Dedication
Elysium is dedicated to the memory of Iván Bach, who taught us Formal Languages on BUTE, and died shortly thereafter. He had a flaming enthusiasm for music supported by a huge collection of scores, accompanied by an exceptional musical memory and comprehension.
Nomenclature
The name Elysium comes from the synthesis of E, the first letter of Eclipse and ly, the extension of LilyPond source files.
And I hope it brings the user experience of working with LilyPond a little bit closer to being on the Elysian Fields. :)
Motivation
The combination of Eclipse and LilyPond is like a match made in heaven. Eclipse is a versatile, open, extensible IDE platform, while writing complex scores with LilyPond inevitably requires a more agile, more managed approach than a simple command line and plain text editor. Therefore, it came as a surprise that there had not been an attempt before to integrate them. Of course, I acted promptly to cease this unsustainable state. :)
Eclipse Added Value
Several advantages ensue from the usage of the Eclipse platform:
- Cross-platform operation: Elysium works on all platforms on which Eclipse and LilyPond exists, and is supported on OS X, Linux and Windows.
- Flexible view docking: there is a reasonable default perspective out-of-the box, and you can tailor your environment to your specific workflow.
- Easy install & update procedure: within Eclipse, the installation is a snap with the help of Eclipse Marketplace, and the update can be automatic.
- Integration with other plugins: there is a pretty abundance of great Eclipse-based solutions which can further assist you in creating and maintaining LilyPond scores.
- Familiarity: Elysium fits the Eclipse IDE philosophy, so if you’re already familiar with it, you can benefit from the conventions you’re accustomed to.
