' notes. UI implemented similar to main window's Tracks -> Move Track Up and Move Track Down menu actions. Option could/would be ignored by the rare user who fluently plays MIDI drums on piano keyboard (or other instrument) via muscle memory that bass drum is pitch B1, snare is D2, low wood block F5, etc.
- Optional "smooth scrolling" mode in matrix editor: Time cursor stays fixed at 1/4 way from left (earliest time) of window and notes scroll right-to-left across it during playback. Avoids current "jump" when moving cursor gets close to right side of window and entire display redraws (moved to the left), requiring visual refocus/reorientation. (Yes, just like turning the page with printed sheet music, but we are no longer limited by 600 year old Gutenberg technology.)
- Add
--stderrcommandline option. If not set, no output to stderr/stdout except fatal errors output immediately before program self-abort. Regardless, all warning and information messages instead/also to new Qt text viewer widget/window, viewable via new main window "Info" icon/button (added to "Open in Matrix Editor", "Open in Notation Editor", etc. group) or via new "View -> Windows -> ..." menu (currently missing, editors/viewers only accessable via icon/buttons or accelerator keybindings). Info viewer widget/window includes "Clear" button to remove already-viewed messages. - Non-uniform matrix editor horizontal scaling: Have minimum width for e.g. quarter notes, possibly same as vertical spacing of pitches, so are "square". If measure contains only quarter and/or longer (half, whole) notes, display as 4x quarter note width. If has shorter notes (eighth and/or below), scale horizontally so shortest note is same width as canonical measure's quarter note. Similar to standard notation (and notation editor).
- Add text/lyric ruler for viewing/editing lyrics (or more generic Rosegarden text events) in matrix editor (and optionally notation editor).