The Native Companion
eXLib ships with a required native companion — a read-only AEGP plugin — that services composition reading from After Effects' idle hook. It's a mandatory part of the install: the panel's launch gate checks for it.
Why there is a native companion
The native companion keeps the pickwhip, property inspection, and the status bar's comp/layer readouts instant, even on comps with hundreds of layers or thousands of properties.
It also powers:
- Comp hierarchy snapshot — a fast native walk of the layer → property-group → property tree, feeding comp-aware completions and the pickwhip tree even on very large rigs.
- Change detection — editing directly in AE (renaming a layer, adding an effect) keeps eXLib in sync with no manual refresh.
- Bulk value read — one bounded pass samples up to 4,000 eligible 1D/2D/3D/color leaves for at most two seconds at the comp's current time. Properties beyond that budget remain usable in the tree but may not show an inline value from that pass.
- Selection tracking — feeds the status bar's active-comp and selected-layer readouts.
Installing it
The panel blocks its own interface until the companion is installed and paired, so on first launch you get a full-panel screen instead of the editor. Its title names the step you're on:
| Screen | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Checking for the After Effects companion… | eXLib is probing for the plugin. | Wait — After Effects is given about 15 seconds at startup to load it. |
| eXLib companion required | The plugin isn't installed. | Click Install companion, approve the administrator prompt, then relaunch After Effects. |
| Companion update required | An older companion is installed and can't exchange data with this panel build. | Click Update companion, then relaunch After Effects. |
| Relaunch After Effects | The companion is installed and current, but this AE session started before it. | Quit and reopen After Effects. |
| Companion could not be verified | eXLib couldn't confirm the companion is running — usually AE is still starting or busy. | Wait, then click Check again. |
| Companion unavailable | This eXLib package contains no companion for your platform. | Reinstall eXLib from a package built for your platform. |
Every blocked screen carries a Check again button, and — where an install action applies — a Manual install block showing the source and destination paths, in case you'd rather copy the plugin yourself.
Installing is three steps: click Install companion, approve the administrator prompt
(the copy goes into After Effects' Plug-ins folder, which needs elevation — you're asked
once), then relaunch After Effects. If the copy can't be verified afterwards, the
installer puts the previous file back rather than leaving a partial install. The install
never modifies eXLib itself.
These screenshots were captured in an earlier beta. Toolbar and Library layouts have since changed; the written instructions on this page describe v0.145.4. See A Tour of the Panel for the current controls.
Reading the status card
You can check or reinstall the companion later from Settings → Companion, where a card headed Native accelerator shows a state dot and a message such as "Native accelerator is active." Its buttons are Install — or Update when a newer bundled version is available — and Refresh. A note under them states what Install does: it copies the bundled plugin into After Effects and asks once for administrator approval.
The card offers exactly one decision at a time, and says which one:
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Not installed | The plugin hasn't been copied into AE's plug-ins folder yet. |
| Installing | The elevated copy is in progress. |
| Active | Paired and working — the card names the version it's talking to. |
| Update available | A newer companion ships with this panel build. Update installs it. |
| Restart After Effects | The right companion is already on disk; AE just hasn't loaded it yet. There's nothing to install. |
Once paired, eXLib stays open. If the companion stops responding mid-session the panel doesn't re-block you — the features that depend on it go quiet instead. If the comp and layer readouts disappear, come here and click Refresh.
The macOS Accessibility permission
The first time you use a reveal gesture — double-clicking a row in Comp Expressions, the pin chip's open-comp button, and similar "jump to the property" actions — macOS may ask you to allow After Effects under System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility.
This is expected. When After Effects doesn't expose a menu command for the reveal, the companion finishes the jump by synthesizing the same SS keystroke you'd press yourself, and macOS requires the Accessibility permission for synthesized keystrokes.
Grant the permission once for After Effects (not eXLib), and every reveal gesture works from then on.
Until it's granted, reveals still select the property in AE and a toast tells you to press SS yourself — the last step is just manual.
If it stops responding mid-session
You can't skip installing the companion — the launch gate described above blocks eXLib's interface entirely until it's paired, so there's no way to open the panel without it. What can happen is a paired companion going quiet mid-session (AE is busy, the plugin crashed). eXLib does not re-block you when that happens: the three heavy reads — comp hierarchy, bulk value read, and change detection — return a soft "companion required" message and go quiet, while the light selected-property read keeps working regardless, so your property chip and Apply target are unaffected. Open Settings → Companion and click Refresh to recover.