Re: get an accidental to not print

[Trevor Bača]

On 2/12/07, Jonathan Henkelman <address@hidden> wrote:
> > > %%% BEGIN %%%
> > >
> > > \new Staff {
> > >   \once \override Accidental #'transparent = ##t
> > >   cis'2
> > > }
> > >
> > > %%% END %%%
>
> > If you instead use
> > \once \override Accidental #'stencil = ##f
> > then the invisible accidental will not even take any space.
> >
> >    /Mats
>
> For the record. I understand both of Trevors examples, but looking through the
> programmers ref to try and understand Mats' fix...  'stencil' is listed of
> type "unknown" and the doc says it represents the "symbol to print". How does
> passing it false result in a symbol not being printed?  Should the doc be
> updated to say something like: "The symbol to print, or don't print if false"?

I think there's something of a convention that quite a few of the
different settings take false as a type of "nullification". You can
set outside-staff-priority, for example, to a number to cause some
graphic element to stack closer to or farther away from the staff. But
if you set ...

 \override Whatever #'outside-staff-priority = ##f

... then you're basically saying to the optimized vertical spacing
algorithm "hey, just don't even consider the Whatever grob when you do
the vertical stuff."

Likewise, setting Whatever #'stencil = ##f says to the layout engine
"just don't draw the Whatever grob at all."

Not sure where the convention about numeric (and other) parameters
taking ##f appears in the docs, but it's a good convention to know.



--
Trevor Bača
address@hidden