NEWS

New features in 2.6 since 2.4

• Global font styles (roman, sans, typewriter) can be defined for each \paper block, with

       
       #(define fonts
         (make-pango-font-tree
          "Times New Roman" "Helvetica" "Courier"
          (/ myStaffSize 20)))
  

• Newly created staves and lyric lines, can be put in any vertical order, by setting alignBelowContext or alignAboveContext properties in the newly created context. An example of the use of this is in input/regression/alignment-order.ly.

  This feature has been sponsored by Bertalan Fodor.

• Staves may be stopped and started halfway a line, e.g.

       
       b4 b \stopStaff b \startStaff b
  
  

  

  This feature has been sponsored by Hans Forbrich.

• Grid lines, vertical lines synchronized with notes, can be drawn across staves, by adding suitable engravers. An example is in input/regression/grid-lines.ly,

  

• Lines, such as glissandi or Text-spanner lines, can have arrows at the end, e.g.

       
       \override Glissando #'arrow = ##t
       b''2 \glissando b'
  
  

  

• Chord names may now be rendered in Italian and French.
• lilypond-book now makes lilypond print line numbers relative to the input file for every error message.
• The command \epsfile allows inclusion of EPS graphics into markup texts.
• There is a music function \displayMusic, which will display a music expression as indented Scheme code.
• Automatic beaming is now specified explicitly for each moment throughout a measure, which enables automatic beaming in compound measures, as demonstrated in the following item.
• A plus sign was added to the number font. This enables printing of compound time signatures

  

• A new \circle markup command allows for all kinds of circled texts

  

• String numbers are now printed on chords as well

       
       <c\1 e\2 g\3>
  
  

  

  See also input/regression/string-number.ly.

  This feature was sponsored by Gunther Strube.

• Notes with ledger lines will be kept at a distance, so they never disappear.
• Clefs that are below notes of other staves are now spaced according to engraving conventions.
• Markup texts can be appended to a \score block or toplevel music expression, for example,

       \relative { c' d e }
       \markup { first text }
       \markup { second text }
  

  

  See input/regression/score-text.ly.

• TeX's kpathsea library is loaded dynamically, so installing LilyPond does not require installing TeX anymore.
• Point and click editing is now supported in the PS/PDF backend as well. See Point and click.
• White mensural ligatures now conform more closely to Renaissance usage.
• With the new tieWaitForNote property, arpeggios may be written out using ties, for example,

       
       \set tieWaitForNote = ##t
       \grace { c16[~ e~ g]~ } <c, e g>4
  
  

  

  Thanks to Steve Doonan for funding development of this feature.

• Individual objects may be assigned colors, for example,

       
       	\override NoteHead #'color = #red
       	c4
  
  

  

• The PostScript backend is now used by default. This backend requires less machinery to run, and gives more consistent results.

  Ghostscript 8.x is required for PDF output. Earlier versions may hang while converting PostScript to PDF.

• Separator slashes may be inserted between systems in a score. For an example, see input/regression/system-separator.ly:
• Locations of errors in the input are now calculated more precisely.
• LilyPond now uses Pango and FontConfig for selecting and rendering UTF-8 input in non-TeX backends. A font may be selected by using a FontConfig name,

       \override TextScript #'font-name = #"Serif"
  

  or using the classic font selection mechanism

       \override TextScript #'font-family = #'roman
       \override TextScript #'font-series = #'bold
  

  Any Type1 and TrueType font recognized by FontConfig is available in LilyPond as well.

• Metrics of blocks of text can be retrieved from (La)TeX directly, using the -f texstr output backend. This provides exact metrics for texts, including kerning and accents.
• LilyPond now uses FreeType to read the Feta font as an OpenType font. This is a cleaner design and more robust. Recent versions of FontForge (2004 1211 or newer) and Freetype are required.
• The SVG backend is now a fully functional backend.
• A new script, \espressivo has been added, for a combination of crescendo and decrescendo on a single note.
• In markups, expressions stacked with \column, \center-align, etc, are not grouped with < ... > anymore, but with { ... }, eg:

       \markup \column {
         \line { first line }
         \line { second line }
       }
  

• LilyPond will now avoid line breaks that cause long texts to stick outside of the page staff.
• Grace notes following a main note, used to be entered by letting the grace notes follow a skip in a parallel expression, for example,

       
         << { d1 }
            { s2 \grace { c16[ d] } } >>
         c4
  

  This can now be shortened by doing

       \afterGrace { d1 } { c16[ d] }
  

• Pagebreaks can now be forced or forbidden after title blocks. This is achieved by setting breakbefore in the \header block to true or false.
• Shaped note heads. This feature has been sponsored by Jonathan Walther,

       
         \set shapeNoteStyles = ##(do re mi fa #f la ti)
         c d e f g a b c d e f g a b c
  
  

  

• Layout for titles, page header and footer can now be entered as \markup commands.
• Positioning of slurs can now be adjusted manually
• Grace notes are correctly quoted and formatted when using cue notes.
• Cue notes can now be created with

       \cueDuring #voice-name #direction { music }
  

  This will set stem directions and put the cue notes in the cue Voice.

• Stemlets, short stems over beamed rests, have been added.

       
       \override Stem #'stemlet-length = #0.75
       c8[ r8 c16 r16 c8]
  
  

  

For older news, go to http://lilypond.org/doc/v2.4/Documentation/topdocs/out-www/NEWS.html.

Other languages: English.
Using automatic language selection.