Externals showing up as folders. Not loading

AudioMatt's icon

Titles says it all. I get no such external messages.
Max 5.1.8
OsX 10.6.8

Mathieu Chamagne's icon

I have a similar problem on one computer ; you need to add a "PkgInfo" from another valid external to the "Contents" folder.
(this file is missing in some 3rd party externals)

Mathieu

Peter McCulloch's icon

Which externals have you tried? If you haven't already, I'd recommend trying some of the more commonly used externals (maybe the Tristan Jehan objects, or Tap.Tools) and see if those load. If they do, then your problem may be more with a specific external.

BTW: The thing that Mathieu just posted: I just went and fixed it for PM.Chamberlin~, so you might download it again and see if that fixes it.

AudioMatt's icon

works like a charm... actually it worked like science... charms don't work.

anyway thank you!

Timo Rozendal's icon

I just had the same problem and pasting the pkginfo inside the packages worked (I also had to do your PM.Chamberlin~ btw Peter (dated 22 aug)).

so, what should a developer do to make sure this never happens? When is the pkginfo created?
I looked around a bit in xcode and I found an option "Force Package Info Generation", should that be ticked?
I never have this ticked and basically all my externals have the pkginfo file, except for 1 old one, but I don't know why...

$Adam's icon

Hi Timo,

this question might look better on the dev forum, but you're correct, Force Package Info Generation should be set to 'Yes'. If you use the maxmspsdk.xcconfig as a basic settings file (which is submitted with the Max SDK), then you'll find the line 'GENERATE_PKGINFO_FILE = YES', which is the reason why you don't have to set it manually in your externals (again, this is the case only if you use the mentioned file as a base for your XCode settings). It can happen, by chance, that you end up having a pkginfo in your external without having this option enabled, but that is, as I mentioned, pure chance (for instance, if you had a pkginfo in a generated external for some obscure reason and later you uncheck the 'Force Package Info Generation', then you won't lose the already generated pkginfo file).

Hope this helps,
Ádám

Timo Rozendal's icon

thanks Ádám , that clears things up (yes it should be in the dev forum :-) )