Recently Comp class gained the following feature in Build 2020.42700:
COMP Class - New methods
saveByteArray()andloadByteArray()for saving and loading .tox files directly to and from memory.
Can something similar to the loadByteArray() feature be added to the Engine Comp, so that ByteArrays of toxes can be loaded from memory, instead of from disk?
Great suggestion. I know Greg is also asking for a way to point to the Engine COMP another COMP in your network, so you can package it up to run in another process, while still having it editable in your main .toe easily. Not quite what you are asking for but I can see both getting added.
Actually thinking about this more, I think VFS is what you are looking for here.
You can throw your .tox into VFS and reference it from the Engine COMP. This is something doesn’t work yet, but I think that would be the workflow
Pointing the Engine Comp to an existing COMP for editing would be a HUGE help for developing toxes for the the Engine Comp. +10 to this!
I do think there would be some subtle differences in between VFS and loadByteArray(), primarily the fact that loadByteArray() would open up options for loading toxes from shared memory between multiple instances of TouchDesigner.
VFS would be a great first step and I imagine it would hit most use cases for going down this path in the first place, but loadByteArray() definitely has some advantages for power users.