The primary purpose of this release was to update from the now unsupported .NET 6 to the still supported .NET 8, and updating all of the dependency projects to get their latest bug fixes.

I also took the opportunity to create a native ARM64 build of Chordious, for folks lucky enough to have the latest Copilot+ PCs, which should provide greatly improved performance over using the x64 build.

Here’s the full change list for those upgrading from 2.6.4 to 2.8.0:

• Updated all projects to .NET 8
• Added native ARM64 build for Windows
• Updated CommunityToolkit.Mvvm to v8.4.0
• Updated DotNetProjects.Extended.Wpf.Toolkit to 5.0.124
• Updated Microsoft.NET.Test.Sdk to v17.13.0
• Updated MSTest.TestAdapter to v3.8.3
• Updated MSTest.TestFramework to v3.8.3
• Updated coverlet.collector to v6.0.4

So update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

The primary purpose of this release was to improve my setup for future releases, by updating dependencies, improving the release automation, and fixing tons of long-overdue code style issues.

Functionally, the only fix was to the scaling of abbreviations for chord names on high DPI monitors.

Anyway, here’s the full change list for those upgrading from 2.6.3 to 2.6.4:

• Fixed issue with chord quality abbreviations not scaling properly on high DPI screens
• Update version string to always display Major.Minor.Build
• Updated WinStore TargetPlatformVersion to 10.0.19041.0
• Migrated from deprecated MVVM Light Toolkit to new MVVM Toolkit

So update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

Like the previous release, there was another bug in the SVG.NET dependency that regressed Chordious. This time the abbreviation portion of chord names were overlapping the root note, like this:

This new release reverts to an older version of the library that doesn’t have this problem. Thanks Chris for reporting the issue!

Anyway, here’s the full change list for those upgrading from 2.6.1 to 2.6.2:

• Reverted SVG.NET to v3.1.1
• Fixed issue with chord quality abbreviations overlapping the root note in titles

So update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

Part of updating Chordious to .NET 6 meant upgrading my dependency on SVG.NET (the library I use to draw the diagrams) by several major versions. While everything looked fine in my testing, exporting scaled images had actually stopped working.

So this release is mostly about fixing that bug, but it was also an opportunity to exercise the new automated release pipeline. I got the bug report this evening (thanks Diane!) and after making the actual fix, I was able to publish the new version in a matter of minutes.

Anyway, here’s the full change list for those upgrading from 2.6 to 2.6.1:

• Fixed issue with exporting scaled images
• Fixed issue with setting the export output path blank
• Updated prompts for numbers to use numeric spinners

So update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

A month ago I released Chordious 2.2, which included the scattered, unreleased work I’d done in the previous year. Part of the reason the work was so scattered (besides the pandemic) was the difficulty I had working on the Chordious code.

I’ve been working on Chordious since 2013, and the current codebase was established in 2015 when I started work on Chordious 2.0. I built on top of the .NET Framework, and while it has served me well for years, it’s starting to show its age.

Long story short: the Windows-only .NET Framework has been replaced with the new cross-platform .NET, and over the past couple years I’ve been slowly moving all of my C# development onto it. Mostly new projects, but I’ve also had success upgrading some of my older ones.

The problem with Chordious has been its sheer size and variety of features. For a while the new .NET versions didn’t have everything Chordious needed, so I couldn’t upgrade.

But now, with the release of .NET 6, I’ve finally been able to take the plunge and upgrade. So that’s today’s release: Chordious 2.6, aka Chordious upgraded to .NET 6.

Feature-wise nothing’s really changed, but on the developer side I’ve got access to all the latest tools and release automation I use with my other .NET 6 projects. From a user perspective, the only thing you might notice is that the downloads are a bit larger.

See, early this year I started working on Chordious 3, which will also be based on .NET 6 and fully cross-platform. So Chordious 2.6 is a kind of transitional/maintenance release. When I released Chordious 2.2 last month, I found switching back and forth between the two codebases very annoying. The hardest part was going back to the manual release process (building a new installers, running tests, uploading them to the right places, updating links, etc.).

Chordious 2.6, on the other hand, is basically the old code with the new release automation. It’s a one-click process to create a new release. So while I’ll be focusing my attention on Chordious 3, I can still easily switch back to Chordious 2 and service critical bugfixes if need be.

Anyway, here’s the full change list for those upgrading from 2.2 to 2.6:

• Updated all projects to .NET 6
• Update SVG.NET to v3.4.0
• Switched from Extended WPF Toolkit v3.8.2 to Wpf Extended Toolkit v5.0.100
• Changed update code to check GitHub releases

So update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

P.S. In case it wasn’t clear, Chordious 2.6 is built on the cross-platform .NET 6, but is still Windows-only.

Last year I started work on the Chordious 2.1 preview, but I got caught up in other projects, and so development kind of stalled for a while. Looking at what I’d done, and what I’d planned to do, I decided I might as well push an official 2.2 release while I regroup and plan for the future.

The biggest functional additions are to allow searching for “partial” chords in the Chord Finder (searching for chords missing notes), and the ability to restrict scales in the Scale Finder (respecting the octave of the scale).

The biggest UI changes are in converting all of the numeric text boxes to have up/down arrows, and now color combo boxes have nice RGB color pickers.

Here’s the full change list for those upgrading from 2.0.13 to 2.2:

• Chord Finder can now find “partial” chords
• Added “Strict Intervals” option for Scale Finder
• Diagram export can now be interrupted, and dialog can optionally close afterward
• Upgraded numeric inputs from text boxes to numeric spinners
• Upgraded color inputs from combo boxes to color pickers
• Fixed issue with non-deterministic style summary text
• Extended clickable area for editing fret labels
• Fixed layout inconsistencies with visibility of elements with text
• Fixed issues with allowing one-string instruments
• Fixed update check to always suggest updates to higher official versions
• Fixed issue with diagram text scaling on high DPI screens

Update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

If you’re new to Chordious, your best bet is to stick with the Official releases. However, if you’re a Chordious veteran and okay with trading some stability for the latest features, give the Preview release a try. For more information, see What’s the difference between “Official” and “Preview” releases?

Now I know it’s been a while since I announced the start of work on Chordious 2.2, i.e. the Chordious 2.1 Preview, but I didn’t get much work done on Chordious in 2020.

However, I’ve decided to resume development in 2021, and I’m kicking things off with the most requested feature: “partial” chords. Now you can ask the Chord Finder to include results that don’t include all of the notes of a Chord Quality, for those times when you’re trying to approximate a chord on an instrument with less strings than notes required.

The other big change is adding a dependency on the Xceed Extended WPF Toolkit, which provides a variety of useful UI controls to Chordious. Now numeric text boxes have up/down arrows (no more having to type in the number of frets, or a font size) and selecting colors is infinitely better with a proper RGB color picker (no more plain list of color names).

Here’s the full change list for 2.1.0.0:

• First 2.1 preview release
• Chord Finder can now find “partial” chords
• Diagram export can now be interrupted, and dialog can optionally close afterward
• Added Extended WPF Toolkit v3.8.2 dependency
• Upgraded numeric inputs from text boxes to numeric spinners
• Upgraded color inputs from combo boxes to color pickers
• Fixed issue with non-deterministic style summary text
• Extended clickable area for editing fret labels
• Fixed layout inconsistencies with visibility of elements with text
• Fixed issues with allowing one-string instruments

So if you’re so inclined, download this latest version of Chordious today, send me your feedback, and stay tuned for further releases!

/jon

P.S. I won’t always make a blog post when a new Preview release is ready, so if you want to make sure you’re on the latest version, go into Chordious’s Options -> Updates and set your Release Channel to “Preview”.

I know it’s been a while since the last release, no features here, just some bug fixes around copying and updating diagram styles. Thanks to John S for alerting me to the issues he was seeing.

Here’s the full change list for 2.0.13:

• Fixed issue with importing configs with collection styles
• Fixed issue with cloning collections not cloning collection styles
• Fixed issue with resetting styles not updating the UI

Update to the latest version of Chordious today, and keep the feedback coming!

/jon

Yesterday I uploaded the final two tutorials for the year, covering the most powerful (and complicated) features in the program – the Diagram Editor and the Style Editor. They’re on the long side, but I hope they help you unlock all of the power of Chordious!

See all of the tutorial videos in the Chordious 2 Tutorial playlist.

Enjoy!

/jon

So today I recorded six more videos, covering everything that the out-of-date videos covered, and also some of other features that never had videos before.

See all of the tutorial videos in the Chordious 2 Tutorial playlist.

Enjoy!

/jon