Fret1 Blog

Fret1 is back for 2009.

Guitar Chord Finder is live, and works!

I had some problems with the upgrade from Silverlight Beta 2 to the full version. Browsing through the code muttering “who wrote this crap?”, I decided to bite the bullet and do a rewrite. Now more “Silverlighty” using databindings, data templates and such like.

Finally got round to implementing PayPal integration. After all, it’s hard to make money if you don’t have a payment option. Joining Fret1 gets you access to the full range of features in the Guitar Chord Finder

Of course, I’m hoping to pad things out in the website a bit more at some point in the near future.

Yes, it’s six months late, but still out before MixAction

Oh, and Happy New Year everybody, hope you all have a great 2009.

UPDATE: Chord Progression Maker is now live.

Here is a preview screenshot of the Fret1 Progression Maker

Here you can choose a Key from the Circle of Fifths, then select a progression. The chords required are then shown in the next listbox and if you select the chord itself you can see the individual notes.

As the 30 day challenge draws to a close, I have lots of half-finished bits of code lying around. I really need to organise and focus on completing some tools, probably the Guitar Chord Finder tool and this Progression Maker tool. While this may of started out as a 30 day challenge, the long term plan is to evolve Fret1.com into a place where many quality tools are available at a decent monthly price (still to be decided!). Possibly even offering weekly video guitar lessons if enough people are interested.

Have a good weekend everybody, don’t code too hard 30 dayers

Yes, that’s right. The Guitar Chord Finder is now in beta.
If you sign up as a beta tester before July 1st, you’ll get 3 month subscription to Fret1.com free!
Not only that, but you can influence future development and shape Fret1.com to be a great resource for musicians everywhere.

Here is some Guitar Chord Finder Help

This requires Silverlight 2 to be installed, but don’t worry it is quick and painless (doesn’t even require a browser restart in IE) You should be prompted through the short install. If you’ve been holding out installing it, why not take this opportunity to have a look.

I think I have crushed all the gremlins, but can never be sure so please leave your feedback in the comments, thanks.

For the past few days I’ve been bogged down in trying to get asp.net membership bits up and running. Some database problems and configuration problems. Website seems to be holding onto the old values in web.config even though it’s been updated. And another problem was just a stupid backslash - forewardslash mix up. Grrr. Slow progress at the moment. Irritating, because I hoped to get the latest version of the guitar chord finder up and open a beta program. Oh well hopefully in the next few days it will all be sorted out.

On the actual development side, the guitar chord finder has a few updates

• Redesigned the layout slightly.
• Fully adjustable tunings
• Can zoom and pan (not sure how useful this is!)

Hmm, doesn’t seem that much, but there was some under the hood changes also.

The year, 1966. The Jimi Hendrix Experience release Purple Haze. Kids go wild.

The year, 2008. I almost get my chordbox subcontrol working. Kids go wild.

So here’s is the chordbox with the “Jimi Hendrix Chord“, or E7#9 as others know it. Give it a strum and then set your guitar on fire.

This will be used to display some common fingerings. In it’s current incantation is needs a lot more work, mainly because I can’t resize it. I suspect this is something to do with the way it is drawn in blend. Lesson learned don’t use transformations when creating a control, only use them afterwards. Although I’m searching for some sort of Apply Transformations to make this easier.

In unrelated news, 100’s of zombies just shuffled through Melbourne City Centre for unknown reasons!