3 ms·

Noteflight: start-up that lets you compose music within your browser

41 points by unalone 18y ago

dan_sim 18y ago
I really like it. It's basic but it'll do the job for a quick composing gig. This app comes right on time for me because I have to write a song for a film and my current soundcard doesn't support MIDI. I wanted nothing fancy, just a way to have a global idea. To be able to share the project is awesome. And the revision too. It's like GoogleDocs for composing music.
felideon 18y ago
Get an account? You know the drill... [Insert standard HN remark for sites that require users to sign up before they can try the app.] Regardless, pretty cool to have something like this on the web.
- unalone 18y ago
  Gah, that line always bugs me. Some things work well without sign-ups, some things wouldn't work as well with them. I dunno about this one, but I'd understand any designer who wants people to get accounts. There's some rationale there.
- jaytee_clone 18y ago
  Agree. Why not make it so that if you want to save your composition you need to sign up? Application like this, you don't need a video. Just let people use it immediately.
- noonespecial 18y ago
  Runs in your browser: no installation But you have to sign up before you can even really see what it does. That's worse than a small install.
paul7986 18y ago
I really like the idea, but your design when loaded in my browser made me think this was a blog post and not a web service. I would suggest centering the site and having a slightly more pronounced logo at the top; maybe adding more color too - less black. Also the window where you have sheet music make it larger, while on the side keeping text there. Though change the text on side of sheet music to be 3 bullet points that say the what, how and value proposition. Describe it quickly and briefly. Also as some1 mentioned above get rid of sign up or offer portion of svc no sign up required. hth
- unalone 18y ago
  Heh, not my site. I just came across it and thought it was neat. It says it's from Cambridge, though, so maybe other people know more about it than I do?
jflowers45 18y ago
Really enjoyed it, but when I created my first score it took me forever to figure out how to put in notes (press C for a c, etc)
brent 18y ago
There are a couple things I would change about the interface (easy insertion), but I am generally extremely impressed. In my case, I knew the score, wrote out several measures and realized I missed a note. They don't seem to have any simple way to reconcile this problem.
11ren 18y ago
A really nice idea (though music composition is pretty niche, that might be a good thing). The score looks beautiful. But too hard to start using. It took me 10-15mins to discover how to enter a note: you have to click where the cursor is. And not just where the cursor is, but slightly to the right... I had to read the help, and it wasn't even the first thing! Entering a note is the very first thing a user wants to do. For user adoption (which is the what you need when starting), you have to make that first thing incredibly easy: click somewhere, get a note. All the additional sophistication should be additional to that. (IMO) I think they are aiming at existing users of existing tools. But I think that's too hard - they can't beat desktop applications on their own turf. There's a lot of sophistication in the tool - so it's like they are aiming at what the professional applications do. These tools have competed and evolved to meet the needs of professional composers. However, I think a web tool is really in a different market, with a different proposition. They should first focus on where they strong. It's Writely vs. Word. Music layout is hard, and their's gets messy when it's more complex (looking at Moonlight Sonata). The fact that you can't publish to the web, or share (except with people who are already members) makes it harder to get started. Maybe not allow the whole score to be viewed without an account, but a tempter, to entice get people to sign up for the rest. As it is, there's little evidence that it's worth signing up. But maybe focusing on dedicated users (not casual) will work? As I said, it's pretty niche.
- kwamenum86 18y ago
  It is a bigger niche than many may realize though.
  - markessien 18y ago
    It's not a niche - it's a large market customers in the millions - and customers who are used to paying for such stuff, and will pay for such stuff.
    - kwamenum86 18y ago
      A niche market can have millions of customers.
kwamenum86 18y ago
This is actually pretty cool. The interface is a bit confusing but that is pretty much par for the course for music composition apps/progs unfortunately.
11ren 18y ago
I take it back - you can publish scores after all: http://www.noteflight.com/scores/view/2177201ae448ab894682b16d557f5544fb678e7b http://www.noteflight.com/scores/view/2177201ae448ab894682b1... But I think you have to leave yourself logged in to do it.
schtono 18y ago
It would be great to have the possibility to import scores from other popular software (cubase etc) so you can collaborate on projects
ken 18y ago
"We'll copy and paste that into the second half which are almost the same, to save some time. Now we can use the mouse to adjust some of the notes that are different in the second half." I've been transcribing some music recently, and this is one of my big gripes with "western" musical notation: the control flow is really weak. You can't encode something as simple as "same as before, but replace the last measure with __" (much less something like simple macro substitution!). You get "repeat a section once", "repeat the last measure", and a weak form of GOTO. Even a simple score is not at all DRY, which I've found makes it harder both to transcribe and to learn. Are there any alternative music notation systems that have more powerful features?

41 points by unalone 18y ago

I really like it. It's basic but it'll do the job for a quick composing gig. This app comes right on time for me because I have to write a song for a film and my current soundcard doesn't support MIDI. I wanted nothing fancy, just a way to have a global idea. To be able to share the project is awesome. And the revision too. It's like GoogleDocs for composing music.

felideon 18y ago

Get an account? You know the drill... [Insert standard HN remark for sites that require users to sign up before they can try the app.] Regardless, pretty cool to have something like this on the web.

unalone 18y ago
Gah, that line always bugs me. Some things work well without sign-ups, some things wouldn't work as well with them. I dunno about this one, but I'd understand any designer who wants people to get accounts. There's some rationale there.
jaytee_clone 18y ago
Agree. Why not make it so that if you want to save your composition you need to sign up? Application like this, you don't need a video. Just let people use it immediately.
noonespecial 18y ago
Runs in your browser: no installation But you have to sign up before you can even really see what it does. That's worse than a small install.

paul7986 18y ago

I really like the idea, but your design when loaded in my browser made me think this was a blog post and not a web service. I would suggest centering the site and having a slightly more pronounced logo at the top; maybe adding more color too - less black. Also the window where you have sheet music make it larger, while on the side keeping text there. Though change the text on side of sheet music to be 3 bullet points that say the what, how and value proposition. Describe it quickly and briefly. Also as some1 mentioned above get rid of sign up or offer portion of svc no sign up required. hth

unalone 18y ago
Heh, not my site. I just came across it and thought it was neat. It says it's from Cambridge, though, so maybe other people know more about it than I do?

jflowers45 18y ago

Really enjoyed it, but when I created my first score it took me forever to figure out how to put in notes (press C for a c, etc)

brent 18y ago

There are a couple things I would change about the interface (easy insertion), but I am generally extremely impressed. In my case, I knew the score, wrote out several measures and realized I missed a note. They don't seem to have any simple way to reconcile this problem.

11ren 18y ago

A really nice idea (though music composition is pretty niche, that might be a good thing). The score looks beautiful. But too hard to start using. It took me 10-15mins to discover how to enter a note: you have to click where the cursor is. And not just where the cursor is, but slightly to the right... I had to read the help, and it wasn't even the first thing! Entering a note is the very first thing a user wants to do. For user adoption (which is the what you need when starting), you have to make that first thing incredibly easy: click somewhere, get a note. All the additional sophistication should be additional to that. (IMO) I think they are aiming at existing users of existing tools. But I think that's too hard - they can't beat desktop applications on their own turf. There's a lot of sophistication in the tool - so it's like they are aiming at what the professional applications do. These tools have competed and evolved to meet the needs of professional composers. However, I think a web tool is really in a different market, with a different proposition. They should first focus on where they strong. It's Writely vs. Word. Music layout is hard, and their's gets messy when it's more complex (looking at Moonlight Sonata). The fact that you can't publish to the web, or share (except with people who are already members) makes it harder to get started. Maybe not allow the whole score to be viewed without an account, but a tempter, to entice get people to sign up for the rest. As it is, there's little evidence that it's worth signing up. But maybe focusing on dedicated users (not casual) will work? As I said, it's pretty niche.

kwamenum86 18y ago
It is a bigger niche than many may realize though.
- markessien 18y ago
  It's not a niche - it's a large market customers in the millions - and customers who are used to paying for such stuff, and will pay for such stuff.
  - kwamenum86 18y ago
    A niche market can have millions of customers.

kwamenum86 18y ago

This is actually pretty cool. The interface is a bit confusing but that is pretty much par for the course for music composition apps/progs unfortunately.

11ren 18y ago

I take it back - you can publish scores after all: http://www.noteflight.com/scores/view/2177201ae448ab894682b16d557f5544fb678e7b http://www.noteflight.com/scores/view/2177201ae448ab894682b1... But I think you have to leave yourself logged in to do it.

schtono 18y ago

It would be great to have the possibility to import scores from other popular software (cubase etc) so you can collaborate on projects

ken 18y ago

"We'll copy and paste that into the second half which are almost the same, to save some time. Now we can use the mouse to adjust some of the notes that are different in the second half." I've been transcribing some music recently, and this is one of my big gripes with "western" musical notation: the control flow is really weak. You can't encode something as simple as "same as before, but replace the last measure with __" (much less something like simple macro substitution!). You get "repeat a section once", "repeat the last measure", and a weak form of GOTO. Even a simple score is not at all DRY, which I've found makes it harder both to transcribe and to learn. Are there any alternative music notation systems that have more powerful features?