25 replies to this topic

[pscEx]

There are some bugreports about display failures in other desktop themes than "Windows Classic"

Especially under Win7 there are strange results. WinBuilder running on a Vista host seems to run fine.

That is caused by the fact that Delphi (not WinBuilder!) cannot handle some situations which came up after the release of the used Delphi version.

When you have troubles with the WinBuilder appearance under Win7, you have to check in WinBuilder.exe's properties / compatibility tab "Disable visual themes"

Peter

[paraglider]

Have you considered porting to Lazarus Pascal:

http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org/

You would get a 64 bit compiler then.

[sbaeder]

There are some bugreports about display failures in other desktop themes than "Windows Classic"

Especially under Win7 there are strange results. WinBuilder running on a Vista host seems to run fine.

That is caused by the fact that Delphi (not WinBuilder!) cannot handle some situations which came up after the release of the used Delphi version.

When you have troubles with the WinBuilder appearance under Win7, you have to check in WinBuilder.exe's properties / compatibility tab "Disable visual themes"

Peter

Can you be more "specific"? I have seen a lot of cases where the font scaling causes some of the text to be clipped. Is this the kind of thing you mean? Or is it something else? Can we document this with a picture of a failure?

Thanks!
Scott

[homes32]

Can you be more "specific"? I have seen a lot of cases where the font scaling causes some of the text to be clipped. Is this the kind of thing you mean? Or is it something else? Can we document this with a picture of a failure?

Thanks!
Scott

its mainly an issue with things "disappearing"

how about a practical example:

open the script interface editor and look down in the bottom left where the tooltip input box is
now switch to "classic theme" and look again.



this type of issue have plagued WB as long as I can remember. PSC usually fixes right away when pointed out but as he only uses Classic Theme sometimes they get overlooked.

[pscEx]

Can you be more "specific"? I have seen a lot of cases where the font scaling causes some of the text to be clipped. Is this the kind of thing you mean? Or is it something else? Can we document this with a picture of a failure?

Wrong clippinmg is not the main issue I'm thinking on.
The main issues are described in pecd's bug reports in the "Test WinBuilder 082" topic.

Peter

[sbaeder]

thanks Homes32 and PSC...I have seen this a bit, but didn't need to switch back to classic to make them show up...I think it was a layering thing, but can't remember...

Just to be complete, here is direct link to the comments made in that other thread...(assume this is the #1 issue under interface).

[pscEx]

@homes32!

Your example of missing "ToolTip" is a very good example for my suggestion.

When in a win7 host with (standard implemented) theme, you do my "Disable visual themes" suggestion, you see the "Tooltip" line.

Has somebody an idea, how I can programmatically execute the "Disable visual themes" line?

Peter

EDIT: BTW: Besides others I mailed to pecd some hours / days ago:

Use Google with "Delphi TCheckBox Win7 problem"

[pscEx]

Just for the record: new results.

I tried The Vista ALT Fix.

It helps with disappearing check boxes on hit of ALT.

But it does not help on hidden "Tooltip" label reported by homes32.

Peter

[pecd.net]

I tried The Vista ALT Fix.
It helps with disappearing check boxes on hit of ALT.
But it does not help on hidden "Tooltip" label reported by homes32.

Well, it is called ALT Fix, so it does what it says:-)) Good to hear that you are making progress, thank you for you work and time!

[pscEx]

Well, it is called ALT Fix, so it does what it says:-)) Good to hear that you are making progress, thank you for you work and time!

Maybe I did not explain enough last post: That is not progress, I only did tests, and decided "Not to use the fix". It brings processing time of e.g. nativeEx_multiPE XP-Track from 5 min 30 sec to 6 min, and helps only partly. And who knows which new bugs would be introduced by such a fix ...

BTW: The hidden "Tooltip" APPEARS on the first ALT hit

I'm rather sure that not WinBuilder, but Billy the Door has a little problem here ...

Currently to avoid the issue, IMO there is only the "Disable visual themes" check I proposed in the first post.

Peter

[pecd.net]

I'm rather sure that not WinBuilder, but Billy the Door has a little problem here ...

not sure if always billy is to blame - well i think it is more a thing of the very old delphi (was it v7)? Or does WB build on newer editions?

Currently to avoid the issue, IMO there is only the "Disable visual themes" check I proposed in the first post.

oh man...that is bad news to me...

[pscEx]

not sure if always billy is to blame - well i think it is more a thing of the very old delphi (was it v7)? Or does WB build on newer editions?

Unfortunatelly I cannot find the 1000 € on the street to buy a newer license.

WinBuilder is the ONLY development I'm using Delphi for.

And as you know, it is FREEWARE. Development is made by volunteers, w/o asking for beeing payed.

For other things I use Billy's Visual Studio. Also some newer WinBuilder related apps like WimCaptEx are made with VS (Of course NOT with .NET)

Peter

[pecd.net]

Unfortunatelly I cannot find the 1000 € on the street to buy a newer license.

WinBuilder is the ONLY development I'm using Delphi for.

And as you know, it is FREEWARE. Development is made by volunteers, w/o asking for beeing payed.

For other things I use Billy's Visual Studio. Also some newer WinBuilder related apps like WimCaptEx are made with VS (Of course NOT with .NET)

Peter

Thanks for explaining...

Again my question: what is the current version of delphi used for WB and would it build on newer versions easily (and if so would this help with the problems?)

[pscEx]

Thanks for explaining...

Again my question: what is the current version of delphi used for WB and would it build on newer versions easily (and if so would this help with the problems?)

My current version is 7. And I do not have any opinion wheter a newer version would fix the issues. Maybe it is a delphi design issue, how the WinMessages are processed ... I cannot test.

Maybe here is somebody with Delphi 2010 or similar, and can write a small test app ...

Peter

[homes32]

My current version is 7. And I do not have any opinion wheter a newer version would fix the issues. Maybe it is a delphi design issue, how the WinMessages are processed ... I cannot test.

Maybe here is somebody with Delphi 2010 or similar, and can write a small test app ...

Peter

would porting to free pascal and using the Lazarus IDE like paraglider suggested work for a future version of winbuilder? or are you using Delphi specific functionality that won't port easily?

[paraglider]

Total Commander File Manager also written in Borland pascal is being ported to Lazarus Pascal mainly to get the 64 bit support.

Lazarus pascal is also free and supports platforms other than windows as well.

[Brito]

As much as it pains me to see, Lazarus is a bad option.

The compiler takes a long time to execute, the debugger is bad, the IDE has serious defects. Insisting to proceed on this road does not improve winbuilder on the long term.

The next generation of Winbuilder will use Java and give preference to a web based user interface as already depicted in Remedium.

This opens way for:
- neat UI customizations by project developers
- interaction with third-party programs
- moving to a development platform with a large support/improvement scale
- enjoy a large pool of components and code snippets made available
- go multi-platform (develop code non strictly for Windows machines as done in present)

As we speak, a significant part of the architecture and code base has already been implemented in Java and most of the results are satisfactory.

[paraglider]

Think most of don't care what language winbuilder is written in. However it must be no worse speedwise at executing scripts than the current 82 version with compatibility mode off.

[Brito]

It won't.

[paraglider]

When will we see a prototype - would not need to execute scripts - just a working user interface.

[Brito]

September.

[MedEvil]

OMG, Nuno. First a switch from Boot-Land.net to reboot.pro and now from Delphi to Java? You're just full of fantastic ideas!

[Brito]

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. If you didn't liked the shift to a new domain, I am sure that there will also exist people (myself included) who appreciate a simpler and shorter name without hyphens.

There were also more reasons to promote the shift of domain name, but I would appreciate if we could stick to discuss the current topic or at least open a new topic to debate if the domain name change was a "fantastic" idea or not..

As for the switch to Java, I always gave preference to Delphi Pascal above any other language/compiler due to its simplicity and efficiency in terms of produced binaries.

Right now I also measure other factors that are relevant to ensure quality in the future. You are welcome to keep on criticizing these choices, provided the fact that you will also admit being wrong in the future times if history proves a different outcome than the one you envision.

I will do the same and admit my mistakes in case these actions do not bring visible benefit to our community in future times.

Edited by Nuno Brito, 01 July 2011 - 02:19 PM.

[MedEvil]

The benefits of saved 2 letter and a hyphen is debateable, not just in typing speed but especialy since most, if not all, of the regulars will have it on speed dial anyways.

You are welcome to keep on criticizing these choices, provided the fact that you will also admit being wrong in the future times if history proves a different outcome than the one you envision.

No problem, just don't forget to tell me: "I told you so!" or i might miss it!

[Brito]

The benefits of saved 2 letter and a hyphen is debateable

Yes, it is debatable.

just don't forget to tell me: "I told you so!" or i might miss it!

Nahh.. I'd already be happy if some of these changes did worked out for the better.