[Openal] no context open on non-dev computers

[Garin Hiebert]

>
>> I believe you'll need wrap_oal.dll (in the system32 directory) as well
>> (OpenAL32.dll is the router... it decides which back-end to use).
>> wrap_oal.dll is the DirectX wrapper for OpenAL.  If you don't use the
>> run-time installer though, it will be more difficult to support native
>> OAL drivers...

As it works out, if you include openal32.dll and wrap_oal.dll in your 
application's directory, you'll still get native device support as 
well.  The router (openal32.dll) will use the local version of the 
wrapper (wrap_oal.dll) to support the "Generic Hardware" and "Generic 
Software" devices, but will then go off and look in the system directory 
for native libraries as well.

The main downside of an app-local router is that any router improvements 
which occur after the version included with your app won't be available 
to your app.  At this point, that's probably a minor concern, as long as 
your app isn't running under Vista.  If your app is going to be run 
under Vista, then do make sure it ships with the router currently in SVN 
or (even better) the next packaged release version -- there are various 
Vista-related changes are currently under test...  The next packaged 
binary release should be out around the end of the month, maybe sooner...

Three related articles which may be of interest:

Enumeration With OpenAL Under Windows -- 
http://www.openal.org/windows_enumeration.html
OpenAL Installer Options -- http://www.openal.org/win_inst.html
OpenAL and Windows Vista -- http://www.openal.org/openal_vista.html

Garin