Installation is now a lot easier than before. If you are using the Microsoft Windows platform (XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 and 10), download and execute Runabc_2011*_setup.exe which will not only install runabc.exe but also the required support executables in abcMIDI. On other platforms, you will need the source code runabc.tcl and the tcl/tk 8.5 interpreter. As of version 2.349, runabc no longer displays PostScript files directly. Instead it converts the PostScript file into a pdf file and calls an internet browser to display the pdf file. As a result, SumatraPDF, ghostview, or evince are no longer used.
Runabc.tcl is a tcl/tk script which requires a Tcl/Tk environment. To execute runabc.tcl you should have Tcl/Tk 8.5 which you can find at http://www.activestate.com/activetcl. Select the package appropriate for your system and install it. The package without the source code is somewhat over 9 Mbytes on my computer.
Runabc.tcl will create will create and update a folder called runabc_home where it will store the file runabc.ini. This file saves the user's settings and states. Other temporary files will also be stored in this folder.
Note that even if you are only running the runabc executable, you may wish to download runabc.zip. Besides runabc.tcl, it contains other useful stuff, such as an icon (runabc.ico), *.fmt files for abc*2ps, sample abc files and a description of the latest updates in runhistory.txt. Note that all the files including runabc.tcl are text files which can be viewed with any editor.
You also need the James Allwrights's abcMIDI package consisting of abc2midi, yaps, abc2abc and other programs. James Allwright is no longer supporting this package and I have made numerous fixes as well as added new features. Executables for the package are available for some platforms; otherwise you will need to build them yourself from the source code.
You can find the latest abcMIDI sources of abcMIDI from my main page http://ifdo.ca/~seymour/runabc/top.html and compile it on your system. Executables for Microsoft Windows can also be found on the same site. Other precompiled versions systems are available on Guido Gonzato's site The abcplus Homepage.
To convert the abc files to postscript files displaying the sheet music, you also need Jeff Moine's abcm2ps package. The executable for the PC is included with abcMIDI executables on my site.
A MIDI player is also handy. They usually come with the operating system or sound card. If you have the capability of playing audio files but no MIDI capability, you could download the TiMidity package. Free SoundFont patches for Timidity may be obtained from Big Soundfont Though runabc no longer displays PostScript files directly, it still needs the GhostScript package to convert the PostScript files into other formats (eg. pdf).
You can find many other software packages and abc notated files from Chris Walshaw's, The abc Homepage.
Return to top level to download runabc.zip.