After so many years, there still is no solution to this problem online. So, I had to try to fix it on my own. Two things worked for me: 1. Manually delete all stuff related to BattleNet from my computer (registry and disk) then try to reinstall: Full of wisdom, Blizzard spreads its crap all […]
Solution to Battle.Net installer stuck to 45% Read More »
Environment variables are strings defined by the IDE. Each environment variable serves a specific purpose. Some of them are fixed, others are changed dynamically depending on what/how you are compiling your project. For example, they provide dynamic paths that influence where files are stored, define default locations for binaries, define how projects are built, and
Environment variables and macros in Delphi Read More »
For any debugging issue, make sure that the program is compiled under the “Debug” configuration, and that the “Debug” configuration is properly set, as explained in the “Debugger” chapter in my books. Don’t forget to build (instead of compile) after changing any project settings! Also, don’t put yourself in a dreadful situation by using 3rd
Breakpoints – Issues during debugging Read More »
Breakpoints A breakpoint tells the debugger to pause the program’s execution at the location (line of code) where the breakpoint is. We can set source breakpoints in the Code Editor before we run the program, but also while the program is already running. The places where we can place breakpoints are marked by a blue
Delphi breakpoints Read More »
I am still amazed to see how many (even seasoned) Delphi programmer don’t understand exceptions. This post starts from a nice video posted by the Silver Coder. He states that exceptions are not the best idea and the reason mentioned in the short video is that try/except makes the code slow and difficult to read.
Too many programmers don’t understand exceptions. Do you? Read More »
Note: This article is tightly connected to the “Never create a new Delphi project” article. These are my settings for each new project I start and the explanation why they are set like this. Also, I will try to convince you to use Assertions. They are a gemstone ignored by (way too) many
How to correctly set the compiler options Read More »
Note: This article is tightly connected to the “How to correctly set the compiler options” article. Somebody asked how to set the default project options for a new Delphi project. I stopped years ago wasting time with this. Instead I have a folder where I store a “template” project. You can find this Delphi
Never create a new Delphi project – Use templates instead! Read More »
I needed to open PDF files in Delphi. There seems to be a lot of libraries out there, but when my restrictions (read PDF, native Delphi code, cross-platform, acceptable price) started to kick in I realized that there are not so many options. I created therefore this Delphi PDF library comparison table to help me
PDF libraries for Delphi – Roundup Read More »
Note: This page is an excerpt from my “Delphi in all its glory – Libraries” book. $(Auto) is a new environment variable, introduced in Delphi 10.4. Embarcadero didn’t make a big show around it so it went unnoticed by most programmers. But don’t ignore it! It is extremely useful for packages, where it can
$(Auto) – One package to rule them all Read More »
12 years ago I built a PC that worked for… 12 years. The mainboard died recently so I have to build a new one. So, I started to document myself. CPU I am interested in single-core high-frequency CPU because I will use the PC mostly to compile Delphi code. I have found some charts that
Godzilla II – Building a new PC Read More »
Today I ran a test to see which is the best way to compress Delphi projects for backup/archive purposes. The contestants are Zip, WinRAR (v7.01) and 7Zip (v24.08). I expected WinRar to be the winner in all cases (as usual) but for plain text files (PAS), the results were surprising. 7Zip won! TEXT COMPRESSION Original
Best compressor for archiving Delphi code Read More »
I am happy yo announce that all books in the “Delphi in all its glory” series will be available in electronic format. They will be delivered not a PDF but under my own reader (exe file) called Orinoco eReader. Advantages You can read the book from you computer. Smaller price Fair price – With the
Get “Delphi in all its glory” as eBook Read More »
My Experience with Cursor: The Promise and the Reality This week, I had the opportunity (or perhaps the misfortune?) to try out Cursor, a new tool that promises to enhance productivity for programmers. As someone who primarily works in Delphi, I was curious to see how it would stack up. Cursor is an AI-powered
AI plugins for Delphi (a sad story) Read More »
The Delphi in all its glory book shows that at design time the IDE is the host of all visual components on our forms. If a single control misbehaves at design time it might take down the whole IDE. In most cases this happens while we drag and drop such components from Components Palette on
How to debug your VCL components Read More »
“Delphi in all its glory – Delphi for more than mere programmers” (ISBN:9798387412141) was released on time (March 2023) as promised. This is the first book in the series. You can find the printed book on your local Amazon (Amazon.com, Amazon.de, etc) or in electronic format. The source code for the example used in the
News: The “Delphi in all its glory [Part 1]” book Read More »
SetFocus is broken in Delphi. Has been since v1 and there are no signs that it will be fixed soon. What does it mean, broken? Do I really have to explain it? We all know. Try to set focus on a visual control that is disabled or is invisible or simply is not focusable, and
SetFocus is broken in Delphi Read More »
Two weeks ago, a buggy project landed in my hands, to repair. The bug report was really unclear – it was just stated a piece of code that was supposed to upload some Json files to the Azure cloud was not working on some PCs. The code was something like this – well actually was
When company does not want to spend money for training… they spend more on bug fixing Read More »
I worked in a large project that had lots of frames and lots of dynamically created controls. When the software was running was difficult to figure out which control is which and were is created. So, I wrote this tiny piece of code that tells you which control is under the mouse. I was showing
Mouse Digger – Show control under cursor Read More »
We all created at one point some small utility to do some dirty job for us. It started as a 100 liner then became bigger and bigger. And then we decided to publish it so the whole world can enjoy it. And this is when disaster hits: the users start to ask more and more
One function to rule them all – Saving the whole GUI one single procedure call Read More »
01.2023 Some of my programs need to run as single instance. This means that if an instance of my program is already running and the user is trying to start another instance, the second instance should not run. However, before closing the second instance, I want to pass the command line parameters from that second
Somebody asked me: can you tell if the machine on which you are running is a virtual machine installed secretly by some malware/hacker? I thought about that question and the answer is SURE. Without any doubt. A virtual machine will consume some resources by itself (quite a lot). If you observe these missing resources you
KSDev released this year CrossVCL – a framework that allows you to build multi-platform applications. What is the difference between Firemonkey and CrossVCL? If you want to make your current app multi platform, you need to port it to Firemonkey. With CrossVCL you don’t need anything!!! They really upgraded Delphi/C++ programming to a brand new
KSDev CrossVCL – A framework that allows you to build multi-platform applications. Read More »
List of IDE features that are cool Search backwards – Ctrl+F to do a search in your code. F3 to go to the next position Shift+F3 to go to previous position. Move/Relocate/Rename project’s files directly from Project Manager Navigate to recently modified code – Ctrl+Shift+F7 and Ctrl+Shift+F8 Search for usage – Right click a variable
Cool new features and functions in Delphi Read More »
0) ALLOW LESS SECURE APPS: Login to gmail using your browser, switch to your google account (top-right round button), go to Sign-in & Security>Connected apps & sites, scroll down until reach Allow less secure apps:OFF and turn it ON (if it’s already on, leave as it is); 1) DELETE OLD GMAIL PASSWORD: Launch Thunderbird, select
Thunderbird cannot connect to gmail after changing password [FIXED] Read More »
Most of my Delphi programs are flagged as virus by some antivirus programs. Some of these antivirus programs are really cheap/under-the-table products (such as Baidu and Comodo) other are big (TOP) name like Kaspersky. In theory you should report a false positive to the antivirus producers so they can fix their bug but if the
Delphi programs have too many false positive detections Read More »
Email sender settings in EurekaLog v7 SMTP Server [1] Simple MAPI MAPI Shell (MailTo) SMTP client [3] Can attach the ELP file Yes Yes [2] Yes [2] No Yes See sender’s email No [4] Yes Yes Yes No Email client software* Not required Required Required Required Not required Chance of success Highest chance among all
How to configure EurekaLog to send bugs via email Read More »
I wanted to send an email (“Send via SMTP client”) from EurekaLog v7.4.8.0 RC 1 but I was getting this error: FAILED: Error code = -2146885613 The revocation function was unable to check revocation because the revocation server was offline EurekaLog 7.4.8.0 RC 1 Testing send with TELMailSMTPClientSender Options: _BugAppVersion=”21.0.17707.5020″ _BugID=”73D40000″ _BugIDSource=”bds.exe My email is
Another bug in EurekaLog 7 Read More »
Total Commander (aka Windows Commander) is the ultimate file manager for Windows (and recently for Android too). Who can use it? The regular Windows user that used all his life Windows Explorer will find Total Commander interface AT LEAST awkward. The interface concept and user experience is totally different in Total Commander. This doesn’t mean
Total Commander – the ultimate file manager for Windows (and recently for Android too) Read More »
Delphi is still in Top 20… but barely.
Delphi is still in Top 20 Read More »
A computer code that is supposed to be able to infect DNA was found. The corresponding article posted ~2.5 years, and some c++ codes. Citation: The computer code, written in C++, hosts the DNA sequence of M.mycoides JCVI-syn1.0. At runtime it acts as follows: 1) Preparing the DNA sequence of M.mycoides JCVI-syn1.0 in the memory,
Computer Virus that infects real-world DNA? Read More »
