ChoralWiki:CPDL support, help, and feedback/Archive 1: Difference between revisions

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Typing <tt><nowiki>{{Composer|William Byrd}}</nowiki></tt> on a score page does '''two''' things: (1) it produces the line
Typing <tt><nowiki>{{Composer|William Byrd}}</nowiki></tt> on a score page does '''two''' things: (1) it produces the line


'''Composer:''' [[Wiliam Byrd]]
'''Composer:''' [[William Byrd]]
(followed by a line-break)
(followed by a line-break)



Revision as of 16:29, 21 November 2008

CPDL support, help, and feedback/Archive 1

This page archives topics from the Bulletin board forum CPDL support, help, and feedback

Archive 1

PDF File protected on Williams Server

 Help 

If you try to access the PDF file for the following work:

https://www.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Sailing_at_Dawn_%28from_%27Songs_of_the_Fleet%27%29_%28Charles_Villiers_Stanford%29

You get an error: Forbidden You don't have permission to access /cpdl/sheet/sta-1171.pdf on this server.

Any idea why ?

It seems to be a general problem with ALL of the files stored on Williams server ...


Apache/2.2.3 (Ubuntu) Server at wso.williams.edu Port 80

 Help 

I've left a message for Raf (the Manager of CPDL) and hope it will be resolved soon. There have been occasional problems like this with the Williams server in the past which have generally proved to be only temporary.

 Help 

Seems to be fixed now ...

Diacritics (e.g., ç) not accommodated in search & alphabetization features?

 Help 

After uploading a piece entitled "Utěšený nám den nastal," I noticed that a search for "Uteseny" (sans diacritics) does not return any results. Does this also mean that pieces whose titles begin with diacritical characters (É, Ç, Ü, etc.) are not found under any letter of the alphabet in templates that auto-categorize alphabetically? Is there a wiki feature that can be enabled in order to allow diacritical characters (e.g, ñ) to be dynamically interpreted as their "essential" (e.g., n) selves for search and alphabetization purposes? Or should the editor remove all diacritics from a title before posting?

Sorry for the rehash if this has been addressed previously.

 Help 

I don't know about extending the search facility of the Wiki, but at very least, I think creating a page Uteseny nam den nastal (without the diacritics) which redirects to the page in question might be one kludge. At least it's worth giving it a try. -- Chucktalk Giffen 13:39, 11 April 2008 (PDT)

 Help 

Thanks, Chuck. So...how do I make that redirect happen, now?

 Help 

I just made the redirect for you. In general, to make a redirect type: #redirect [[<page name>]] in the edit box.

 Help 

Great, thanks. I see that searching cpdl for "Uteseny nam den nastal" now brings up the redirect result. However, searching for "Uteseny" (or any other subelement(s) of the title sans diacritics) still brings up zero results. Is this due to the way that the titles of redirect pages are indexed in the search feature? For comparison, a search for "Utěšený" brings up the appropriate result.

 Help 

I think that redirects must be ignored by the search part of the "search and go" aspect of the Wiki search (I don't like it), but as a work-around, I've put "|Uteseny nam den nastal (Anonymous)" as a sort key for the categories on the page in question, and now a search on "Uteseny" points to the right page. It is probably best to insert sort keys which suppress the diacritics in other situations as well ... yet another minor (or major) headache! But many thanks for pointing the problems out.

 Help 

Got it, thanks. I'll keep that strategy in mind for the future...
By the way, I am able to view the totality of your most recent post only in edit mode; in page view the last bunch of it (immediately after the phrase >>I've put<< ) is rendered out.

 Help 

I've fixed that: I had a "pipe" (just before just before "Uteseny") which has to be enclosed inside a "nowiki" group to prevent it from being (mis)interpreted by the template ItemPost. Sorry about that!

CPDL number

  • Posted by: Carlos 01:51, 7 April 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

I was wondering, is there any kind of CPDL # generator? How does one know what number to use next?

In case this is a manual task, may I suggest a workaround that might easy the work: the admins could create a template {{CPDL#|1234}}, that when used would put the score in a category like [[Category:Works by CPDL number]] that would list the scores by (descending?) CPDL number. Then when we needed to know what number was last used, we only needed to consult this category page and look for the last (or first, if descending) work.

 Help 

Hi Carlos. A new CPDL number is generated every time the add works form is run. Simply goto ChoralWiki:Add Music then click on "Add Choral Work, or New Edition". Then if you wish to create a new page, fill in the boxes. If you just want a new CPDL no. click "Add works data" at the bottom of the form. Regards --Bobnotts talk 02:10, 7 April 2008 (PDT)

  • Posted by: Carlos 02:27, 7 April 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

Good to know that! Usually I prefer to create a new page from scratch using another similar composition (already formatted with all necessary templates) as a basis. Then I will use your second option to only generate the CPDL no. Thanks, Bob!

  • Posted by: MandyShaw 04:08, 7 April 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

For anyone who's interested - mainly as a personal learning exercise using various scripting tools, I'm working on an automatically generated list of CPDL scores by CPDL no. (and vice versa), which will hopefully prove useful once I resolve my few remaining problems (mostly with diacritics/character sets). It'll take a while to extract the data as the process does generate traffic against the CPDL website (I have to load 2 web pages for each CPDL no., a search and an export) so I'll want to do it in pretty small stages. Hope this makes sense.

 Help 

That sounds great, Mandy. I fear you'll find a few gaps! Would this process be able to be integrated into the current verified editions pages? If the process puts some strain on the server, do make sure that you run it in manageable steps otherwise the whole site could go down!

  • Posted by: MandyShaw 17:32, 7 April 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

Absolutely, Robert - the data can be formatted however it is most useful, once I have collected it. In fact I am having to use Verified Editions as an initial source for numbers 1-999, as CPDL Search doesn't index such low numbers (nothing's ever simple, is it). I'll fill in any remaining gaps in 1-999 via Google (which is actually a much more effective tool for this purpose than CPDL Search, because the latter can't cope with phrases). I'm doing the extract 100 entries at a time with reasonable gaps in between (and sticking mostly to early morning UK time). I'll keep you posted.

 Help 

I, too, have been working on some CPDL number and related things, and you can see some of what I've done at Category:CPDL numbers and also at ChoralWiki:Sandbox (unfortunately, I've discovered that the magic word __HIDDENCAT__ doesn't seem to be a part of our version). I'll get back to all of you later.

Added later: Okay, the DPL mechanism works in the wrong way (I was out in left field on that one), so I'm disimplementing Template:Work (changing it immediately to have no effect) and will remove it from the pages that contain it. I plan also to shorten the Template:CPDL_number just to Template:CPDL (CPDL number is too much to type) and extending the syntax to make it usable for numbers with fewer than 5 digits (albeit, 4 digits or fewer is a wee bit inconvenient), so that the sorting facility still remains. The worst part of it is that it is necessary to "create" each "Category:CPDL xxxxx" (and they really should be hidden).

Mandy, I'm really interested to know just what your scheme is.

-- Chucktalk Giffen 22:34, 8 April 2008 (PDT)

  • Posted by: MandyShaw 04:39, 15 May 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

Greetings, just wanted to say that I haven't, despite appearances, given up - I just hadn't quite finished my work when lots of other things started to get in the way - I hope to make some progress this weekend.

Template:Composer - being used and misused?

 Help 

I've recently come across instances of Template:Composer being used on score pages which most likely do not conform to the intent of Philip Legge, whose version of the template been in effect from 2006 April 9 until today. Just why this is happening, I'm not sure, since the template does not appear in Category:Templates. Perhaps users, having seen it used on score pages of works by Byrd, Monteverdi or others, have concluded that this is the "best" or "proper" way to specify the composer field on a score page. To see what the problem I'm addressing is, consider the following instances of the use of this template:

Typing {{Composer|William Byrd}} on a score page does two things: (1) it produces the line

Composer: William Byrd (followed by a line-break)

and (2) it adds the Category:William Byrd compositions to the page, and the resulting category provides an alphabetical-by-title listing of all the pages in that category. This is all well and good for Mr. Byrd, whose works on the composer page are (a) plenteous and (b) (more importantly) split into three groups (Sacred in Latin, Sacred in English, and Secular). However, only 81 (fewer than 1/3) of Mr. Byrd's score pages have been categorized this way.

Mr. Palestrina does not fare so well: Category:Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina compositions lists just one score page! But, at least the category page has been "created" (ie. it has descriptive text, so that the link to the category appears in blue). It is the same for Category:Johannes Brahms compositions - just one page in the category.

Alas, for Orlando di Lasso, whose composer page lists many scores grouped into Sacred and Secular works, the Category:Orlando di Lasso compositions contains just 2 entries, and the category hasn't even been created (since the link to the category appears in red)! Unfortunately, there are numerous instances of a composer's compositions category appearing in red (because of the use of Template:Composer and, more often than not, listing very few (usually only one) entry. Only the ("uncreated") Category:Clément Janequin compositions lists more than ten entries (19).

Indeed, only 5 compositions categories have been created, and only two of these (Monteverdi and Byrd) have a reasonably large number of entries).

What is wrong here, and what should be done about it?

  1. The template seems to have been applied often either indiscriminantly or without understanding its effect, since most of the composer's composition categories have not even been "created" and since the composer pages often have very few works ... in the latter case making the process of creating a composer's composition category and categorizing works there an exercise superfluous excess.
  2. At very least, the template should be properly documented and categorized in Category:Templates.
  3. If retained in its present form, the template should be remomved from pages where it does not belong.
  4. Where it makes sense to have a composer's compositions category, the application should be complete across the entire spectrum of the composer's works pages at CPDL.
  5. Probably the template should be changed or, if retained, moved to a new name, such as Template:CompCat (for "composer/composition category"). Without extra bells and whistles (perhaps provided through optional parameters or the like), Template:Composer should serve only the simple purpose of linking a composer's name to the corresponding composer page.
 Help 

As no doubt some have noticed, it is mainly I who have been adding this particular template to score pages in my usual day to day edits. First of all, allow me to apologise for not discussing and documenting this template appropriately (it's something that I've been meaning to do but not got round to... not a good excuse but there you go). The way that I see it, there are two very good reasons for including this template on all score pages.

  1. For composer pages which are ordered in any way except a single alphabetical list, an alternative (automatically generated) list may be a useful resource for users who wish to view such a list.
  2. Secondly, by categorising all score pages as all works on CPDL by a particular composer, we make it possible in the future to use the wiki functionality to create Dynamic Page Lists (click here for full explanation of what this wiki extension does) which would be automatically updated lists of almost anything users want to have lists of. An example: say I want a list of all a cappella anthems by Charles Wood - well I could go through each score page linked to from the composer page and have a look to see if they're anthems, then if they're a cappella or not. Alternatively, I could create (or request for creation) a DPL page of all pages on the wiki categorised as "Charles Wood compositions" and "a cappella" and have a look through this list instead (which would be a good deal shorter). Another example: I want to find a Renaissance motet in five parts (though it's for an SATB choir so I want at least one of each part). I could go through every Renaissance composer page and look around for motets in five parts (again, going into each individual score page) or, I could simply create or request a DPL page which has the following criteria:
    1. Categorised as "Renaissance music"
    2. Categorised as "Motets"
    3. Categorised as "SSATB" OR "SAATB" OR "SATTB" OR "SATBB"

So much easier to make a powerful search with the DPL functionality than browsing. At the moment, CPDL uses the wiki base but the information in CPDL has not been integrated to use the wiki effectively.

Anyway, to reply to your specific points, Chuck:

  1. I plead guilty to the first charge (applying the template indiscriminately) but not the latter (applying it without understanding its effect)! I believe that for conformity, the template should be applied to all score pages. That way, we don't need to have a discussion about which composer's score pages should and shouldn't have it. Also, more editions of works by the composer may be contributed at a later date.
  2. I agree, apologies for not doing this earlier.
  3. As above - I believe the template should be applied to all score pages.
  4. I agree. I think the best way to go about this is to only create the category when all of the score pages for works by a composer have had the template added (and I think we should delete categories which do not have all the works categorised). List the categories which have been created on Template talk:Composer or some other page created for this purpose so that a user may undertake to add the template (and others) to a particular composer's score pages.
  5. If Template:Composer were simplified as you suggest, Chuck, what would be the point of using it?

As to the issue of score pages being categorised with non-existant categories, this is already what's happening with Template:NewWork. Categorising with non-existant categories doesn't do any harm and if, in the future, the category is to be created (when someone takes on a composer's score pages as I suggested earlier) then there's one (or several) less pages to edit.

 Help 

Thanks, Rob, for explaining your rationale in the context of DPLs. I guess that's a rather wider purpose than what I perceive was Philip's original purpose. I had thought you were simply using fewer keystrokes through the template (which would make sense, too)! I would, however, suggest that whenever a composer's composition category is created, that category should itself be categorized in a category, something like Category:Compositions by composer or simply Category:Compositions. In true Wiki philosophy and practice, nearly every page, whether article or category should itself be categorized, and these compositions categories will be very numerous when and if your vision for them is realized.

 Help 

Hi guys! Like most of the templates I've tinkered with, {{Composer|composer name}} was designed to be simple to apply but to be extensible to do something useful, and the immediate usage I saw was automatic generation of a works category. I'm sorry the template hasn't been properly documented, but the erasure of four months work of 2007 resulted in the loss of a lot of documentation as well as several new templates and additional features added to others. I suppose one handy extension to the composer template would be to add arbitrary sort fields for DPL, but I'm not sure whether this would break the existing instances of the template.

 Help 

I have to say I don't really understand half of what you said, Philip, but it sounds rather impressive! I'll get to work on documentation and categorising the pages when I return after a short break.

Art Songs category not working sorting by name of work

 Help 

All the new Parry Art songs are showing up under "A" in Art Song category. Any idea why ?

 Help 

My bad, I fixed the Template:Cat

List of current CPDL problems (moved)

Moved to: Operation and implementation issues

Score count for March 1 - Same as Feb ?

 Help 

I'm waiting to the 10,000 score mark for CPDL (party time?) - but this month the number of scores stayed frozen at 9081 ! The composer count stayed the same also... Is the counting mechanism faulty, or weren't these figures updated ? - just curious -

 Help 

Those numbers on the Main page are not automatically updated, but instead must be updated by hand by an Admin/Sysop (see Template:CPDL statistics). I have made a point of updating the statistics at the beginning of every month since the restoration after the crash, and prior to that numerous times as well, at least when I noted that they had not been updated (Raf is the only other person to do an update). Fortunately, Raf had commented in a very old phpBB message to Admins about how to do it. On January 4, I posted updating instructions with the CPDL statistics template. Good thing I did, because Raf's original phpBB message has since been lost, due to recent pruning of the phpBB.

BTW, I just checked the count, and we are only now up to 9101 score pages, so there is still a long way to go before 10000 score pages. One should realize that the count is score pages, not scores, and that the number of score pages goes down whenever pages are merged or combined. Also, the score count at the beginning of February was 8970, at the beginning of March 9081, for a difference of 111 score pages.

Naming: Unaccompanied vs. A cappella

  • Posted by: Tpandeco 09:50, 28 March 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

While I really wonder whether it's worth mentioning, I'm curious if anyone else cares that the term "a cappella", because of its literal meaning, would not apply to many of the more modern styles of unaccompanied choral music. Might a catagory name change be considered?

 Help 

I suppose that a cappella (Italian "at chapel' or Latin "from the chapel/choir") is right up there with the contemporary meanings of other secular-world interpretations of terms with religious or sacred connotations, such as Christmas, Halloween, Shrove Tuesday (a.k.a. Fasching, Carnival), Anthem (originally a song set to a religious English text, but now co-opted to mean also a song of celebration for a particular group of people, as in "National anthem"). I think that, nowadays, we generally take the term to mean vocal/choral music for which no additional specifically instrumental parts are composed. And, as such, a cappella is now throrougly ingrained, at least into the English speaking world. Of course, it is quite likely that much a cappella music was and is, in fact, performed at times with instrumental doubling (or substituting) some parts. To use the them "unaccompanied" in place of a cappella would tend to exclude what this latter type of long historical performance practice has been. In light of this generally accepted convention/definition, it does not seem to me that a change in category name is warranted.

 Help 

I agree, Chuck. The term a cappella has evolved way past its original meaning so that I believe the current categorisation is appropriate.

  • Posted by: Tpandeco 08:35, 11 April 2008 (PDT)
 Help 

Okay, I admit that I like a cappella better due to its sophisticated ring, and now I'll now admit what prompted the question. The American Choral Directors Association stylebook for the Choral Joural prefers unaccompanied to a cappella? It's probably a question for them, but I posed it here to get "outsider" perspective. I'm not really looking for the actual answer but rather ideas. Perhaps by posing this question, I'm necessitating a move to a different area of the forum. If so, please move it as such.

I've reposted a missing score (moved)

Moved to: Sheet music requests and questions

Should we consider setting up a mirror site? (moved)

Moved to: Operation and implementation issues

Can the CPDL Catalogs be brought up to date ?

 Help 

Can the CPDL Catalogs be brought up to date - they are over 2 years old now.

 Help 

I think the answer of whether this can be done depends once again on Raf Ornes' time availability - he is still the only recipient of the email list that documents the submission of new works; if anyone else were to attempt it, that person would have a much harder time tracking down every addition to the CPDL since 2006.

Can we add a category for "Art Songs" ?

 Help 

Can we add a category suitable to categorize Parry's "English Lyrics" ? I would suggest "Art Songs" "Lieder" is there, but these are in English ...

 Help 

Hi John. A while ago, I created the Category:Art songs and have it already listed on the ChoralWiki:Music Subcategories page.

 Help 

Thanks, Chuck. Must have been using a capital S in songs...