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MUZIKA User's Guide Software Version 1.0 Lavy Libman & Yakov Aglamaz July 1992 1Introduction 1.1 Musical software packages Musical software packages at the market today allow the user to perform a variety of functions that can be split into several categories: o Musical analyzers: Sample analog signals and show information about them including frequency spectrum, loudness, etc. o Sequencers: Allow MIDI communication with musical instruments, convert- ing whatever is played into musical notes or some other notation. o Note recognizers: Recognize bitmap files into digital representation. Bitmap files could be generated by optical scanners, thus allowing the user to convert regular note books into files that can be played by the computer. o Score editors: Input musical notes, display them on the screen, edit, print and play them. 1.2 The Muzika package Muzika is a software package from the fourth category. It was created for fill- ing a hole in this category for PC users: not many packages were written for the PC, none for Microsoft Windows. Muzika is a Musical notes editor - a tool used for writing musical note books, printing them and creating MIDI files for playing the music by other tools. Muzika's environment provides tools for composing, playing, and printing melodies. A melody can consist of several parts; any of them can have upto 5 staves, in any key. Some of he features provided by Muzika include: o Easy inserting notes and other signs into the melody. o Cutting, copying and pasting parts of the melody. o Displaying and printing the melody in two modes: as one part or as a score. o Creating MIDI files for playing the melody by other tools. All these functions are achieved easily by clicking the mouse button. The mel- ody is visible all the time allowing the user to see and play the melody easily while he composes it. The functions are easy to find and use through the pop- down menus. 2Main window structure The main window is divided to four visual sections: o Edit mode symbols. o Active symbol set region. o Status line. o Editing area. 2.1 Edit mode symbols The edit mode symbols consist of three symbols: pencil, eraser and hand. They are used at the editing: o Pencil - for drawing new staves. o Eraser - for deletion. o Hand - for dragging objects. For the usage of these see the "Using the symbols" chapter (page 11). 2.2 Active symbol set region The symbol set region is divided to several slots. The slot corresponding to the active symbol is shown in reverse video. Currently, several symbol sets are avail- able. These are listed below: o Notes and pauses. o Keys. o Beats. o Bars. o Loudness symbols. o Text. For the usage of these see the "Using the symbols" chapter (page 11). 2.3 Status line The status line displays information about the current status of the display. Such parameters as the currently displayed part and the visible staves are shown. 2.4 The editing area The editing area displays the contents of the melody workspace. In other words, the staves and the musical signs on them are shown. The editing area can display either a single part or an entire score, with several parts shown simulta- neously. The control over the display settings is available via the Layout menu. For further details see the "Using the menu" chapter (page 5). 3Using the menu The main menu contains five sub-menus: o File. o Print. o Layout. o Symbols. o Help. These sub-menus are explained in detail in the following sections. 3.1 The File sub-menu The File sub-menu contains file oriented commands: 3.1.1 New The New command item opens a dialog box that asks for the staff width that the user wishes to work with. A list of three widths is supplied (all in pixel units) from which the user should select one. These widths were chosen for comforting the editing on screens of different resolutions: 640x480, 800x600, or 1024x768 pixels. After the width is chosen, the user is presented with a clean workspace. By default the empty melody contains one part, named UNNAMED. The new mel- ody itself is untitled until it is saved for the first time. If the New operation is selected when there is a melody in the workspace that has been modified since the last save, the changes to the previous melody are not automatically saved. Therefore New asks the user for confirmation before destroying the previous melody. 3.1.2 Open The Open command item opens a file selection box. It allows the user the choose the drive and directory from which the file is to be selected. Then the directory contents is displayed, and double-clicking the file name from the file list loads it into the memory. The default extension for Muzika melody files is *.MUZ. However, it can be changed, or even the entire filename typed manu- ally via the keyboard. If the Open operation is selected when there is a melody in the workspace that has been modified since the last save, the changes to the previous melody are not automatically saved. Therefore Open asks the user for confirmation before destroying the previous melody. 3.1.3 Save The Save command item used for saving the current melody. The saving is done to the same file from which it was loaded from. In the case that the melody was untitled, the Save as dialog box is opened. (See below). 3.1.4 Save as The Save as command item opens a file selection box. The directory and drive can be chosen with mouse clicks. The new filename is to be written at the top. Clicking the OK button saves the melody in the new filename (containing the new path). This also changes change the title of the window to the new name. As warning message is displayed if the given file already exists. The user is requested to confirm overwriting the file, or he can cancel the operation. 3.1.5 Create MIDI This last command item is used for playing melodies by other tools. Create MIDI saves the melody in standard MIDI format that can be read and played as voice by various special-purpose tools that are available on the market. The file is saved with the same name with `.MID' extension. NOTE: This file cannot be re-read into Muzika and thus regular saving is a must for re-editing the file later with Muzika. 3.2 The Print command The Print command is printing the edited melody in the same mode as the cur- rent display: as a score or a single part. NOTE: no further notice is given. Selecting this item will print the melody immediately 3.3 The Layout sub-menu Layout is the home sub-menu for driving operations that concern the layout of the display. It is here that the user switches between single-part or score display. The specific choices are listed below. 3.3.1 Parts Selecting the Parts command opens a parts list dialog box. In this box, the user can see and/or change the parts layout of the melody. The buttons in the dialog box allow adding or removing parts, or changing attributes of existing parts. A precise list of the dialog box buttons follows: Attributes changes the selected part's attributes. For example, you may want to select the musical instrument that is to play the part. New adds a new part. Another dialog box appears, prompting the user to enter the new part's name and staff multiplicity. Staff multiplicity means, how many single staves are grouped together in each multiple staff. This parameter cannot be changed after the part is created. Remove removes the selected part. If the selected part is not empty, a warn- ing message appears with a request of confirmation. Also, a part cannot be removed if it is the currently visible one, or if it is the only one in the entire melody. OK should be selected after the requested changes have been made. 3.3.2 Page Selecting the Page command opens a Page dialog box. The dialog box allows to make some settings that are directly concerned with the display. Among the settings that are made through this dialog box are: o The kind of the display: either a score (all parts) or a single part. o If it is a single-part display, what part should be shown. o The default staff height, in pixels. Actually, this is the default distance between adjacent staves, including signs that are outside a staff (such as a loudness symbol or a text instruction of any kind). The number entered here is only a default; after staves are created, they can be manually moved by the hand symbol (see the "Using the symbols" chapter (page 11)). o The default object width, in pixels. This number can be thought of as a granularity of an invisible grid of places on which objects can be placed. In other words, for example, if the object width is 20 pixels (the default), then objects cannot be put closer than 20 pixels away from one another. As in any Windows dialog box, after concluding the page layout settings, click on the OK button for the changes to take effect. 3.3.3 Reformat The Reformat command item reformats the entire part. Blanks between objects are deleted and the notes are equally spaced, according to their dura- tions. 3.4 The Symbols sub-menu This menu chooses the set of symbols to appear in the Active symbol set region. The first 6 menu items contain actual musical symbols, with which objects are created in the melody. The last one is a set of block operations, includ- ing marking, clipping and pasting. For instructions about inserting objects using these sets see the "The musical symbols" chapter (page 11). 3.4.1 Notes Notes and breaks appear in the Active symbol set region. The currently sup- ported objects are: full, half, quarter, eighth and sixteenth - both for notes and for breaks. 3.4.2 Keys F or G standard keys. 3.4.3 Beats The beat object can appear anywhere on the staff, not only at staff start. Currently supported: 2/4, 3/4, 4/4, 2/8, 3/8, 4/8 and 6/8. 3.4.4 Bars These are some commonly-used bar signs. The signs included are: the sin- gle bar separator, the double bar separator, and the thick staff-beginning or staff-ending bar separators. 3.4.5 Loudness The currently supported loudness symbols are: Forte, Fortissimo, Piano, Pianissimo, Crescendo, and Diminuendo. All loudness signs are common to a multiple staff, appearing below it no matter where you insert a loudness object. 3.4.6 Text Text instructions (e.g. Allegro) can be inserted anywhere in a melody, either above or below a staff. The Text symbol is used for this purpose. 3.4.7 Block operations Selecting the Block operations menu item will select four special symbols at the Active symbol set region. These are used for performing block operations on the part being display. The symbols are: Mark, Copy, Cut and Paste. For more details on these see "The block operation symbols" on page 13. 3.5 The help sub-menu Unfortunately, the current implementation of Muzika does not contain any on- line help. Therefore the only item in this menu is: 3.5.1 About The About menu item shows the corresponding dialog box. The dialog box displays such information as: the version of Muzika (currently 1.0), the soft- ware developers, and an icon. 4Using the symbols This chapter concludes, finally, everything about editing except what concerns the menu. What the user should especially note is the extreme ease of the editing process using the mouse. 4.1 The musical symbols Object are divided into two groups: o Point objects: notes, breaks, keys, beats. o Continuous objects:... To insert a point object: o Select the right set of objects from The Symbols sub-menu. o Move the cursor to Active symbol set region and click over the wanted object. o Move the cursor to The editing area in the wanted place and click the mouse. o The new object will be added at the clicking spot. If the object was a note and the clicking was over other notes they will be merged into one accord. To insert a continuous object: o Select the right set of objects from The Symbols sub-menu. o Move the cursor to Active symbol set region and click over the wanted object. o Move the cursor to The editing area in the wanted place for object start and click the mouse but do not release it. o Move the cursor to the wanted place for object end and release the mouse. o The new object will be inserted between the where you click the mouse and where you released it. 4.2 The pencil symbol Used for adding new staves: o Select this item from the Edit mode symbols region. o Move the cursor to the location of the new staff. o When you click it, a new multiple staff appears. Adding multiple staves can be anywhere on the working area. A click between two staves will push the staves after the cursor one staff below and a new empty staff will appear in the hole. 4.3 The eraser symbol Used for deleting objects: o Select this item from the Edit mode symbols region. o Move the cursor to the location of the object to be deleted. When deleting a whole staff, just move the cursor anywhere on the staff. o When clicking the mouse, the objects at the cursor position are erased. Clicking the mouse over a point with many objects will erase them all: click- ing over an accord will remove all the notes. Double-clicking it will delete the entire multiple staff. 4.4 The hand symbol With the hand you drag an object to a new place: o Select this item from the Edit mode symbols region. o Move the cursor to the object. o Click the mouse button without releasing it. o Move the cursor to the target location. o Release the mouse button. In the case that the object dragged was a note the note will be merged to an accord if there were notes previously. If you double-click it, leaving the left but- ton pressed after the second click, the entire multiple staff is dragged. Again, if the click was over a point with many objects, they will all be dragged. 4.5 The block operation symbols Each block operation symbol activates a different operation on a block. The block can be of any length - single note, one bar and even an entire staff. There are four block operations: Mark, Copy, Cut, and Paste. The general principle is that there is always a single block in the clipboard (empty at start). Copy and Cut will insert the Marked block into the clipboard and Paste will insert it to the mel- ody. 4.5.1 Mark Used for marking the block on which Copy and Cut will be used. To activate this operation: o Select Mark from Active symbol set region. o Move the cursor to the start of the block. o Click the mouse - without leaving it. o Move the mouse to the end of the block. o Release the mouse. This marks the block: from the mouse click till the mouse release. The marked block will be displayed in reverse-video. 4.5.2 Copy Used for duplicating blocks. To activate just select Copy and click the mouse button anywhere in the editing area. The last Marked block will be copied into the clipboard. This block will be kept in the clipboard until the next Cut or Copy. It can be added anywhere else in the same melody, or even in a different melody, using Paste. 4.5.3 Cut Used for moving blocks and for deleting them. To activate just select Cut and click the mouse button anywhere in the edit- ing area. The last Marked block will be removed from the melody, but kept in mem- ory until the next Cut or Copy. It can be restored at a different place (either in the same melody or a different one) using Paste. 4.5.4 Paste Used for inserting the block in clipboard into the melody. To activate this operation: o Select Paste from Active symbol set region. o Move the cursor to the place you want to insert the block. o Click the mouse. The block in clipboard will be inserted to the melody starting at the mouse click location.