Posts: 5
Threads: 4
Joined: Dec 2019
Reputation:
0
Please add the ability to import docx files in the Windows version. Both Chordle and Songbook Pro can do this and I find it quite useful. I believe this feature would make MobileSheets the premier, feature-rich music reader program available.
Posts: 1,047
Threads: 112
Joined: Dec 2015
Reputation:
11
IDK about the future of Winword files for sheet music. Maybe for chordpro files but not really for sheet music with notes IMO.
But probably there's a need for native usage of epub. I don't like this format at all for sheet music and by far prefer pdf. But since a lot of publishers (especially Hal Leonard) offer the sheet music as epub nowadays it's something to consider (and ABC of course :-) ).
Since epub is only a zipped html file with images maybe it isn't too complicated either.
Posts: 13,392
Threads: 302
Joined: Apr 2012
Reputation:
238
It's certainly been on my list of things to do for a while. The main limiting factor has been the availability of a library for me to use on the Android side. There is only one available that I'm aware of, and I haven't been able to justify the cost yet. One thing I can consider doing is allowing word files to be automatically converted to PDFs in the Windows 10 version, but I'm not sure that's what users will really want, as it means they would no longer be able to edit their files. Once the iOS version is released, I will make a decision for what I plan to do about this for all three platforms.
Mike
Posts: 15
Threads: 7
Joined: Mar 2021
Reputation:
0
As I would absolutely love this feature, too, I got to wondering if you could maybe just make Android and iOS 'read-only'?
Then you could let the Windows (& Mac?) version be the Editor.
I just looked to see what my Word360 can save as and one option is ODT, Open Document Text.
While it doesn't support all the advanced Word functions, it should work just fine for MS.
It would be a pain for most of us that use Word extensively, but it might be worth it for editing capabilities on-the-fly.
Just some ideas, probably not worth the 2 cents, but alas, I tried. :-)
Eric
Posts: 13,392
Threads: 302
Joined: Apr 2012
Reputation:
238
The way data is saved in a .docx file is extremely complex. I can't take the file and show it on the screen without some kind of library to read that data, make sense of it, figure out how to format it given the output window, and give me back a bitmap of the page that I can then draw to the screen. Whether it's read-only or not, the limiting factor is my ability to show that document on the screen. If I went with the option to convert to PDF, I wouldn't keep the original docx around for editing (as it wouldn't be part of the song's file list so it wouldn't be included with library backups and such), so that wouldn't really support having it be editable on Windows. Having said all that, the PDF library I'm using for both Android and Windows 10 is starting to add support for displaying docx files. The company that makes that PDF library is in the early stages of development for that feature, but if they get it working fairly well, then I wouldn't need a separate library for that and I could start supporting those files with minimal effort. Editing of those files would not be supported in MobileSheets itself - you'd have to use an external editor for that.
Mike
