Re: Date in the footer and Headers/Footers/Titles

[Kieren MacMillan]

Hi Chip,

> first I want to suggest this: move the section '3.2 Titles and  
> headers'
> found in the NOTATION Reference to the LM. Why? Because the NR should
> be about Notation, and headers/footers/titles are not notation.

Interesting... I'm curious to see what others' opinions are.
Although it doesn't bother me where they are, I definitely agree that  
these elements are not "notation".

> As a nooby if I'm looking for info on adding a date to the footer I  
> start by
> searching for Footer in the index of the LM, but it's not there.

That should be the first thing to get fixed!  =)
Graham/Carl: who/what decides which doc elements get an index entry?

> 3.2.2 Custom Titles. And now I'm thinking 'why am I reading about  
> titles
> when I should be reading about the footer?'

If "3.2 Titles and Headers" was changed to (e.g.) "3.2 Titles/Headers/ 
Footers", would that have cleared up your confusion?

> I see the bit about evenFooterMarkup and oddFooterMarkup
> and no example of what to do with them, just a very brief description.

As you later point out, this is where your example code (to include  
the date) could/should go.

> Headers [...] Titles [and] Footers [...] are separate entities. And  
> should be treated as such.

That is definitely a point of preference: I, for one, am quite happy  
thinking about all of these as "page- (or higher) level text elements  
which are not musical notation", and as such lumping them together.  
One of the main concerns in documentation -- especially on-line  
(HTML) docs -- is the number of clicks required to get to the desired  
information. Breaking these items into separate places will almost  
certainly increase the number of clicks required by many users.

> With all that said here is the code for the footer that solves the  
> problem

Excellent; hopefully that will now be added to the docs at the  
correct place.

> I have put in my first 2 cents worth

Welcome to the "I'm doing something to improve Lilypond  
documentation" club!  =)

Best regards,
Kieren.