Re: Sibelius Software UK office shuts down

[Joseph Rushton Wakeling]

On 02/08/12 17:51, Graham Percival wrote:
> In short: if there is a concerted effort to create a "quick
> render" output, I would be absolutely shocked if it wasn't at
> least 10 times faster than the current output.

(1) How paralellized is the current code -- and if not much or at all, what do 
you think the scope is for doing so?  E.g. once basic pagination is in place, 
could all other elements be engraved in separate per-page threads?  Likewise, 
any parts of a score separated by an explicit page break could be engraved by 
separate threads.

(2) Are there any statistics on compile time vs. input file size?  It doesn't 
necessarily help Lilypond to be blazingly fast on a 2-page, 4-part choral score 
if it's horrendously slow in a 100-page full-orchestra operatic score.  I recall 
that Valentin's opera was a nightmare to render both in terms of time and of 
memory used along the way.

(3) The real speed issue is not so much from-scratch compile times but recompile 
times -- how long _should_ it take to re-render the score if e.g. I add a single 
staccato dot to one note?

Sibelius' publicity always used to make much of the fact that if Wagner had 
wanted to add a new bar at the start of the entire Ring Cycle, using Sibelius it 
would have taken no more than 1 second.  That kind of speed-of-tweaking may be 
worth more than speed of first compile -- ideally, you'd be able to type stuff 
into the editor in e.g. Frescobaldi, and see the score change in front of your eyes.