Adding lyrics and songs to the database?

Subject: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: The Fenian
Date: 28 Jan 98 - 08:41 AM

How do you do. I have wanted to donate a few songs for a little while now but I don't have a clue as to how to go about it.

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Wolfgang Hell
Date: 28 Jan 98 - 09:08 AM

look here what Dick has responded to a similar question some months ago. I'm looking forward to sseing the songs.
Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 28 Jan 98 - 09:15 AM

I forgot to say the best way is you start a new thread, give it a title like, e.g., "LYR ADD: The Fenian's escape" and type the song. Every October/April the database is updated. But even if you bury a song in a thread started by somebody else, chances are high that Dick Greenhaus spots the song and you'll find it some months later in the database.
Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Jon W.
Date: 28 Jan 98 - 11:17 AM

We are strongly encouraging everyone to submit the tunes to the songs also. Convenient ways of doing this are to use Alan of Australia's MIDI2TXT programs or ABC notation. There are several people (me included) willing to help with these.

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: The Fenian
Date: 29 Jan 98 - 07:22 AM

Thanks for the help man, and though I'm really not sure what MIDI2TXT and ABC notoation are? And how does everyone get the fancy lettering and stuff in their songs. Everytime I write something it looks pretty ugly.

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 29 Jan 98 - 07:57 AM

Fenian, two little tricks will help to make your posted songs look nicer:
1. if you want to have a new line type <br>
and the next word starts a new line (don't worry, we won't see that <br>)
2. if you want to boldface let's say the title, type <b> and all further words will be boldfaced until you type </b>.

Come on, try it and give us a new song.
Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: The Fenian
Date: 29 Jan 98 - 01:37 PM

Anymore helpful ways to brighten it up? But I must thank for all you have sone already

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 29 Jan 98 - 03:34 PM

Well, Fenian, the most recent word on the fancy stuff from our guru Max was:

DON'T

We had a run of it a while back. Max and Alan showed us a few tricks, and then we learned some on our own, and I think we got carried away to the point that it was slowing down the forum considerably. I plead guilty to being one of those who many have gotten carried away. After much wailing and gnashing of teeth, I have been absolved, I guess....
The main purpose of the forum is to exchange ideas. The fancy stuff may be cute, but it isn't essential. A little bold or italic typeface won't hurt, I suppose, but it really isn't necessary.
However, there are a couple of things that do help in the forum, especially for posting lyrics. All HTML commands are enclosed in those angle brackets that are on the comma and period keys of your keyboard. If you want to see examples of how people had entered something, right-click on a screen here and choose "view source" from the menu that pops up. Then you'll see the HTML code as it was typed, before it has been interpreted by your browser. In addition to typing <br> at the end of a line, you can indent something by starting it off with <blockquote> and ending it with </blockquote>. The slash before a command cancels a previous command.

Another thing that's nice is clickable links, but they're kind of difficult because they have to be entered exactly. If you REALLY want to do clickable links, make sure you know what you're doing. However, if you do make a mistake on a link, there are people here who have the ability to make repairs. So, if you screw up a clickable link, you will be the object of severe disdain, but the damage you do will not be irreparable. I myself have been the object of severe disdain on more than on occasion, and I'm still here to talk about it.

Ok, so clickable links, if you really feel compelled to try them, go like this:

<a href="www.whoozit.org">http://WWW.WHOOZIT.ORG</a>

A clickable link that looks like this will appear on your screen: http://WWW.WHOOZIT.ORG
Alternately, you can choose any word or words to show on the screen:

<a href="www.whoozit.org"> Click Here</a>

What will appear on your screen is: Click Here. The link to be entered exactly, with the link enclosed in angle brackets, and the a href="link.enclosed.in. quotes.with.the.http.and.all" close angle brackets, and then the word or words that you want to be the underlined clickable word appearing on the screen, and then closed off with /a enclosed in angle brackets. Like I say, it's complicated.

Using copy-and-paste helps a lot in doing all this. For lyrics, I type them up on a word processor and save the file, and then I do a search-and-replace to replace the new line/new paragraph marks with a paragraph mark and <br>. For clickable links, I copy-and-paste the URL from my collection of bookmarks.
OK, so if you want to do it, I'd suggest that first you learn how to make new lines by using <br>. Then learn to post lyrics by copy-and-paste, with the <br> already inserted in the text you're posting. Then learn the <blockquote> command. After you feel comfortable, then you might make a very careful try at clickable links. But stay away from the fancy stuff, until the day that Max says fancy is OK again. Hope that helps........and I hope the fancy stuff I put here works.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Jon W.
Date: 29 Jan 98 - 03:54 PM

Note that where Wolfgang says <--he really means < (the less-than sign, which is the upshifted comma key).

ABC notation is a way of writing music so that it can be sent as text. Go to the ABC homepage for more information on it. MIDI2TXT is a program Alan Foster has developed. He is a frequent contributor to this forum. It allows MIDI music files to be posted in messages as text. You run the MIDI file through the program and it outputs a text file. Then you copy that text file from an editor like Notepad into the thread message input box. Here is a link to another thread which discusses it in detail: click here and here also.

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 08 Feb 98 - 03:49 AM

One tip for posting URL's (Web addresses): never try to type them out. Go to the "address" box on the top of your browser, and highlight, right-click, and copy the URL. then go where you want to place that URL, and paste it in. You can also steal URLs from your bookmarks. If you try to type out an entire URL, you have a very good chance of goofing it up - and you may well go bonkers in the process. If you copy-and-paste a working URL, you're much more liable to be successful. Copy-and-paste is a very useful process for a lot of windows and Mac applications, and it sure can save you a lot of typing.
Once you get used to copy/pasting and putting in the line breaks, you're well on your way. Before long, you'll be able to type
<a href="http://www.go.get.em.max.org/">Mudcat Rules</a>
in your sleep. After that, you'll begin to realize that you are becoming a really weird person.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Feb 98 - 07:01 PM

This thread has a perfect example of how a song should look before and after posting. The only thing I would do different in the pre-posting example is leave in the carriage returns, so I can still read the thing in my word processor while I'm working on it. That's optional, and I'm not sure everyone will understand what I'm talking about. There are two types of carriage returns/line breaks we're talking about here - the normal ones that work in your word processor, and the HTML ones that work in the forum. Are we confused yet, class?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: The Fenian
Date: 19 Feb 98 - 07:36 AM

I think i'm in over my head with that ABC notation. Anyways I finally got the links to work after many's the failings

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 02 Apr 98 - 09:04 PM

OK, Class, time for a new trick. If you want to make your e-mail address clickable, here's how you do it:

<A HREF="mailto:[e-mail]">Send Me Mail</A>

Got it?

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 06 Apr 98 - 02:51 PM

Here is another helpful thread on this subject.

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: Susan of DT
Date: 06 Apr 98 - 07:47 PM

Thank you everyone for posting songs to be incorporated into the DT. We are compiling the April 98 edition now. One minor point - If you look at the bottom line of each song, you see the initials of the contributor, ie I am SF (soon to be SOF, since another SF sent in something). Most of you sign postings with your aliases or first name. If you give us your initials, we can credit you properly.

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From:
Date: 18 Jan 00 - 11:59 PM

what'll I do (I think that is the name of the title of it) by Irving Berlin

Subject: RE: Adding lyrics and songs to the database?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 19 Jan 00 - 03:19 PM

If y'all really want to help, you can save Susan and me a lot of typing by following our format; if you don't, we have to convert it.

a) Title should appear on the first line in caps.
b) Author and//or composer should be on line 2, inside parentheses)
c) Please don't indent.
d) Notes, if any, should be after the lyric
e) It helps if you put your initials at the very end.
f) Please don't use # sign, square or angle brackets. They confuse the computers

g)(SHOULD BE a) Please, please, please check in the DT to see if we already have the song.

Many thanx.