Jon, That doesn't sound nasty to me at all. And your second explanation is exactly how I interpreted your earlier remarks. I just included the background in my reply so the thread would make more sense to someone like Shelia who may not have been hanging around here as long as we. I didn't think you were being critical of Dick and Susan, it's just that a lot of people don't remember how primitave personal computers were when they began the DT project.

I too believe MIDI is a poor repository for music. It was never designed as a music repository, it's really a digital language to control devices. Just like the “g” codes that drive numerically controlled machining centers don't fully describe the part they are producing, MIDI doesn't fully describe the music it's making, it just controls the synthesizers that make sound. If you want detailed information about the machined part, you have to have the drawing or the CAD file that created the drawing. If you want to fully understand the music, you have to have the score or the application file that represents the score. ABC+ have the ability to represent all aspects of the music and may be used to produce correct MIDI files as well.

It's good to have a song's melody stored with the lyrics in such a way that people can listen to it without much fuss but that should really be generated from an ABC+ file in real time. The same ABC+ file may then be used to produce a nice looking score or lead sheet complete with chords, harmony and parts. Far easier to work with and users are't required to buy any software products.

      - Mark