Hello to all,
it is with great pleasure that I can "finally" show you the future P-A! I know I've been talking about a new version for a very long time and a lot of things have happened in the meantime that have delayed it.
2019 was the year of the new score-accordion, we spent most of it working full time on the website redesign. The goal was to keep all the functionality of the website while adding new things that should make your life easier.
The only thing that disappears is the chat, because it was very very little used and took a lot of resources for not much.
The heart of the website is now the news, which will summarize everything that happens on the site, discussions, new scores, classified ads etc... Each "news" can be commented. A number of new options are available for members, the ability to create events, add a requested score in one click etc.
A library system is coming
Due to the fact that most of you prefer to use the "view" function rather than the download, we thought that allowing you to save personal libraries, to help you during your performances / rehearsals would be an interesting possibility.
The future P-A mobile application will allow you to have your libraries with you everywhere in order to avoid printing/downloading them and to be able to read them directly via a tablet on the website during your performances.
You will be able to browse other members' libraries, copy them, share them etc...
In order to make the search and use of scores easier for you, you will now be able to search by genre and by instrument. Scores now have a system to indicate if they are original scores or not and in which key the score is written. Composers, performers, authors etc. are now individually identified on each score, which we hope will make Cindou's work easier in the future and allow a better classification! A youtube link can also be associated to a score, in order to easily have a visualization of the score without having to use an external service.
We have also decided to focus on members' compositions and to make P-A a place to find original music around the accordion. A real music player will allow you to listen to members' music, make playlists and show your appreciation for other website users' compositions/covers. The music profile is also now coupled to your profile on the website and is no longer a separate category.
Partitions-accordeon will also integrate a store, which I will tell you about in another post so as not to bombard too much information at once. There are also a lot of other improvements that we will tell you about as we go along :)
The redesign of the score-accordion has been in the works since the beginning of the year, it required several months of design, reflections and meetings in order to try to produce something that we hope will be as satisfying as possible for you. It also required a complete technical overhaul of the website and the system that powers it. As I write this we are talking about hundreds of files, and over 12,000 lines of code to power the new platform, which will also come with many improvements in the speed and fluidity of the platform as well as for us and for cindou in the administration of the website. The new website is not yet finished but we are in the final stretch and we can assure you that it will be available for you, at the latest in January.
In addition to all these new features, unfortunately another change is coming to the new P-A. Partition-accordion is now a team of 3 full time people, not counting the work provided daily by Cindou and the revenues from the website are not enough to compensate for all this, which leaves us all in a situation far from optimal for us and for P-A.
After deliberating for a long time on the issue, we had to take the decision to raise the subscription price to 24.99 euros per year for everyone. This was already the case for new subscribers and it would unify the subscription price and allow us to have a minimal remuneration that would allow us to continue to devote 100% of our time to the development and support of the platform and its community. This will also allow us to double P-A's participation in the annual fund for cindou! And also hopefully continue to increase this participation year after year, as it has been done since it was set up.
We understand that this is news that will not please you, but we think that the price (about 2€/month) remains affordable and in adequacy with the service offered. We hope you understand all this and we are here to answer your questions, criticisms, and any other form of feedback you want to give us :)
Thanks for reading this far, feel free to express your opinion on the new site, on the functional changes that will come, and on the price change. We hope you'll enjoy these few screenshots as much as we do :)
PS: I forgot to mention that the new site is fully adapted to tablets, and mobiles!