Delphi Port

[benibela]

Delphi Port

[benibela]

I plan to do that some time, but I do not have a recent Delphi version and at the moment I'm too busy (moving, starting my PHD, need to add xml schema and XQuery 3 ...).

And which Delphi version? I used to port all my projects to Delphi 4, but I use some new fpc features (like += instead of inc) which it does not have, so it will be quite annoying for such a big project.

I also thought about a kickstarter project, but it is probably not popular enough for that.

[dodenko]

It can be Delphi 7 and I can convert it to XE4 :)

I can do it already however I need to know some of the equivalents FPC -> Delphi

Like Delphi doesn't have CompareByte, SwapEndian etc.

The only big thing to port is the bbutils.pas the rest will be easy.

[benibela]

It can be Delphi 7 and I can convert it to XE4 :)

I think it would be easier to port it to a newer version

Although I only have Linux, do not know if the newer versions run in WINE

Does Delphi have exit(value) as shortcut for result := value; exit; ?

Like Delphi doesn't have CompareByte, SwapEndian etc.

CompareByte compares the bytes of the pchars, i.e.

for i := 0 to l - 1 do begin
   if p1^ <> p2^ then 
      if p1^ < p2^ then exit(-1);` 
      else exit(1);
   inc(p1); inc(p2);
end;
result := 0;

SwapEndian is only used for my own UTF16LE <-> UTF16BE conversion, which is probably not needed for Delphi, because Delphi has its own string conversion functions.

The only big thing to port is the bbutils.pas the rest will be easy.

I though bbutils would be the easier part, because it just has many independent little functions

[dodenko]

Yes XE4 has exit(true/false) or exit('not done); etc

No need for WINE .. VirtualBox + Delphi + Windowless

[dodenko]

Can you convert the bbutils? I will convert the rest.. Also XE4 works on wine..

Make a another folder for Delphi here on github :)

[benibela]

Can you convert the bbutils?

Later.

Currently I'm writing a little arbitrary precision math library, because xs:decimal and xs:integer are supposed to be able to have an infinite value range and they do not have that yet in my implementation. (decimal maps to extended (especially bad because fpc has a lot of bugs in its floattostr function), and integer to a 65-bit integer)

Make a another folder for Delphi here on github :)

I usually prefer defines in the source.

[dodenko]

How is the port coming along?

[benibela]

Oh, I did not start yet.

I was moving to another city for my PHD, had trouble finding an apartment and was almost homeless without internet access for the last 2 months..
And I stored all my stuff with my mother for that time, and she was supposed to bring it now, but she did bring my Delphi CD.(I explicitely asked for it, but she did not find it :( )

But the arbitrary precision math library is finished.

[dodenko]

I hope you port it ! It is a fantastic library ! GOLDEN !

[benibela]

I have changed the bbutils to compile and run with Delphi 4.

Porting the other stuff might be more complicated (advanced records and overloaded operators definitely do not work with Delphi 4)

[lovethisgame]

cannot compile under delphi berlin.
How can i port it to delphi berlin?
Sometimes I got the error "[dcc32 Error] bbutils.pas(726): [dcc32 Error] bbutils.pas(2437): E2251 Ambiguous overloaded call to 'StrLComp'".
Thank you.

[benibela]

A while ago I tried it on Delphi 4 again. Check out eff65eb

[SergeyPyankov]

I wrote an article in Russian that describes how to use InternetTools in Delphi without porting.

[Bi0T1N]

For successful compiling of internettools in Delphi, in a first step all += need to be replaced by inc() as Delphi does not support += at all. Using exit() with a parameter is supported since Delphi 2009.
Due to the new free Delphi Community Edition it would make most sense to port it to this version first (it's even the newest). Maybe it's enough/easier to port the parsers/interpreters only.

[benibela]

It might have become even less Delphi compatible now that I use more newer fpc features. Or old ones, object has turned out to be much nicer than record or class.

Due to the new free Delphi Community Edition it would make most sense to port it to this version first (it's even the newest)

Let's see if there still is a Community Edition in a few years.

Maybe it's enough/easier to port the parsers/interpreters only.

The interpreter depends on everything else. It is the final piece that puts it all together. The parsers are so old now, they probably are more in need of a rewrite than a port

@SergeyPyankov : Cool, I never thought of using interfaces that way.

[ange007]

Are there any plans for the automatic generation of DLL from the article in Russian - when updating the library?

For Delphi, there is still no normal library for parsing :(

[benibela]

Are there any plans for the automatic generation of DLL from the article in Russian - when updating the library?

Not really

There are some issues:

• A COM interface is very Windows centric. A DLL with a pure procedural wrapper would be better, since it could be used on any platform and with any language.

• Creating a new COM interface wrapper is pointless. Almost all my data structures already implement an interface (to get automated reference counting). That probably could be exported directly to Delphi by adding a GUID to the interface declaration, although some functions need types that are not exportable that way. (however, I would like to stop using interfaces internally, because they are unnecessarly slow)

• I do not use Delphi anymore, so I cannot test it

Delph is not really popular anymore, so I am also thinking about converting everything to Kotlin or Rust