LenMus / News: Recent posts

• Main window re-design to allow direct access to all content and to facilite
  navigation. The toolbar has been removed, as was of little utilitty and made
  it more complex, to new users, to find the relevant content.
• The exercises has been sequenced in two levels with predefined configurations,
  to help students configure them for their skill level.
• Two new chapters added to the books: one about anacrux start and another one
  on chords. Music reading exercises now will include anacrux start.
• Extensive tests done and many bugs fixed.
• The Spanish version of the music reading books have been reviewed and the
  chapters reordered, to follow a different learning progression. The old books
  they are stil available in File menu.
• Removed experimental features whose development will not continue, such as
  the score editor, to simplify the code and program maintenace.... read more

The main objective of version 5.6.0 is to avoid problems with the sound when installing
LenMus. In previous versions, the user had to configure a MIDI synthesizer and sometimes
even install it, and this caused problems. This now has been solved:

• LenMus includes now a preconfigured internal MIDI synthesizer and, therefore, the user no longer needs to install a MIDI synthesizer or configure the program to use it.
• The MIDI assistant has been removed, since the user has nothing to configure after installing LenMus. But, for greater flexibility, LenMus now includes a MIDI
  configuration option, to allow you to configure the internal synthesizer (for example, change SoundFont) or allow the use of an external MIDI synthesizer instead of the internal one, in case the user prefers to use specialized hardware or other MIDI synthesizers.
• Add link in welcome window to facilitate users to report errors and make suggestions.
• Fix bug preventing to translate the "Cancel" button.
• Fix bug: MIDI instrument names not properly translated when changing the language.... read more

This is a maintenance release to add the translation to the Greek language and some few
small improvements, and to fix bugs. The main changes are:

• The translation to the Greek language has been added. Thanks to Avgeris
  Tsironis (Αυγέρης Τσιρώνης).
• The cadences generator have been re-coded to remove bugs in Cadences exercises.
• Updates the MS Windows installer for Windows 10 x64.
• Improves metronome by adding a metronome settings window and allowing to select
  the beat note value.
• Keyboard buttons Page Up/Down are now operative in eBooks.
• More visual tracking options during playback.
• Fix to display the Study Guide in the selected language.
• Fix bug in options for theo idfy/build interval and for cadences exercises, causing
  to ignore some selected options.
• Includes de latest Lomse library with improvements, mainly in MusicXML import and
  music notation support.
• Links for features not yet fully operational have been disabled.
• Fix error in figure in Theory and Harmony eBook.... read more

I'm starting to create web pages oriented to project management and collaboration. I have added a new link "DEVELOPMENT" in the website pages top menu. The bug and task trackers are now accessible from this new section. Would you like to collaborate in LenMus? Take a look!

Currently, as I am the only developer I keep a text notebook with all the information I need. I tried to use one of those available web tools for bug and task tracking, but they greatly increase my management costs. So, I have created some scripts to extract the information from my project notebook and build these new web pages.... read more

This is a maintenace release to address a bug in LenMus installation,
preventing help files to install properly. Please visit
the lenMus website for more details:
http://www.lenmus.org/en/phonascus/release_notes

Download files from lenmus PPA at
https://code.launchpad.net/~lenmus-phonascus/+archive/ubuntu/ppa/+packages

The main goal of this release is to simplify LenMus installation. I've changed the way in
which LenMus is built and installed, removing the dependency from Lomse library that
caused a lot of problems. Unfortunately, it is too costly to prepare a release without
including all the new code in development and, thus, this release includes a lot of new
features not yet finished, but this new code is, by default, disabled. Please visit
the lenMus website for more details:
http://www.lenmus.org/en/phonascus/release_notes... read more

It is with my deepest regret that I have to announce the closure of the LenMus project.

After a decade-long run, LenMus is no longer being developed. I began LenMus because I was studying music theory and needed interactive exercises for practicing. At that time (2002) there were no much free software for musicians and music students and I programmed some exercises, especially for ear training. I was soon attracted by the computational problems derived from the complexity of this domain. But world changes very fast and I alone can not do all and move as fast as this requires. I always failed in attracting more developers to the project and the result is that LenMus is increasingly lagging behind the increasing complexity of the project and the fast pace of changes on computers (notebooks, mobile phones), the web (HTML5 interactive applications), and the available teaching materials on the web (videos, free web schools). As I can not do it all alone, all development was stopped five months ago. Probably I will not to resume development again.... read more

LenMus Phonascus version 5.3.1 has been released. This version is focussed on
fixing bugs, in particular on those causing unexpected program termination.
This version also completes translation to Chinese and adds options
for clefs reading exercise:

• Full translation to Chinese.
• Changes in exercises to display more messages to guide users.
• Added options to clefs reading exercise for choosing clef and notes range.
• Bug fixes:
  - Occasional program termination when moving to another exercise.
  - In compare interval exercise the option to start both intervals
  with same note was not working.
  - In interval exercises sometimes an strange error message saying
  that 'Not possible to generate valid interval' was displayed.
  - Button colour was removed as soon as mouse moved over the button.
  - Other bug fixes and changes related to exercises.
  - Moved to Lomse library version 0.14, as it fixed many bugs.
• Technical changes: Logger class removed and replaced by Lomse logger.

LenMus Phonascus version 5.3 has been released. The main changes from previous
version are the following:

• Restored all other missing features, present in previous version 4.2, that
  were disabled in 5.0:
  - All exercise modes (learning, practise, exam, quiz) restored.
  - Right/wrong sounds when answering an exercise restored.
  - After answering an exercise, the answer buttons will play the
  button sound when clicked.
• Fixed bug #1074909: Exercises on intervals in TheoryHarmony, lesson 4.1:
  not for level one. Settings for these exercises were for level 3 and have
  been restored for level 1.
• Fixed bug #1082637 Incorrect answer in key signature exercise. There was an
  error with B flat minor key signature. Now fixed.

LenMus Phonascus version 5.2 has been released. The main changes from previous version are the following:

• Fixed bug #1059064: TheoryHarmony: crash when opening lesson 3.3.
• Fixed bug #1067628: Crash if page change while playing back an score.
• Added German translation (Thanks to Undine Peters).
• "langtool" program for generating and translating books, has been modified
  to generate books in new xml format with LMD files.
• All eBooks converted to new format.
• Removed irrelevant log messages.

LenMus Phonascus version 5.1 has been released. The main changes from previous version are the following:

• New dialog for selecting books.
• Added "Study guide" to help students and explain how this program should be used.
• Improvements in all music reading exercises, that include now a checkbox to turn metronome on/off.
• Chinese translation added.
• Restored some features, present in previous version 4.2, that were disabled in 5.0:... read more

After one year of work LenMus 4.0 is available. As the version number change suggests,

release 4.0 is major update in the program code and functionality. The main changes are:

• Inclusion of a score editor (beta status)

• Change of license to GPL v3+

• Bug fixes

• Welcome page
• Three new translations (Basque, Galician, Italian)

For more details, please read the news item at out website:

http://www.lenmus.org/sw/page.php?pid=noticias&id=29

We have started to prepare documentation about program internals, oriented to help anyone interested in programming or just in having knowledge about LenMus program internals.

The first themes of the 'Lenmus Hacking Guide' are now available on this web site.

We have changed the layout of the documentation pages, to have more white space and better legibility. If any one has ideas for improving the layout (logo, banner, colours, fonts, style, etc.) please send us a draft html page displaying the proposal. Thank you.... read more

Some new features and changes are introduced:

• A new eBook with theory and exercises on cadences.

• The automatic composer algorithm has been rewritten to take into account harmony

  rules. Scores in music reading exercises are now 'singable' and takes tonality

  into account.

• Some errors corrected in Music Reading Level 1 eBook

• French translation has been totally reviewed.

• Some bug fixes and other technical improvements:

  • Bug fixed [#1742061]: Occasional crash on Ear Interval exercise.... read more

From a user point of view the main changes are the new features introduced:

• A new eMusicBook included: Music Reading level 1
• Playback: added rhythmic accent. Higher volume on stronger beats.
• Replaced MDI user interface by a notebook tabbed interface.
• The lenmus program now includes the Dutch language translation.

But the new version has a lot of technical changes an some bug fixes:... read more

To support multiple languages modern software, as LenMus, is developed using the Unicode standard. Unicode works on Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista, but not on older versions (Windows 95/98/Me). Therefore, supporting Windows 95/98/Me requires us to deal with different encodings and this, in turns, causes a lot of additional work for encoding conversion of all eMusicBooks and other files, some program code variations, and more additional testing.... read more

Release 3.4 includes, mainly, technical changes an some bug fixes:

• A new eMusicBooks source format, based on XML and DocBook, has been developed
  with three objectives in mind:

  • To simplify writing eMusicBooks.
  • To simplify the translation of eMusicBooks.
  • To enable new features.

• The controller to display eMusicBooks has been rewritten to adapt to the new
  eMusicBooks format. Now the index panel can also display images.

• New buttons to increase/decrease font size on eMusicBooks. They scale also the
  scores on the books.
• All toolbar icons has been reviewed to improve the disable images.
• A program, named LangTool, has been developed to compile eMusicBooks and to
  automate the translation process.
• Supporting wxWidgets libraries upgraded to version 2.8.0
• Bug fixed: In the options panel, key signature 'D mayor/B minor' is duplicated
  and 'D b Mayor/B b minor' is missing [1610190].
• Bug fixed: Minor scales, in scales exercises, have wrong key signature [1604535].
• Bug fixed: No ascending intervals in aural training [1601350].
• Bug fixed: Metronome lose previous run settings. Always initialised at 20.
• Bug fixed: Some navigation buttons on eMusicBooks didn't work.
• Bug fixed: Spanish translation error in aural training exercises [1610186].... read more

<p>LenMus is a reader for books about music (eMusicBooks).
These eMusicBooks are not part of the program and anyone can write them.
Since lenmus 1.0 version, the format has been evolving as new needs appeared, The new format
to be used from next lenmus release, version 3.4, is XML.
The reason to choose XML as the format for eMusicBooks is due to its advantages. Among them
we would emphasize:</p>... read more

Release 3.3 includes some new features and improvements:

• A new exercise for aural training: identify scales.
• Theory exercise on scales identification improved: now it is user configurable and more scales have been included.
• Software updater improved: now it takes proxies into account (user request, task #130256).
• Options dialog modified to include Internet settings. Updater settings moved from 'Other settings' to 'Internet settings'.
• French and Turkish translations now included.
• Changing to another language is now immediate. In previous versions it was delayed to the next run of the program.
• New option to enable/disable right/wrong answer sounds in exercises (user request #1559450).
• New option to do exercises in teams: two answer counters are displayed and each new problem is assigned to a different team.
• New option to show the solution also when the answer was right.
• Now, at first run, the program detects the language chosen for installer interface and configures program to use also this language as default.
• Screen renderization code modified to deal with fractions of a pixel and add anti-aliasing. This technique greatly improves visual quality of displayed scores.
• Bug fixed: Metronome not synchronized with the score in compound times (user reported bug #1581743)
• Bug fixed: Occasionally, crash when displaying and exercise.
• Bug fixed: When printing a score, in occasions, it is not adjusted to page size.... read more

Release 3.2 includes some new features and improvements:

• New exercise for ear training: identify chords.
• New theory exercise: identify chords.
• Ear intervals exercise now allows to play intervals while not expecting an
  answer
• eBooks navigation toolbar now integrated with the
  main toolbars.
• Print button and menu print option now also works for eBooks.
• Unicode build, to fully support internationalization.... read more

Release 3.1 includes some new features, improvements and a few bug fixes:

• First release oriented to support score edition:
  ....- LenMus scores imported from text files.
  ....- New toolbars for the score editor: play back, zoom.
  ....- Export scores as bmp or jpg images.
• Toolbars are now draggable and dockable.
• Improvements in score layout.
• Some bug fixes and technical improvements.

For more details and to see changes since version 3.0, please, visit the LenMus website.

Finally, version 3.0 stable, is here. Release 3.0 includes some new features and improvements over beta 1 and a few bug fixes:

• Sound feedback (wrong/right answer sound) added to all exercises.
• Automatically checks if a new version of the program is available.
• A new menu item to access to LenMus website.
• About box improved to facilitate user accessibility to information.
• Some bug fixes.

For more details and to see changes since version 2.0, please, visit the LenMus website.

Release 3.0 beta 1 (probably the last one before stable release) is mainly a bug fix release but also include the missing features that were present in version 2.0 and some new features and improvements. Changes include:

• Counters for right/wrong answers and total marks included in all exercises.

• Buttons for answers added to 'identify scales' and 'build interval' exercises. (new in 3.0)

• Name of intervals now displayed in ear training exercises when requesting to show the solution.... read more

LenMus project moves to beta status with the release of the first beta for GNU GPL version 3.0. This beta version includes an installer for Windows. All the documentation and eBooks are availble in English and Spanish. Help documentation has also been prepared and translated and many bugs has been fixed.

In preparation for the beta version this is the first release of the windows installer. It installs a more debugged alpha version (alpha 3) and one eBook for music reading (in Spanish, with the exception of lesson 14 that is in English). Please, report me any trouble you could find with the installer so that it can be fixed before releasing the beta version. Thank you.