Don't know if this is possible but it would be great if annotation on text files (chordpro) scaled and reflowed when the page is zoomed. For example if I annotate a song to strike out part of it, (pen tool to cross it out) then change the zoom the annotation stays in the same place on the screen but the text underneath gets reformatted to fit the zoom and consequently the wrong part is shown as being struck out.
Unfortunately, annotations are just anchored to a specific point on the page - there is no correlation between their positioning and rendered content in the file. In order to support what you are describing where annotations could move as the font sizes increase or decrease, the entire implementation would have to be changed so that each annotation is anchored to something on the page (i.e. the nearest word). This still isn't guaranteed to provide exactly the results you would want either, as the things on the page can shift a great deal as the font sizes increase, and annotations could very quickly be moved off the page. There is also the issue where the file could be edited and the anchored word could be removed and so there would have to be a great deal of code to ensure annotations always have a valid anchor point after a file is edited (which would be complex to implement). These kinds of changes also means that the annotation implementation would have to be significantly different for chord pro files versus other file types, increasing the likelihood of bugs. It also would increase the workload as any change to annotations would have to be tested independently on chord pro files to ensure it wouldn't break things.
If someone else has an idea about how this could be implemented, I'm all ears, but chord pro files are just text files so nothing complex can be stored in them. I don't really want to introduce any changes to the files themselves that would cause them to be incompatible with any other chord pro application. The pango syntax support might eliminate the need for some annotations in chord pro files, so perhaps when that is implemented, this won't be as an issue for some.
Thanks for the reply Mike, I thought it might be tricky. Only asked as I made several annotations to a song and my wife zoomed to make it more readable and now the annotations don't make sense. No worries ...... oooh another idea then is it possible to lock the zoom just for annotated files so they don't get messed up?
Load a song in your library, tap the center of the screen to bring up the song overlay, tap the second icon at the bottom left, tap Zoom/Pan Settings, and then change the dropdown for "Text and Chord Pro File Zoom Mode" to "Disabled". Then zooming won't work for chord pro files. You could also change it to "Change Page Size", and then zooming in on chord pro files will work like it does with PDFs where it just increases the size of the rendered image. The annotations will then stay positioned correctly as you zoom in.
(11-15-2021, 07:32 AM)Zubersoft Wrote: Load a song in your library, tap the center of the screen to bring up the song overlay, tap the second icon at the bottom left, tap Zoom/Pan Settings, and then change the dropdown for "Text and Chord Pro File Zoom Mode" to "Disabled". Then zooming won't work for chord pro files. You could also change it to "Change Page Size", and then zooming in on chord pro files will work like it does with PDFs where it just increases the size of the rendered image. The annotations will then stay positioned correctly as you zoom in.
Mike
Thanks for the suggestion Mike, unfortunately it doesn't really do what I'd like. I want to be able to zoom text files except when there are annotations (which at a later date I would encorporate into the text file and then delete). With your suggestion I would have to constantly turn on/off zooming which isn't practical ... maybe you could take it as an enhancement to a future update,for now I'll just avoid zooming after annotating.
11-16-2021, 05:08 AM (This post was last modified: 11-16-2021, 05:53 AM by Zubersoft.)
> If someone else has an idea about how this could be implemented, I'm all ears, but chord pro files are just text files so nothing complex can be stored in them. I don't really > want to introduce any changes to the files themselves that would cause them to be incompatible with any other chord pro application. The pango syntax support might eliminate > the need for some annotations in chord pro files, so perhaps when that is implemented, this won't be as an issue for some.
Hm, I already replied to this but it got lost in the system.
Wouldn't it be possible to have an option to automatically convert the chord pro txt source file to a pdf which then is used to display it in MSP? There could be an extra edit button which again loads the chord pro source for editing/transposing and would again convert to pdf when it's saved?
I think this option would be useful in the same way for ABC notation (I really wish to be included in MSP rather sooner than later, but am aware of all the things which are due before that).
With PDFs the annotations zoom with the rest, correct?
11-16-2021, 09:15 AM (This post was last modified: 11-16-2021, 09:15 AM by Zubersoft.)
I think even if the chord pro was converted to PDF, you'd run into the same problem if the chord pro font size was modified - the PDF is just going to contain exact copies of the rendered chord pro pages at whatever text display settings were used. So if the font sizes increased, the annotations would be positioned incorrectly, and the PDF would have the same problem.
You are correct that with PDFs the annotations zoom with the rest though.
PDFs just don't suit my needs, if I'm close to the tablet then a small font on a PDF is OK, however if a group of us are sharing the tablet I need to be able to zoom to a fairly large font so its easily visible at a distance. If I try this with a PDF, after cropping as much as possible, then the lines don't fit on the page. It may be my settings but MSP centers the page and the start and end of the lines is off the screen. Text files are perfect for this requirement as the lines are automatically reflowed, even if I do lose some of the PDF benefits, for example colour highlighting of parts of the lyrics.
(11-15-2021, 04:15 AM)Zubersoft Wrote: Unfortunately, annotations are just anchored to a specific point on the page
ChordPro6 has a basic provision for textual annotations controlled from the ChordPro.
They are written similar to chords, but with '[*'. Currently the annotation is rendered just like a chord (possibly with a different font/size/colour) and it is suitable for simple annotations like "Rit.", "Coda", "A-Capella", etc.. Some (also basic) provisions are planned to control placement of the annotation.
This is, and will never be, as powerful as MSPro's annotations but it covers a lot of daily cases.
