Re: \with mods targeting parents

On Mon, Oct 27, 2025 at 1:14 PM David Kastrup <[email protected]> wrote:

> Carl Sorensen <[email protected]> writes:
>
> > On Sun, Oct 26, 2025 at 8:56 PM David Kastrup <[email protected]> wrote:
> >
> >> Dan Eble <[email protected]> writes:
> >>
> >> > This currently compiles without warnings.
> >> >
> >> > ```
> >> > \version "2.25.30"
> >> > \new Voice \with {
> >> >   \propertySet Staff.instrumentName "Quack"
> >> > } {
> >> >   \contextPropertyCheck Staff.instrumentName #'()
> >> >   \contextPropertyCheck Voice.instrumentName "Quack"
> >> >   R1
> >> > }
> >> > ```
> >> >
> >> > It seems wrong to set the property in Voice quietly when the user
> >> > wrote "Staff".
> >>
> >> Why?  If the user puts a setting that is normally Staff-wide (like
> >> \ottava #1) in a \with-block of a Voice, why would you assume that they
> >> don't know what they are doing?
> >>
> >
> > To me as an experienced user who has not followed the evolution of the
> > usage of \with blocks, it seems a bit surprising that after explicitly
> > requesting the Staff.instrumentName property to be changed, the
> > Voice.instrumentName property is what is actually changed.
>
> There is no difference between "explicitly requested" and "implicitly
> requested" in the form of predefined commands to LilyPond.
>
> The current behavior was a design decision along with the implementation
> of allowing property-setting music in \with-blocks to be converted.
>
> We actually went through all this once already including actual code,
> and the results were unhelpful.
>
> Please check
>
> <https://gitlab.com/lilypond/lilypond/-/issues/2982>
>

Sorry about the noise.  I agree with your conclusion.

Thanks,

Carl