JianZiPu Font (v3) looking for v2?

The JianZiPu font uses a glyph layering system where each musical notation character is built by combining multiple component glyphs that stack and position themselves relative to each other. So each character is made of a series of glyphs, similar to how an English word is made of a series of letters.

1. Basic Layout

For left hand...

• 名 or s → sEx: 名九勾五 or s9k5 → s9k5
• 中 or d → dEx: 中九勾五 or s9k5 → d9k5
• 食 or f → fEx: 食九勾五 or s9k5 → f9k5
• 大 or v → vEx: 大九勾五 or s9k5 → v9k5
• 跪 or x → xEx: 跪九勾五 or s9k5 → x9k5

For right hand...

• 劈 or n → nEx: 名九劈五 or s9s5 → s9n5
• 托 or h → hEx: 名九托五 or s9s5 → s9h5
• 抹 or j → jEx: 名九抹五 or s9s5 → s9j5
• 挑 or u → uEx: 名九挑五 or s9s5 → s9u5
• 勾 or k → kEx: 名九勾五 or s9s5 → s9k5
• 剔 or i → iEx: 名九剔五 or s9s5 → s9i5
• 打 or l → lEx: 名九打五 or s9s5 → s9l5
• 摘 or o → oEx: 名九摘五 or s9s5 → s9o5
• 历 or U → UThis takes two strings. Ex: 名九历五四 or s9U54 → s9U54

For numbers in hui position and string... well, just use numbers! Which numbers? Like 五 or 5. You can also use 外 or 13+ for the :wai character, as well as 散 and 0 for the :san character.

• 名九勾五 or s9k5 → 名九勾五
• 名外勾五 or s13+k5 → 名外勾五
• 散勾五 or 0k5 → 散勾五

Try it out below! You can type in both text boxes, and both will update. The Text textbox just shows you what you are typing.

2. Numbers and Decimals

If you are using ASCII, you can note a decimal by just writing 7.5, 7.6, etc.

If you are using Chinese, the font will treat the numbers different depending on if they are preceded by a left hand glyph or not. For example, if two numbers are follows a left hand, then that gets converted to decimals (s76 => s7.6), can put comma between (s7,6)

• 名七六 and s76 → 7.6 hui (no string) s76
• 名七,六 and s7,6 → 7 hui, string 6 s7,6
• 名七六六 and s766 → 7.6 hui, string 6 s766
• 名十一 and s766 → 7.6 hui, string 6 s766
• 历七六 and U76 → string 7, string 6 U76 Here 76 is not converted into 7.6 since it's not preceded by a left hand glyph

For Chinese, you can also use 点 and 徽 to indicate decimals For example, 名七点九 gives 名七点九.

Here are some crazy examples:

• 名十 gives 名十
• 名十二 gives 名十二 In the code this is represented as 10.2
• 名十二徽 gives 名十二徽 In the code this is represented as 12, though I don't know if visually it's all that different from 10.2 above.
• 名十，二 gives 名十，二
• 名十二二 gives 名十二二
• 名十二二二 gives 名十二二二

Anything that results in ".5" hui will be rendered with the :ban character.

• 中八半勾五 gives 中八半勾五
• 中八五勾五 also gives 中八五勾五
• d8.5k5 also also gives d8.5k5
• d85k5 also also also gives d85k5 Do you see the difference? There's no period between 8 and 5, but the font still treats it as a decimal.

Anything that's after the 13th hui will be rendered with the :wai character. You can use 13+ or 外 for the :wai character.

• 名外挑六挑六 and s13+u6 gives 名外挑六
• 名十三二挑六 and s132u6 gives 名十三二挑六
• 名十三二挑六 and s132u6 gives 名十三二挑六

You can use 散 or 0 to indicate an open string as in 0k5 or 散勾五 → 散勾五

You can use 就 or jiu to indicate a repeat from the previous character as in jiuk5 or 就勾五 → 就勾五

3. Basic Modifiers

There are a lot of modifiers in the font, but there a few that is positioned in funny places around a JianZiPu character. I'll show it with a 名九勾六 character

• 泛音名九勾六 or fys9k6 → 泛音名九勾六
• 名九急勾六 or s8>k6 → 名九急勾六
• 名九绰勾六 or s8/k6 → 名九绰勾六
• 名九注勾六 or s8\k6 → 名九注勾六
• 名九绰注勾六 or s8/\k6 → 名九绰注勾六

4. Chords

For the purpose of the font, a chord is anything where there's something on the left and right side, and generally takes up more space.

Ex: Cs9,6|3 or B6|5 or TT6|5

You start with a "chord" indicator, 撮 or C, and use the | to separate the left and right side.

• 撮大九，六｜散三 or Cv9,6|03 → Cv9,6|03 Note you'll need to use a comma between the hui and the string, otherwise...
• 撮大九六｜散三 or Cv96|03 → 撮大九六｜散三.. you get this. And yes, the system is smart enough not to interpret 03 as 0.3.

You can see the complete list of chords in the glossary below.

Here's a few "chords" for you to try out.

5. Vertical Texts

Vertical texts are just a string of characters, and will be rendered vertically. You start with a vertical indicator, ：. While the characters here have ASCII equivalents, you sholud probably use Chinese characters to avoid ambiguity with homonym pinyins. Also in general, it is more robust with Chinese characters.

• ：上七九 or :shang79 → :shang79
• ：下六二 or :xia62 → :xia62
• ：分开 or :fenkai → :fenkai this is actually one character I squished together.
• ：泛止 ：泛起 or :fanzhi :fanqi → :fanzhi :fanqi
• ：滚沸or :gunfu → :gunfu

Please reference the glossary below for the complete list. There are quite a bit.

You can also embed some left handed glyphs with hui positions.

• ：大八五轮七 or :v8.5lun7 → ：大八五轮七
• ：大八五七 or :v8.57 → ：大八五七
• ：大八五 or :v8.5 → ：大八五 Note that 八五 is interpreted as 8.5
• ：大八,五 or :v8,5 → ：大八,五 If you don't want 八五 to be interpreted as 8.5, then you can use a comma 八，五

Here are some examples to try out.

6. Glossary

Keyboard Map (Basic Glyphs)