externalsCommands

[Trevor DeVore]

On Jan 12, 2006, at 9:48 PM, Sarah Reichelt wrote:

>> I just created a standalone using a stack that had the externals set
>> to /Full/Path/to/revspeech.bundle and the externalPackages returned
>> "RevSpeech" (answer the externalPackages of this stack).  This was
>> using 2.6.1 on OS X.4.  I'm not sure how the speech commands are
>> working without the external being loaded in a standalone though.
>>
>> FWIW, I always check the externalPackages to see if an external has
>> loaded successfully.  the externalPackages of a stack will always
>> report the name of the externals that have successfully loaded.
>
> What do you use for the full path to the external? I made a test app
> that uses this:
> /Users/sarah/Desktop/SpeechTest/SpeechTest.app/Contents/MacOS/ 
> externals/revspeech.bundle
> but this is a bundle folder which contains 2 revspeech files in
> differently nested folders. Should I be setting the external to one of
> them?

For bundles you always set the path to the .bundle folder so what you  
have above should work.  Did you use the standalone builder?  I just  
created a new stack and set the externals of the stack to the  
revspeech.bundle that is in the Revolution application folder.   
Perhaps the standalone builder is doing something funny?  I don't  
ever use it to include externals, I always assign them manually.

> The other thing that I have noticed is that the substacks of my app
> include one called: revExternalLibrary. I wonder if the speech stuff
> being copied into this automatically?

I'm not sure how rev handles external with the standalone builder but  
if they are including this file then I would check the externals of  
this stack.  In order to make the external handlers available to all  
stacks in your application the Rev folks may bet setting the  
externals of this revExternalLibrary stack and then using it as a  
library.

> In my test app, I have shown the following:
> - speech works perfectly without any setting of externals.
> - the externals, the externalPackages, the externalCommand & the
> externalFunctions all return empty.
> - if I set the externals to revSpeech.bundle, it makes no functional
> difference. The revSpeech.bundle then shows up when I query the
> externals, but the others all return empty.

The externals will always return the value that you assign to it.  It  
won't tell you whether the external was properly loaded or not.

-- 
Trevor DeVore
Blue Mango Multimedia
trevor at mangomultimedia.com