[PD] Install path assumptions for [soundfiler] vs [file glob]

[Roman Haefeli]

On Tue, 2022-01-11 at 11:31 +0000, Pierre Alexandre Tremblay wrote:
> Dear all
> 
> I am wondering if I my assumptions are wrong, or if there is a
> discrepancy that needs solving (or not.)
> 
> Setup: if one installs objects like our flucoma.org bundle, one might
> have stuff included in the help, like media files. To make a clean
> install, we have put all of them in a folder called media/
> 
> The behaviour I rely on for the held-files is that [soundfiler] will
> find, for instance, [read -resize media/mysound.wav] (see attached
> file)


If 'media' lies near the patch, yes. From what I understand, when given
a relative path to [soundfiler] (and many other objects), it'll try all
search paths, starting with the directory of the path. 

> First question: am I right to do so (not ethically, but in term of
> path resolution to installed libraries)

From what I understand: yes.

> —
> If I am right that it should find the file (as it does), let’s
> continue:
> 
> Second question: should [file glob] resolve [symbol media/*.wav] ?
> Because it doesn’t and that makes me doubt the whole world.

I guess you missed this whole thread from a few days ago:
https://lists.puredata.info/pipermail/pd-list/2022-01/130639.html

TLDR: Unlike many other file accessing objects like [soundfile],
[reasf~], [textfile], etc. [file] doesn't use search paths¹. Relative
paths given to it are resolved against the current working directory,
which is the start location of Pd (which is your user home when
starting Pd from menu).

[symbol media/*.wav(->[file glob] doesn't work  unless you started Pd
from the location where your patch resides.

Until there is a pure [file]-based solution, you could use [dir( -
[pdcontrol] to get the directory of your patch, append '/media/*.wav'
to it and feed that to [file glob].  

Roman

¹ [file which] does traverse all search paths, but it doesn't work for
directories or for globs.
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