Yearly Archives: 2020

⭐ New setting to define favorite chord types for all instruments at once

⭐ Enhancements for fingering favorites
▫ New option to treat a fingering as favorite, if the fingering pattern is equal to the fingering pattern of one of your fingering favorites
▫ New option to treat a fingering as favorite, if the fingering pattern is equal to the fingering patterns of the CAGED system
▫ Fingering favorites are preferred over other fingerings and listed first

⭐ New screen to get comprehensive help
▫ It searches within help pages, settings, tips and frequently asked questions
▫ Complex search terms can be logically linked with ‘AND’, ‘OR’, ‘(‘ and ‘)’
▫ The search also supports the wildcards ‘?’ for any character and ‘*’ for 0 or more characters
▫ You’ll find a link to this screen on each help screen

✅ Possibility to translate help texts

✅ Songbook
▫ Workaround to prevent duplicate song texts from Ultimate Guitar
▫ Handling custom chords with slash in name

✅ Chord progression
▫ Option to keep the screen on
▫ Link to ‘Chord name’ in the navigation menu as shortcut to add chords from there

✅ Chord name
▫ Support for beginners with inverse and slash chords

✅ New chord types

✅ Fix ‘Choose chord’: Sorting custom chord types

✅ Fix ‘Table of content’: Search didn’t notice last changes in content

✅ Other changes and fixes

❀ Special thanks to Ana Abigail Soriano, David Lind, David Murgatroyd, Federico Galeotti, Luiz Marcos Wal, Martin Braun, Martin Porubsky, Mike Walker, Peter Mott, Ric Shore, Roland Schippmann, Shaun Powell, Soham Dey and Thor Crowley for their contribution to this version.

⭐ Custom instruments
▫ Create additional instruments with their own instrument and chord settings
▫ Gives you the possibility to change very comfortably all the instrument settings (more than 20) at once
▫ They are seamlessly integrated and available in all features

⭐ s.mart Online Songbook Importer
▫ It allows you to import new songs comfortable via the browser of your computer
▫ Import a bunch of songs at once using the ChordPro directive {new_song}
▫ Find it here: http://www.smartchord.de/song/import
▶ Our video leads you through the import process: https://youtu.be/V7L-p4UzZWo

✅ Instrument lists are sorted by language specific names

✅ Option to hide notes on the piano

✅ Fix Songbook: Share PDF generated a blank page

✅ Other changes and fixes

❀ Special thanks to Dmitry Prokopenko, Frank Huster, Henk Oostrom, Kasey Starnes, Matthew Faris, Mike Mountain, Mike Walker, Robert Shamburger, Thomas Bourgon and Wojciech Skórecki for their contribution to this version.

✅ Fix: Chord name crashed in landscape mode

✅ Fix: Metronome crashed in background mode on some devices

✅ Smaller changes and fixes

❀ Special thanks to Antonio Fraga, David Lokan, Henk Oostrom, Ilona Weißhuhn, Max di Fresco and Stefan Bomnueter for their contribution to this version.

⭐ Custom chords
▫ New screen to create your own chords
▫ They are seamlessly integrated and available in all features (e.g. in a song)
▫ You can also use it to rename existing chords to your naming convention
▫ New and easy way to request a new chord type for smartChord
▫ ‘Custom chords’ is a new chord type filter beneath ‘All’, ‘Basic’ and ‘Favorite’
▫ Custom chords are part of the synchronization between your devices

✅ Metronome
▫ Background mode supports timer
▫ Background mode supports count in
▫ Echo removed in background and dimming mode
▫ Workaround for Android bug (played sound on every Android notification)

✅ Songbook and Set-List are using complete screen in full screen mode

✅ Fretboard trainer does not play the note/chord anymore, if input module is microphone

✅ Fix Songbook: hide ‘Info’ section on switch to full screen mode

✅ Fix Songbook: Add song to set list

✅ Fix: ‘Scale Fretboard’ shown on whole screen if TAB view is hidden

✅ Fix: Timer plays sound when time’s up

✅ Other changes and fixes

❀ Special thanks to Artiom Donoga, Charles Kangethe, Dean Eisen, Eugene Mih, Franz Armbrust, Johann Kraus, Majid Hindi, Martin Porubsky, Michael Hill, Neville Cope, Patrick Murphy, Paul Abbott and Shaker Huda for their contribution to this version.

✅ Fix: Metronome crashed in dimming mode

✅ Fix: Select button in ‘Table of content’ to accept multiple selections was disabled

✅ Other smaller changes and fixes

❀ Special thanks to Aklan Akdağ, Heikki Herva and Marco Di Palo for their contribution to this version.

⭐ ‘Table of content’ mode
▫ If activated, the screen ‘Table of content’ is opened before the feature itself. There you can select one of the stored items to open it with the feature. If we take the songbook as an example. With the ‘Table of content’ mode activated, the ‘Table of content’ is shown if you start the songbook. There you can select a song and the Songbook is started and shows the song. If you go ‘Back’ from the songbook, the ‘Table of content’ is shown again.
▫ With the ‘Table of content’ mode deactivated, the songbook is started immediately with the last song. To open the ‘Table of content’, you have to use the menu item ‘Open | Manage’ from the ‘Folder’ menu.
▫ The mode is affecting:
◾ Chord progression
◾ Fretboard Trainer
◾ Metronome
◾ Notes
◾ Pattern
◾ Playground
◾ Practice
◾ Set list
◾ Songbook
◾ Tone generator

⭐ Drag’n’drop support for more convenience
▫ Reorganize and reorder the home screen (menu ‘Reorder’)
▫ Set list
▫ Notepad
▫ Scale favorites

✅ Auto save option to store items like songs or notes automatically when leaving the corresponding screen

✅ We could enhance the YouTube quota. Everybody can now use the YouTube search for videos to embed them into songs

✅ Showcase for the most important functions and GUI concepts

✅ Tooltips for most of the buttons (long press on the button)

✅ Set list: Start songs by double click

✅ Welcome wizard

✅ First optimizations for Chromebook

✅ Fix: Songbook A-B repeat and changed playback speed

✅ A lot of other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks to Alistair George, Francisco José Vela, Matt Faris, Paul Schoonderwoerd and Tarun Mudgal for their contribution to this version.

✅ Fix: Songbook YouTube search did not present the result on some devices

✅ Fix: Fretboard quiz ‘Find all notes’ does not acknowledge each correct answer some times

❀ Special thanks to Dmitry Prokopenko for his contribution to this version.

⭐ Songbook supports YouTube videos
▫ Link to a YouTube video within a song
▫ Embedded YouTube player to show the video
▫ Special search to find the YouTube video for your song (at the moment it is unfortunately limited to subscribers and UNLIMITED customers, as YouTube has a limited quota to access their data)
▫ Option to synchronize the start/stop for the YouTube player
▫ Duration of a song is automatically set by the duration of a video
▫ New directive to define the YouTube video id {x_sccrd_yt:19JVc76ExkY}

✅ Fretboard Trainer: Sound was to quite and it crashed, when capo was set outside the quiz range

✅ Two new tunings for Portuguese Guitar: ‘Portuguese Lisboa’ and ‘Portuguese Coimbra’

✅ Online song editor update (V1.5) with support for YouTube directive (http://www.smartchord.de/song/edit)

✅ Other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks also to Evgenij Neuwirt, Hugo Maia and Maria Amélia for their contribution to this version.

⭐ s.mart Fretboard Trainer released (frets 0-3 in free version)
▫ New quiz type to identify chords
▫ New quiz type to locate chords
▫ Add chords easily from your songs and chord progressions
▫ New statistic type ‘Distribution’ to identify the chords and notes you have to focus on
▫ Share your quizzes with your friends, other musicians or students
▫ Define a visible range beyond the fretboard range to be queried
▫ Most effective training mode realized: ‘Lab by lab’
▫ Option to query just whole notes
▫ Menu item to link your quizzes within the notepad
▫ Synchronize Fretboard Trainer quizzes

✅ Songbook supports new search engines e.g. for the case that your preferred internet site for chords is not listed by the default search engine:
▫ ecosia.org
▫ qwant.com
▫ bing.com
▫ yandex.ru
▫ baidu.com

✅ Possibility to overwrite an existing item when saving or renaming

✅ Possibility to define a color for the fret markers

✅ Chord name: Tap on the nut allows to mute a string

✅ Fix: Correct name when importing shared exercises

✅ Other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks also to Andreas Isaksson, Dale Alan Bryant and Kyle Bradley for their contribution to this version.

smartChord V6.21.2 – 2020-03-28
=================
⭐ s.mart Fretboard Trainer (still pre-release version)
▫ Shows correct answer on mistake
▫ Shows cheat hint on all modules
▫ Statistic summary
▫ Other smaller refinements

✅ Metronome: Shows status of loops and iteration when using the speed trainer

✅ Fix: Chord name and Fretboard Trainer had incompatibility with older devices

❀ Special thanks also to Matthias Coll and Uwe Fischbach for their contribution to this version.

⭐ s.mart Fretboard Trainer (still pre-release version)
▫ New input module ‘Microphone’. With this module you can play the answer with your instrument
▫ Option to play a buzzer if the answer is wrong
▫ Refinements and fixes e.g. for 5-string Banjo

✅ Fix: Removed audio file in songbook

✅ Other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks also to Dave Murray, Derek Lichter, Roland Schippmann, Tarun Mudgal and Yuriy Medyany for their contribution to this version.

⭐ s.mart Fretboard Trainer
▫ In a pre-release version for subscribers and UNLIMITED customers (invisible for all others)
▫ Teaches you the notes on the neck of your instrument in a playful and effective way
▫ Different quiz types: Either identify notes or locate notes
▫ Different input/output modules: Fretboard, Piano, Text, Musical Notation, Sound
▫ Statistics to check your training progress (table and chart)
▫ Supports all instruments and tunings ▫ Supports all other relevant smartChord features (e.g. left handed fretboard or Solfège)

✅ Songbook: Improved lookup for audio files, if location has been changed (e.g. after synchronization)

✅ Fix: Set list crashed when adding PDFs and images into a empty one

❀ Special thanks also to Antoni Nicolau, Emory Keller, Jürgen Wernicke, Pavel Novák and Robert Hilverth for their contribution to this version.

✅ Songbook has now support for Bluetooth device and MIDI device (Android >= 6.0 Marshmallow)
▫ Uses the same Bluetooth and MIDI configuration as the set list
▫ Start/stop auto scrolling, metronome or the audio player
▫ Smooth scrolling

✅ Set list: New search tool to handle also large set lists

✅ Fix Songbook: Audio player had to be visible to play

✅ Fix Songbook: No more loop of search for audio dialogs when audio file does not exist anymore

✅ Fix Metronome: Option to keep the screen on either dimmed or bright

✅ Other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks also to Christopher Noll, Karlheinz Mackel and Armin Schmitt for their contribution to this version.

✅ Set list notes:
▫ Add links to your stored items: chord progressions, songs, set lists, exercises, patterns, metronome and tone generator settings
▫ Add internet links

✅ Notepad: Support for internet links within notes

✅ Fix: Tempo of metronome couldn’t be changed by ‘+’ and ‘-‘

✅ Fix: Set list opening PDFs and images

✅ Other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks also to Andre Messerschmidt, Arisio Costa, Francisco José Vela and Simon Thompson for their contribution to this version.

✅ Access to the ‘Table of content’ by the navigation menu

✅ Metronome: Option to keep the screen on either dimmed or bright

✅ Songbook: You can determine the scroll speed by editing a song (even below the limit of the seekbar)

✅ Fix: Chord diagrams are sometimes too narrow, when the setting ‘Frets per chord’ was small

✅ Fix: Practice: ‘Table of content’ didn’t show the name of the entries

✅ Fix: Practice asked too often for saving

✅ Fix: Audio player in ‘Notepad’ did not start the playback in every case

✅ Other changes/fixes

❀ Special thanks also to Benno Schoppel, Christopher Noll, Daniel Rothra, Daniel Südhof, Henk Oostrom and Thaddeus Steyskal for their contribution to this version.