[ANSWERED]Airfoil with Indigo 6.0.7

[jay (support)]

I got the same email yesterday.

Anyone found a workaround for this yet?
This is a very big part of my system

I switched to PortHole. Not a perfect solution as you have to broadcast all the system sounds, but I have a dedicated headless server so turning of notification sounds in Sys Prefs wasn't a problem for me. There's no plugin for PortHole but it can be controlled vic simple 3 line Apple scripts to connect to speakers, etc. Right now this seems like the best workaround until the Indigo boys and Rogue Ameba get things figured out with Airfoil.

Best

H

[jay (support)]

Unfortunately, there's nothing we (Indigo Domotics) can do. As the Airfoil support guy states in the quote above, it's their problem to solve.

I hear ya Jay and didn't mean to imply any lack of effort on your part. It's odd because they are claiming Mavericks support on their site and the update they pushed this week is still exhibiting the problem. PortHole IS working fine. It doesn't have the great integration with Indigo that Airfoil does but it's highly scriptable and they give great examples on their site.

Best

H

[jay (support)]

Some good news: I got a prerelease version of Airfoil 4.8.9 from Rogue Amoeba that seems to to work in my cursory testing. I don't know what their ETA is on the actual release, but it's a step in the right direction. Their current solution is to target the process that generates the speech (which is a bit cumbersome) but not also that the System Audio source now works - so if you're redirecting all of your Mac's sound to Airfoil then TTS seems to work fine (this is how I do it since my Mac is dedicated to Indigo/iTunes/etc). I don't know if this will be their final solution but in any event it's at least workable.

To summarize, current release versions of Airfoil don't work on Mavericks (and, presumably, Yosemite) when trying to play text-to-speech from any application. Apple changed how that audio is generated (moved it to a separate app rather than having it generated inside the app calling for it) and Airfoil doesn't know how to deal with it (even when using System Audio as the source). It looks like 4.8.9 may solve that issue so keep a watch for it.

I have been using Indigo (Trial version) for the past month, and I am very happy with everything thus far. The last big thing I wanted to test before buying is the voice over speakers. It would be nice to get an announcement if someone pulls into my driveway (as an example). I invested time today with Airfoil, but it just doesn't seem to work. Spotify and apps similar to it work fine with Airfoil. I had the voice from Indigo working once when I set the source to "System Audio", but it quit working after a few seconds.

The last post in this thread was about a year ago. Does Airfoil still not work with Indigo? If not, what options are other people using to do voice announcements? Thanks for any help. The version of Airfoil I've tested is 4.8.14. My Mac version is 10.10.4.

AirFoil (latest version) is working fine with Indigo latest version (I have not tried with the previous version).
I am using for radio/itunes and so on

Use AirFoil daily with Indigo; yes it definitely works.


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[jay (support)]

You must select the following App as the source in Airfoil:

Code: Select all

/Library/Application Support/Perceptive Automation/Indigo 6/IndigoServer.app

My guess is you're selecting the client (Applications/Indigo 6) which won't work because the server is generating the speech.

[UPDATE] In newer OS releases, you must select com.apple.speech.speechsysthesisd as the source for any text that the Indigo Server speaking to be directed by Airfoil. Apple changed the way speech is rendered so that it's all actually spoken by the above process rather than the actual app requesting it.

It is encouraging to hear that it seems to work. I did make sure that I'm selecting the Airfoil source as "Indigo Server" at the path you supplied. Maybe I'm not executing Airfoil correctly.

What I did is make sure Airfoil plugin is enabled. I then created a trigger for when a certain light is turned on. I created an "Action" for the Airfoil to connect to speakers. I typed in a few words in the Speak box at the bottom of the Action page.

When I turn on that light, the words in the Speak box play on my Mac. However, nothing gets played through Airfoil. Is there something else I need to do that I'm not doing?

[jay (support)]

You may need to delay the speaking because it takes a few seconds for airfoil to connect to a new source and/or a new speaker - it's definitely not instantaneous. So, one action to connect, a second action with the speech with a delay of maybe 2 seconds (you may need to try several options to find the one that works best for you). If you're leaving Airfoil connected to your Indigo Server as it's source and whatever speakers you're using, then you don't really need the connect step (and therefore no delay).

Jay, I'm still not having any luck. I connected to the Apple TV using Airfoil, so I removed the action in Indigo to connect to the speakers. Now, I just have a test word in the Speak box. It plays fine on the local machine (Mac), but it does not play on the Apple TV. I tried using delays up to 10 seconds also. I did verify that Airfoil works fine by switching the source to Spotify or System Audio. When I do System Audio, it works but the music playing locally is playing also. Therefore, I don't won't to use System Audio.

Could it have something to do with me having Apple TV (3rd generation)?
I'm using:
Mac OS 10.10.4
Airfoil plugin 1.1.9
Airfoil 4.8.14

[jay (support)]

How are you testing? If you're testing using the Test button on the actions edit page, then it won't work. The client performs the test speech when you click that button, not the server app. When testing, you must force the server to perform the speech - so select the trigger in the Triggers list and click the Execute Actions Now button. That will cause the server to execute the actions including the speech.

I have a trigger for when a light becomes "on". The action for the trigger is the text "Hello World". When I test, I turn the light on. Have you tested with the same software versions as mine?