If you place the cursor on an identifier (variable/function name/etc), CnPack will show you where that identifier is used in your code. Look for example how easy is to spot where the FBuffPos variable is used in the code below: Also, see how “dangerous” instructions (“Exit”) have been marked in blue! Note: On your Delphi […]
How to highlight identifier under cursor in (any) Delphi IDE Read More »
Here is the trick: Go to Preferences->Multi-instances->Default (mono-instance). Close notepad++ Go to “c:\Program Files\Notepad++” and create there an empty file called “asNotepad.xml” (of course, you will need Admin privileges for that). Result: When you double click a TXT file in Explorer, Notepad++ will open and show that new document in its own window/tab.
How to make NotePad++ open each document in its own tab? Read More »
I’ve seen this trend where AI lacks (compared with other languages) when you try to use it for Delphi (VCL). Probably not their fault. Probably because of lack of code on GitHub…. 😞 Initially, I thought it was only an impression, but later tests (for example, generating a full program with Replit in Delphi and
Is it time to ditch the VCL? Read More »
I was looking for a collapsible panel for many years.The most important feature I want from this control is to be able to collapse vertically. Here are the results of my research: FoldingPanel (VCL) I used FoldingPanel v1.3 http://www.torry.net/authorsmore.php?id=2386 for years. It comes with nice chevron bitmap too. Advantage: The component comes as a
A vertically collapsible panel for Delphi (round up) Read More »
Delphi is great for RAD. We all love Delphi, even when we are mad at it. In my opinion Delphi has 3 issues that Embarcadero has to fix in order to make Delphi more attractive. 1. It has ACTIVELY work to bring new Delphi programmers. 2. Solve the problems with the IDE stability 3. Has
A bunch of surveys for Delphi users Read More »
I haven’t nailed down a favorite AI yet. Copilot’s at the bottom of my list—it churns out the worst Delphi code and gives answers so short they’re borderline useless. Grok’s been the frontrunner so far, based on my own tinkering. I had subscriptions to Google’s AI and to ChatGPT and Copilot. In some video presentations
Best uses of AI for Delphi programmers Read More »
Locating BPL dependency failure In one instance my package required another package, but its BPL was not present. The error I got was “Can’t load package xyz.bpl. %1 is not a valid Win32 application”. I used the Dependency scanner feature from ‘PE Explorer’ ( www.heaventools.de ) to detect this. There was supposed to be
Can’t load package xyz.bpl. %1 is not a valid Win32 application – BPL dependency failure Read More »
Recently, I came across a forum where somebody described FreeAndNil as an “abomination” and I think that’s a bit over the top. Let’s unpack this topic ca refully, with technical clarity and an eye for proportion. FreeAndNil(SomeObject) is just syntactic sugar for: if SomeObject <> nil then begin SomeObject.Free; SomeObject := nil; end; The actual
Again on FreeAndNil – A meaningless debate? Read More »
I was undecided if I should attend to this conference or not because I didn’t had enough information about the previous one. So, here is my 2.5 cents. A Journey by Bicycle Setting off in early June from Denmark on two wheels, I pedaled a few hundred km for the Delphi summit.The northern weather delivered
Amsterdam Delphi Summit 2025 (A call to arms for bringing in “fresh blood”) Read More »
Alt+T, E is all you need to press when the LSP stops working in Delphi. Delphi 12.3 introduced a new menu under Tools -> Reload LSP server. Alt+T, E is it keyboard accelerator. It will require under a second for LSP to restart. However, the menu will not be available to be reused for quite
Delphi LSP stopped working? Fix it with 2 key strokes. Read More »
In FMX, unlike the VCL, the Visible property affects both design time and runtime when set in the Object Inspector. That’s why setting Visible:= False in FMX hides components in the Form Designer, which is a big inconvenience. If you edit the form at design time often, you can keep Visible:= True in the designer
Under FMX, TComponent.Visible effects also the design time! Read More »
VCL had a nice and uniform message box system. Most important (and convenient), the messages were blocking. Because of the Android platform which does not support asynchronous messages, all this is gone. So I document here the behavior of few different ways in which we can display message boxes in FMX. None is perfect (not
(Issues with) Dialog boxes under cross-platform Read More »
Generate your key here https://aistudio.google.com/app/apikey and enter it into the IDE. As URL enter: https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1 Parameters Top-P [official documentation] Top-P changes how the model selects tokens for output. Tokens are selected from the most (see top-K) to least probable until the sum of their probabilities equals the top-P value. For example, if tokens A,
Connecting Delphi 12 to Gemini AI Read More »
Delphi Athene – Release 1 (12.1) Support for split editor views in the IDE. Use multiple editors side by side, above and below each other, or a mix, all in the same window. Right-clicking a tab and choose Split or Move. Split will create another version of the selected tab, while move will close the
New in Delphi Athene 12.1, 12.2, 12.3 Read More »
IDE Removed deprecated features: VCL Translation Support & Modeling Object Inspector – New string list editor Multiline string Editor Multiline string literals The Find in Files dialog now has a new Subdirectory exclude mask option, which excludes specific folders from being searched when using the Search in directories and Include subdirectories There are default exclusions
New in Delphi Athene (12.0) Read More »
10.4 Styles are finally working! Better support for high DPI monitors. High DPI support in styles (skins) Per Control Styling Better cross platform support Custom managed records – records now support custom initialization, finalization, and copy operations. Developers can customize how records get created, copied, and destroyed, by writing the code to be executed at
New in Delphi Sydney (10.4) Read More »
Dark-light themes for IDE The IDE includes some of Andreas Hausladen’s “IDE Fix Pack” fixes and improvements (FINALLY!) High resolution timer caused by using Virtual Treeview. Findhinstance optimisations. Debugger using CREATE_DEFAULT_ERROR_MODE when creating the process. Tstringlist indexof and Name optimizations. High DPI Image List Support. Can fully support multi-resolution, pixel perfect images on all controls,
New in Delphi Rio (10.3) Read More »
New custom VCL controls corresponding to some new Windows 10 UI controls, which can also be used on previous version of Windows. New VCL controls: TActivityindicator, TSearchbox, TRelativePanel, TToggleSwitch, TSplitview Modern looking SelectDirectory function Support for Windows 10 Notifications using the notificationcenter component Box2D physics engine. Object Pascal interfaces for the Box2D physics engine Support
New in Delphi Seattle (10.0) Read More »
GetLinesEnumerator – New enumerators for reading file content Returns the line-by-line enumerator without loading full file content into the memory. Memory Efficiency: TFile.GetLinesEnumerator reads the file line by line, which is memory-efficient for large files. Unlike TFile.ReadLines (which loads all lines into a list), this method streams the file incrementally. I test it with both
New in Delphi 12 – GetLinesEnumerator for reading text files line by line Read More »
Stack Overflow However, Stack Overflow has a very tough community. It can be quite challenging to post a question there AND get a decent answer and you could easily feel bullied there. The Stack Overflow lords know about it, and they tried to fix it with stricter rules about how people SHOULD behave, but they
Stack Overflow is of the past, Enter AI Read More »
This post is not about databases but against data bases. If you are a big fan of DB, don’t be sad. Maybe you will get a new insight into a different mindset and you will migrate some of your programs that are slowed down by databases to objects and binary files. I will not discuss
Databases – A change in the philosophy Read More »
While trying to communicate with my HTTPS server, I encountered a problem when CDN (Cloudflare) was active. Exception class EIdOSSLUnderlyingCryptoError with message ‘Error connecting with SSL. error:14094438:SSL routines:ssl3_read_bytes:tlsv1 alert internal error’. error:14077438:SSL routines:SSL23_GET_SERVER_HELLO:tlsv1 alert internal error’. I switched to TNetHTTPClient and it worked. Here is the code: // TNetHTTPClient. function GetToken(CONST URL: string; StatusInfo: TCallbackEvent
Serialization is a critical technique in programming, enabling objects to be saved to disk or transmitted over a network. While there’s no universal, automatic way to serialize complex objects in Delphi (due to challenges like private fields), manual serialization is straightforward—and binary serialization, in particular, stands out as the fastest and most efficient method. In
Saving an object to disk/file Read More »
This is a review of some of the free AI image generator that come on top of Google search. The prompt was something like: “A cyber queen in a dystopian palace, in a ceremony, surrounded by organic tall elegant alien creatures. Cyber-futuristic”. Let me know if you know better free generators. Freepik Stars: 4.6
Review of free AI image generators Read More »
Do You Have Legacy Delphi Code? I Can Modernize It! Are you still working with old Delphi codebases using AnsiStrings, raw pointers in arrays, TStringList misusage, hardcoded typecasts, goto, blocking timers, Application.ProcessMessages, or excessive global variables? Would you like to upgrade it to modern coding standards, ensuring compatibility with Delphi 11.3 and 64-bit environments? I
I refactor your old code for free! Read More »
After a conversation about the low popularity of the Delphi language—further worsened by the lack of libraries for Delphi—I decided to share my odyssey in the world of bioinformatics, using Delphi as my primary development tool. My toy tool that turned into a commercial product Back in 2007, I wrote a small tool for
My odyssey in the world of bioinformatics, with Delphi Read More »
Even though there are a few tools for porting a project from the VCL (Visual Component Library) to FMX (FireMonkey) the process is not easy especially because not all VCL components have direct FMX equivalents. Some components require substitution, and some functionality must be reimplemented. The problem deepens with 3rd party VCL components. Tools for
Converting VCL code to FMX Read More »
After installing FMX and using it for a while I started getting a weird “ld.exe cannot find shlwapi.dll” message. There was nothing like this to be found on the internet! I posted a question of StackOverflow but people started to point in (as later turned out to be) totally wrong directions. The complete error msg
Delphi Firemonkey – ld.exe cannot find shlwapi.dll: No such file or directory Read More »
You can publish your application on your website. However, the Microsoft Smart Screen will not like it at all if the application is not signed. This is how your application looks like when it is singed and un-signed: Signing your application could cost as much as $800 per year, but if you do some research,
Obtaining cheap EV/OV certificates & singing your application Read More »
This is a chapter from “Delphi in all its glory” book. Preparing for cross-platform An SDK is required for the following platforms: Multi-device applications for the iOS Device – 64-bit platform. Multi-device applications for the Android platform. Multi-device applications for the Linux platform. If you haven’t chouse to install them during Delphi setup, you need
Cross-platform development with Firemonkey – Tool-chain setup Read More »
