Hey folks! If anyone is wanting to make shamisen notation for your favorite songs, please check out Karl Hedlund’s ‘Shamisen Composer’, which is a free service he made to help us all tab out our epic, three-stringed riffs!
Shamisen Composer - http://bachido.com/wiki/Shamisen-Composer
Hello! Long time reader,first time poster. I was using the Shamisen composer 1.1 to notate a song, but came up with an error when trying to convert it to a PDF. This is the error that I get:
Server Error in ‘/’ Application.
The resource cannot be found.
Description: HTTP 404. The resource you are looking for (or one of its dependencies) could have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable. Please review the following URL and make sure that it is spelled correctly.
Requested URL: /failed.html
Any ideas on how I can work around the error message?
Send the PDF url to Karl so he can check it out. Possibly something has changed in it and broke it. EDIT: Actually scratch that, probably not helpful. I think something failed in PDF generation itself - probably some weird stuff in the score which makes the app break.
Find the magic button in your browser (if there is one) to access developer mode and copy-paste the local data for the song to Karl. Should make it quick to reproduce the problem. Or take a screenshot and send that …
Did you try to generate it again? The files are removed after 10 minutes, but there can always be unexpected behaviour so that it was removed too fast. At what time did you try to generate it? I can see if I find anything in the logs.
I tried to generate it again and still receive the same error. The last time that I tried to generate it was ten minutes ago. Thank you for helping. Your shamisen composer is truly amazing!!!
Angelica there aren’t that many who test it so I’m afraid there could be a lot of things going on, seeing as I’m not really a web developer 
According to my logs the PDF generation went fine. Perhaps there is some setting in your browser that prevents the site from automatically direct you to the new link, as a security precaution.
Which web browser do you use? Can you try it in another one?
Yo Karl, anyway you could add back in the symbols for repeating into shamisen composer at some point? Or is it there and I’m just not seeing it?
Yo N8, I don’t think I’ve ever had them. I think I was about to but left it for later since it will require some stuff for the playback code.
How would you want to use it? Mark a few beats and press “repeat” and then have the marks added afterwards?
I wanted to inform that I will take down my website. There are simply too few users for me to feel generous enough to pay over 100$ a year in website costs. I will probably try and make a desktop or Android version of it, but the whole online part will be gone.
as for me helping out with whatever amount of webspace would be no problem at all but a pleasure for shamisen related stuff but I cannot or rather don’t want to offer hosting a script that offers the option to alter the contents of the webspace (after getting hacked twice and continously seeing hacking attempts in my logs I am quite happy about having switched to simple client side versions of my sites where I don’t have to worry about this)
Yikes! I wasn’t aware you had to pay so much for maintaining the website yearly.
It would be a great shame for the composer to go away. Though regrettably I don’t find myself needing to make notation as frequently as I once thought, whenever I do need to make some, I’m always so thankful for your creation.
May I suggest having a ‘Donate with Paypal’ button, so folks who use the composer can contribute? I certainly will!
(A desktop version would be great as well, but in the meantime, but in the meantime, let’s all chip in to keep Shamisen Composer alive!)
When it began I wanted to try out web development, so my initial thought was that I would use the website for both the composer and other stuff. Now it’s only the composer and the amount of users are really few.
I can probably whip up the desktop version pretty fast and there would be quite a few benefits too. The main reason for having it online was that people would not have to execute programs on their computers. Considering how few users there are, I’m sure they would trust me. Also, I’m a Swede.
When it began I wanted to try out web development, so my initial thought was that I would use the website for both the composer and other stuff. Now it’s only the composer and the amount of users are really few.
Would there be another, cheaper option for web hosting - think there’s plenty available globally.
Also an option could be transferring the application/responsibility to another site such as Bachido.com.
The main reason for having it online was that people would not have to execute programs on their computers. Considering how few users there are, I’m sure they would trust me. Also, I’m a Swede.
I would probably see it more as a disadvantage. When there isn’t 10 000 users the chances are low that somebody would be reverse engineering it just for fun or analyzing if the binary does anything unwanted.
Of course if you wanted to release it open source the situation would be very different.
I think I might release it as open source. I’ve been aware of that you can simply copy all the code since day one.
The only obfuscation is that when I started out the code was a mess, and still is. Only some newly added parts have a proper layout.
I’ve never had as a goal to make money from the composer, which is why it might as well be open source. For guitar, there are lots of much more advanced sites that does what my site does. Of course, they take money for it 
But I’m just saying that someone else would most likely not be able to earn money from my work.
Karl, can we set up a Skype meeting? I’m in dire need of mastering the music score writing of your Shamisen Composer! When will you possibly have some time?
Do you have a road map for where you want to see the composer go? If you open source it, it might make a good project for any developers in the Bachido community that have talked about working on a Bachido app to come together and form around. I’d hate to see it disappear. Along with composing new material, it’s a great tool for hearing what sheet music should sound like and practicing along with it.
Along with composing new material, it’s a great tool for hearing what sheet music should sound like and practicing along with it.
Come to think of it, midi or DAW export could be a nice feature?
Kevin, I think the best bet is to see if I’m online when you wake up.
Joel, there are some requested features that I used to have on the road map but I haven’t put any effort into the project in quite some time now. Since you mentioned how it “should” sound like, one of the big things would be to have more sound recordings. Now all strikes are heavy on all notes so it easily becomes too much sound.
Yatagarasu the representation of all songs are the same as MIDI, because I use a library for playing the notes that does that with MIDI. So exporting a MIDI file would be possible with a little work.
I’m taking vacation soon and I will think of how to progress with this stuff.
Wait - does that also mean we could take midis and convert them to tabs easy?
That’s actually what I started working on before doing the website. The problem is that I ended up with the same problem with each file. It’s impossible to turn it into something that you can play on the shamisen. It always ends up in that you either don’t have octaves enough or that you are forced to play fast parts in awkward or bad sounding ways. I still have the Java code for it though.
When you want to play a cover on the shamisen you always have to make compromises. Only three strings, so all chords with more than 3 notes need to be cut down. Then you have the fact that most songs go down one note below the key note. Then you can either play that note on position 3 on the second string, but then you don’t get the same feeling. You could also make the song start on the third string, but then you lose an octave. Often you need to remove notes.