Neil, As far as the snm= command is concerned, take a look at the latest version of the document at the link Jon provided above. I think you'll find this error has been corrected.

On the points about the %%MIDI program reference and the %%STAVES command, these commands are already in wide use all over the Internet. They are described in detail in Guido Gonzato's manual—linked above—and Gonzato's manual is, in turn, referenced by hyperlink in the introduction to the 2.0 standard (draft IV, 14/8/2003). You are no doubt correct that the standards document itself doesn't yet describe these commands but it seems pretty clear that they mean to include them.

In an earlier post (20 Jan 04 - 01:05 PM) you noted that you aren't familiar with the ABC+ standard. ABC+ isn't really a standard, it's just a project to combine the most common and practical ABC extensions into a unified document with supporting software. However, I think the evolving 2.0 standard is really trying to use ABC+ as a starting place while improving consistancy and adding some features that seem practical and have broad support. Given that you are a developer incorporating ABC notation in your products, you may want to familiarize yourself with ABC+ as it has become the de facto standard until the 2.0 draft has been finalized.

Jon, I didn't mean to say that ABC will replace LilyPond, per se, I only meant that, for most people needing the ability to produce musical scores on a computer, ABC will provide everything they need and there will be no need for them to install and learn Tex, LaTeX, MusixTeX, LilyPond and the computing environment needed to support them. ABC will be sufficient for 95% of all users.

When Dick began the Digital Tradition project, there weren't many suitable programs that would allow him to distribute melodies that users could hear. Not only was there no ABC, but PC's commonly had no sound cards and the available sound cards typically did not include MIDI. Now, 9000 or so songs later, it would be a huge undertaking to convert all the melodies to ABC. Still, I agree that ABC would be a much better format for sharing the music. It seems clear that Dick expects the DT to evolve and perhaps one day ABC will become the standard format. In the meantime, we're just so fortunate to have the DT at all, I can easily live with any imperfections.

      - Mark