WINDOWS - Installing GNU LilyPond on Windows
********************************************

This document explains how to install the binary release for windows on a Microsoft Windows 95, 98, NT or 2000 machine. Please follow the instructions carefully. If it doesn't work for you, please send a bugreport, following the guidelines in the section on bugreports below.

Windows binary setup
====================

If you run Windows NT, 2000 or XP, please become administrator first (currently, installing as an ordinary user will not work).  Download and run setup.exe (http://www.lilypond.org/gnu-windows/setup.exe). You will be asked some questions. If you are unsure just click "Next". Do not change the default install directory c:/cygwin.

This installs LilyPond, and Cygwin, GUILE, Python, teTeX (MikTeX is not supported) and GSView.  If you already have some of that software under c:/cygwin, then don't worry: nothing will be installed twice.

If you want to install any of this software by hand, do this before you run setup.exe, otherwise your LilyPond setup may not work.

Testing LilyPond
================

Open a LilyPond shell (To open a a lilypond shell, click the "GNU LilyPond" icon), and type

          lilypond --help

You should see something similar to

          Usage: lilypond [OPTION]... [FILE]...

          Typeset music and or play MIDI from FILE

          LilyPond is a music typesetter.  It produces beautiful sheet music
          using a high level description file as input.  LilyPond is part of
          the GNU Project.

          Options:
            -h,--help             this help
          [..]

Then, prepare a file called foo.ly, by issuing

          notepad foo.ly

Enter the following into the file

          \score { \notes { c4 ( ) c4 } }

Close the file and save it. Run the following command. It should say PS output to `foo.ps', DVI output to `foo.dvi'.

          ly2dvi -P foo

You can now view the file using the following command

          gsview32 foo.ps

If this works, then you can head to the Tutorial (../../user/out-www/lilypond/Tutorial.html) to start using LilyPond.

Removing LilyPond
=================

Start setup.exe, click Next, select "Install from Local Directory". Then click next until you reach "Select packages to install". Click "View". Now, for every package, click on the recycle icon until it says "Uninstall". Then, click Next.

(If you find this too tedious, you can also simply remove c:/cygwin. This also removes the /home/ directories under cygwin (i.e. C:\CYGWIN\HOME, so make sure that you bring important files in safety first.)

Troubleshooting
===============

For problems and solutions see Troubleshooting Windows (http://lilypond.org/wiki?TroubleshootingWindows)

Bugreports
==========

We can only help you with a problem if you give a full, detailed bugreport. A bugreport includes

  * A precise description of the problem.

  * A full description of your platform (machine type, operating system)

  * All version numbers of relevant software you run.  Specifically, we want to see the output of the  following commands:

                 python --version
                 lilypond --version
                 ly2dvi --version
                 gswin32c  --version

  * If ly2dvi fails, then please run it as follows and include the output in the

                 ly2dvi --verbose MY-FILE

You can also check out http://lilypond.org/wiki/?TroubleshootingWindows for more instructions on how to make a bug report.