The Great NSM Audit™

[Yug_Guy]

UPDATE: This topic has been superceded by The Great NSM Audit™ 2.0

Please check that thread for any future updates.


So as many of you know, NSM accepts submissions to the site through the NSM Panel: an automated bot used as quality-assurance to maintain a high level of quality and consistency. It's a really great system, and I have to commend Deku and the updaters for the past two years of outstanding & polished sheets!

That being said, it hasn't always been like this. For years, there wasn't this level of oversight, and so many sheets got on site that were of... questionable quality. Go on the main site, click on any random sheet and I give you 50/50 odds that what you get isn't of very high quality.

Now, the NSM Panel does allow for replacement sheets to be submitted. But, a large problem is figuring out exactly which sheets are in dire need of replacing, and which ones are just fine. The layout of the site itself doesn't necessarily lend itself well to that...

Which is why I've spent a good 2 months now creating this:

The Great NSM Audit
yes, i've removed the link. cry about it

I have gone thought literally every single sheet on site, and checked for formatting errors. Anything that goes against what's in the Offical Formatting Guidelines has been carefully documented to include any and all errors for a given sheet. My reasoning goes like this: if the formatting for a sheet is absolutely horrendous, then it's fairly certain that the music for that sheet will likely be as equally horrendous. Likewise, pristine-looking sheets will probably have pristine music as well, so there's no need to bother with them.

So, I've tried to make the table as easy to digest as possible, given the large amount of sheets that are contained within:

• All games are listed in alphabetical order
• Each sheet contains the following information: Name of the song, arranger, list of errors, and any other comments I'd like to add
• Anything highlighted in red is either a duplicate, corrupted, or I believe should go under a different game
• Here's a list of the errors that are listed in the sheet:
  Spoiler

  • Does the title of the sheet match the title given on site?
  • Does the arranger of the sheet match the arranger listed on site?
  • Is the title bolded & in quotation marks?
  • Is the game title correct?
  • Is the game title in italics?
  • Is the composer and arranger text formatted the way it should be?
  • Does the sheet contain a tempo marking?
  • Does the sheet have at least one dynamic at the beginning of the song?
  • Does the sheet have measure numbers?
  • Does the sheet have the original publisher?
  • Does the sheet have the copyright year?
  • Does the sheet have the correct url? (http://ninsheetmusic.org/)
  • If the sheet has more than one page, does it have "mini-titles" at the top of each page?
  • Are these "mini-titles" in quotation marks?
  • Plus a few incidental errors here and there

  [close]

With the way I have the table set up, sheets with multiple errors "look" a lot bigger than those with very few errors. So ideally, it would be a lot easier to tell which sheets should be replaced right away, and which ones can wait a while.

At the moment, I figure this'll be a good way for people to see what songs need replacing. They can either choose to see whether or not a certain song is located in this list, or just simply to browse to find a song to replace. But, like the NSM Data Table before this, I'd like for this to be as useful to as many people as possible. So if anyone has any thoughts/concerns/suggestions, please let me know.

It's also worth noting that the updaters know nothing about this, so please don't bother them about it.

[mikey]

thank mr sketlon doot

[Zeila]

There are quite a few sheets (notably some Kirby and Zelda ones) with other errors such as missing repeat signs, missing voices,introductions, or pickup measures that definitely could be put in, and wrong/missing notes in existing voices (although this one in particular would be cumbersome to find/write for each sheet). Still, nice job!!

[Sebastian]

Now this is an idea that I like. In fact, I have been working on something like this myself, but you have done a great job so far spotting errors in these sheets. Excellent work.

If you need any further help, I would love to help you out with this. This greatly interests me.

[cashwarrior1]

So, for songs with a few errors would we just update it, only changing the errors, and put it back as the same person? Songs with several errors would probably require a replacement. I think that changing the URL shouldn't require re-submitting the sheet, and an updater/submitter could probably fix that.

[Yug_Guy]

There are quite a few sheets (notably some Kirby and Zelda ones) with other errors such as missing repeat signs, missing voices,introductions, or pickup measures that definitely could be put in, and wrong/missing notes in existing voices (although this one in particular would be cumbersome to find/write for each sheet). Still, nice job!!

Thanks! I would love to be able to pick out every single error for any sheet, including musical ones, but that would take an extraordinary amount of time. Hopefully, what I already have is sufficient.

Now this is an idea that I like. In fact, I have been working on something like this myself, but you have done a great job so far spotting errors in these sheets. Excellent work.
If you need any further help, I would love to help you out with this. This greatly interests me.

If I need any help in the future, I'll be sure to let you know. 

So, for songs with a few errors would we just update it, only changing the errors, and put it back as the same person? Songs with several errors would probably require a replacement. I think that changing the URL shouldn't require re-submitting the sheet, and an updater/submitter could probably fix that.

It would probably depend on the song, the sheet, and the magnitude of errors. I think at least for the moment, it would be better to focus on the ones that have the most errors, since they need replacements badly. In the future, we could maybe have a project similar to the "Replacing the URL" project for sheets with one or two errors, but that's probably going to be a lot further down the line.

[Dude]

Panel de Pon was before Tetris Attack and technically had more music besides the Yoshi's Island themed songs.

If anything it should be called Panel de Pon instead of Tetris Attack.

[Maelstrom]

I know it would take more time than it's worth, but could you simplify the musical errors to a scale of 0-5 to show how badly it would need to be edited musically? This would help the updaters a lot.

[Th3Gavst3r]

This is awesome work Yug! I've been working on replacement arrangements lately and it's really hard to decide what to work on through the 3000+ sheets... This will help massively.

One suggestion I can think of: the division of games is a bit confusing to read through. A system of alternating colors ought to be easier to read, but it might take a while to do. If you feel up to it sometime though, it'd be a nice touch

Spoiler

[close]

Edit: the ability to comment on the document would also be nice for a few misc things I've noticed

how do?

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[close]

[Yug_Guy]

I know it would take more time than it's worth, but could you simplify the musical errors to a scale of 0-5 to show how badly it would need to be edited musically? This would help the updaters a lot.

You mean errors in the actual music? Because this is only a list of formatting errors. If you want a list from 0-5 (or similar) of all the formatting errors, I can do that as well.

This is awesome work Yug! I've been working on replacement arrangements lately and it's really hard to decide what to work on through the 3000+ sheets... This will help massively.

Thanks! Glad to hear you'll get some use out of this thing!

The ability to comment on the document would also be nice for a few misc things I've noticed

how do?

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[close]

Yeah, I'm not sure I want to open it up to comments just yet. If you wanted to let me know of any discrepancies, just send me a PM.

One suggestion I can think of: the division of games is a bit confusing to read through. A system of alternating colors ought to be easier to read, but it might take a while to do. If you feel up to it sometime though, it'd be a nice touch

Spoiler

[close]

brb, totally stealing this

[Maelstrom]

You mean errors in the actual music? Because this is only a list of formatting errors. If you want a list from 0-5 (or similar) of all the formatting errors, I can do that as well.

Well, you see, if it's a 1 in musical errors and a 5 in formatting, it's not inconceivable that an updater could fix that up pretty quickly. You see, formatting is not all that makes a sheet good. Yes, we could fix up the site, but, if we don't change the fact that some of the arrangements are downright bad, it's like polishing a turd. It may be polished. but it's still a turd. The hit list for edits and replacements shouldn't be limited to just formatting is what I'm getting at. That said, I by no means am trying to belittle the tremendous amount of time you poured into this. It's quite incredible. Thank you.

[Altissimo]

I started a project like this like a year ago but it never got anywhere. Glad you had the same idea. I like this.

[WaluigiTime64]

If you want the musical errors on the table, there are plenty of us willing to help check the sheets.

[cashwarrior1]

I'm not one of them.

[Yug_Guy]

Well, you see, if it's a 1 in musical errors and a 5 in formatting, it's not inconceivable that an updater could fix that up pretty quickly. You see, formatting is not all that makes a sheet good. Yes, we could fix up the site, but, if we don't change the fact that some of the arrangements are downright bad, it's like polishing a turd. It may be polished. but it's still a turd. The hit list for edits and replacements shouldn't be limited to just formatting is what I'm getting at. That said, I by no means am trying to belittle the tremendous amount of time you poured into this. It's quite incredible. Thank you.

I completely understand. While I was doing this, I figured the most important thing was that users knew which sheets needed replacing. Once they had one or more sheets to work on, I figured they would look into the music themselves to see what needed fixing. I guess this mentality only works if you're working on one or two at a time & not a whole swath of sheets.

If you want the musical errors on the table, there are plenty of us willing to help check the sheets.

We'd have to come up with a quantifiable system, and get quite a few volunteers, but I'm open to this suggestion.