Where is the app?

From LilyPond Wiki

If your operating system is not Windows but GNU/Linux, go to Where is the app? (Linux).

If you ask one of the following questions, you are on the right page:

• How do I open the application?
• Are you sure that this program really works? I double-click its icon and it exits immediately.
• Where are the menu, the canvas, the buttons found in other notation packages?

LilyPond is probably very different from most software you have already used, which usually have a Graphical User Interface (GUI) — windows with menus, toolbars, buttons. GUI music notation software visually let you to put notes with your mouse or your keyboard on a rendered and dynamically refreshed score. You needn't fiddle with the mouse in such a way in LilyPond, because it has no GUI.

[edit] No Graphical User Interface? What sort of interface does have LilyPond then?

LilyPond has a text-based interface: it means you describe the music to be typeset in a text file, then LilyPond reads this file and produces a beautifully engraved score in a PDF file.

For a quick introduction to this text-based interface, see http://lilypond.org/web/switch/howto.

If you want to start using LilyPond, read the tutorial from the documentation on the tutorial.

[edit] A text interface? Does it really work?

LilyPond is actually not so different from other software pieces called compilers whose task is to take a plain text file (the source code) as input and create something very different from it: an executable binary, a text with mathematical formulae, or—in LilyPond's case—a beautiful PDF file with your score in it, ready to print, send to a friend or show on to the screen.

In a few words, the process cycle the following way:

1. Write your score in the LilyPond language (it is very easy to learn), using Notepad or any text editor.
2. Process that file (for example, in Windows all you have to do is to click ENTER if the icon of your document is selected). Wait a couple of seconds.
3. Open the resulting PDF and enjoy your newly typeset music.
4. Make any changes to your code, save the file again, and return to step #2.

So you DO NOT interact with Lily by any other means that is not the code into your input text. You do not edit your score visually. It simply does not work that way. Sounds awful? It is not.

In fact, this process has many advantages if you think on it. Files are easily shared. Humans can read it. Machines can read it. You can insert comments in the code. You can split big projects onto multiple files. You can have the conductor score AND the instrumental parts, writing the music only once.

And the output quality is superb.

[edit] Any questions?

• How do I open the app?

You should rather open your input file and let LilyPond to process it. It is the only thing it can do, but it does it very well.

• Are you sure that this program really works? I double-click its icon and it exits immediately.

Double click your lilypond document, not the LilyPond icon. The .ly extension is associated with the program and it will be processed. If you have got a PDF, the program has finished its work. If your code is wrong, you could obtain a wrong PDF (or no PDF at all). Read the generated .log file and fix your input code. Then launch it again.

• Where are the menu, the canvas, the buttons found in other notation packages?

These are only there to distract you from your main goal: getting you music typeset. No, really, we don't need those. We don't have any. There are, nevertheless, great environments to help you to write and process your input text. Here are direct links to jEdit + LilyPondTool and EasyLilyPond. I'd also recommend Notepad++ as an alternative for small systems.