Which frontend?

[Eyolf Ostrem]

Which frontends do yo all use for lilypond? Here's the ones I've tried out so 
far, with my experiences - some bad, some good:

1. NoteEdit. 
I like the way one can just input bare, basic notation, and the 
configurability. I've also come to like the way the keyboard input works, at 
least after I redefined all the keys to something that suits me (note names 
in sequence and not their alphabetical values; durations likewise: 1/4 note 
should be between 1/8 and 1/2, not set to 4, 8 and 2; all the modifiers 
should be accessible to the "duration" hand without having to move around, 
etc).
however: I haven't found a keyboard shortcut for \breve and \longa - essential 
if one writes a lot of renaissance music. Also, It would have been nice if 
one could generate a lilypond output on the fly, of whatever one has written 
in, without having to go through the process  of exporting, opening the file, 
copy-pasting into the "real" document, etc.
Also, I miss things like a default score setup, a snippet/templates library, a 
menu for inserting more specific lilypond commands (but I realize it's not 
only a lilypond frontend, so that's probably too much to ask).
But all in all, it's so far my favorite frontend - not for generating whole 
scores, but for entering the music which I can then paste into another text 
file.

2. Rosegarden.
I had hopes for this program, but most of them have been thrashed. The 
keyboard input mode is hopeless, with the fixed positions, relative to the 
key, which means (as far as I have found out), that if you write a piece in b 
major, there is no way one can insert notes with the keyboard below the 
middle line in a staff with a treble clef. 
There are other gripes too, but this is enough to make it useless for me. 

3. Jedit + LilyPond plugin
Looks very promising, but apparently there's something wrong with my java 
setup, because if I try to do anything more than the most basic text input, I 
get errors and nothing happens. 

4. Denemo
From the looks of it, it seems to have what I want from NoteEdit, but I've 
never been able to test it out properly, because it crashes all the time. 
Might have to do with my locale settings, which it doesn't like, but I'm not 
sure.

The emacs mode - I haven't tried it out, but from what I've read, it also 
looks very promising. Is that something I should invest some more time in? I 
want a plain tool which can quickly insert notes through the keyboard, 
preferably also with sounding output, but without straying too far from the 
text mode of the basic ly-file. 

Have I missed anything? 

Eyolf Østrem

-- 
There's no such thing as an original sin.
                -- Elvis Costello