LilyPond — Changes

This document lists changes and new features in LilyPond version 2.23.3 since 2.22.

The new command \vshape is like \shape, but also shows the control points and polygon for easier tweaking.
```
{ a1\vshape #'((0 . 0) (0 . 0.5) (0 . 0.9) (0 . 0.4))^( c'1) }
```
Support for alternate accidentals was improved. Through the alterationGlyphs property of staff-like contexts, accidental glyphs may be set for all grobs at once (refer to Alternate accidental glyphs).

Ottava brackets may apply to a single voice instead of the entire staff. This used to require workarounds.

\layout {
  \context {
    \Staff
    \remove Ottava_spanner_engraver
  }
  \context {
    \Voice
    \consists Ottava_spanner_engraver
  }
}

Measure counts now take compressed multi-measure rests and alternatives into account.
The string tunings banjo-double-c and banjo-double-d were added.
lilypond-book now appends the current directory as the last entry to search for included files, instead of prepending it to the list of specified include paths. This allows include directories to shadow files from the current directory, and will only be noticed if there are files with the same name in both.
lilypond-book supports a new snippet option ‘inline’ for inline music, that is, music snippets like that appear within a paragraph of text.

Bar numbers may be centered in their measure, as is common in film scores.

\layout {
  \context {
    \Score
    centerBarNumbers = ##t
    barNumberVisibility = #all-bar-numbers-visible
  }
}

<<
  { \bar "" \repeat unfold 3 { c'4 d' e' f' } }
  { \repeat unfold 3 { c'4 d' e' f' } }
>>

Adding the Melody_engraver to the Voice context now works out of the box to change the stem direction of the middle note according to the melody. Previously, this required an additional override to Stem.neutral-direction.
```
\new Voice \with {
  \consists Melody_engraver
}
\relative c'' {
  \autoBeamOff
  g8 b a e g b a g |
  c b d c b e d c |
}
```
The suspendMelodyDecisions context property may be used to turn off this behavior temporarily, as \override Stem.neutral-direction = #DOWN used to do.
In the Emmentaler font, identical-looking noteheads whose only difference was stem direction have been consolidated into a single glyph. For instance, the glyphs noteheads.u2triangle and noteheads.d2triangle have been replaced by a single glyph, noteheads.s2triangle. Notehead pairs that look visually different depending on the direction remain distinct.
In addition, the stem-attachment property of NoteHead grobs now returns its actual, direction-dependent stem attachment point instead of a hypothetical upwards-stem attachment point.
Repeat alternatives may appear in places other than the end of the repeated section.
```
\repeat volta 3 { c'1 \alternative { d' e' } f' }
```
The volta numbers for repeat alternatives may be set with the \volta command.
```
\repeat volta 3 c'1 \alternative { \volta 1 d' \volta 2,3 e' }
```
The \volta command removes music when a repeat is unfolded.
The \unfolded command adds music when a repeat is unfolded.
The ends of hairpins may now be aligned to the LEFT, CENTER or RIGHT of NoteColumn grobs by overriding the property endpoint-alignments.
The lilypond-book script now allows braces in the argument of the commands \lilypond (for LaTeX) and @lilypond (for Texinfo).
With the new markup list command string-lines it is now possible to split a string at a given character. The default is to split at line break. Surrounding white space gets dropped. The resulting list of markups may be further formatted. This is a very convenient way of entering additional stanzas for songs.
Color transparency is supported when generating Postscript and PDF files. To use this new feature, it is necessary to use Ghostscript version 9.53 or later.
A new grob FingerGlideSpanner is now available, indicating a finger gliding on a string from one to another position. Several appearances are possible, depending on the setting of style. Shown in the image are line, stub-left, stub-right and stub-both.

Also possible is dashed-line, dotted-line, zigzag, trill, bow and none.
A new grob BendSpanner is now available for TabStaff, indicating a bent string. Apart from the default three styles are possible: 'hold, 'pre-bend and 'pre-bend-hold.
A new grob callback function break-alignment-list is now available for returning different values depending on a grob’s break direction. As an example, use it to provide different alignments of a grob depending on whether it is positioned at the beginning, the middle, or the end of a line.
The alignment of bar numbers appearing in the middle or end of a system has been changed to align them on their left edge. This is in keeping with the advice of Elaine Gould (Behind Bars, p. 237), and was mostly the consensus reached in a discussion of the issue by developers. The alignment of bars at the beginning of a system remains unchanged.

For older news, go to https://lilypond.org/doc/v2.22/Documentation/changes/, https://lilypond.org/doc/v2.20/Documentation/changes/, or go back to the Documentation index.

LilyPond — Changes

LilyPond — Changes v2.23.3 (development-branch).