I would like to Display a Scratch Project (.SB) file within my Delphi EXE file. I would like to know if it is possible to display and build the Scratch Project into your Delphi Project.
I wish to make a small game in Scratch and then use the game within my Delphi Application without the need of the Scratch IDE. Perhaps a 3rd party delphi tool or component or something that can help me achieve this would also be nice.
Is this possible?
How can this be done?
It's possible, like everything, but it's not been done AFAIK, which means it's going to be hard work.
You have a few choices:
Scratch is normally embedded within web sites as a Flash object. If
you can embed Flash media, that is a solution.
Some Scratch-inspired systems like BYOB export to exe. You could look into how they do that to use your project (Scratch and BYOB
are compatible enough to load your project and export it after
minor changes)
If you don't like these, then write your own Scratch interpreter for Delphi. Scratch sprites are objects, their behaviour is straightforward enough, the Scratch projects are easily parsed (it's XML), now - off you go!
I am assuming that you want to port a scratch program to .EXE.
If this is the case, then you can install BYOB.
After doing this, you can convert your scratch project to a BYOB project and load it into BYOB.
Then, go to Share->Compile this project, and it will generate a .EXE for you.
Related
I've got an .xnb file from a Windows Phone project made on Windows 7. I'd like to use the same asset in a Windows 8 Metro app. I've got MSVS 2012 RC on Windows 8 with a project from the MonoGameWindowsMetroApplication template. I put the .xnb file in the project Assets folder and tried to load it, but I get an exception telling me that the asset can't be loaded. What properties or configuration do I need to be able to use the .xnb file?
While MonoGame is working on the Content Pipeline piece of the framework, you can simply use the same Content Pipeline engine that you used for the Windows Phone 7 game to create a Content Pipeline and use the associated .xnb files in your Windows 8 XNA MonoGame project.
I have a blog tutorial series on building XNA games with MonoGame for Windows 8, and if you look at Part 3, I provide a step-by-stepy walkthrough of accomplishing this. My hands-on lab and information on my blog was reviewed and approved by the MonoGame team.
See info here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/tarawalker/archive/2013/01/04/windows-8-game-development-using-c-xna-and-monogame-3-0-building-a-shooter-game-walkthrough-part-3-updating-graphics-using-content-pipeline-with-monogame.aspx
The runtime Xna framework has many type reader objects that read the various xnb files. Some of the type readers are for xnb files that were processed from fbx models, others are xnb files processed from 2d image files, etc.
When you call content.Load<T>(xnb file name), The content manager uses the appropriate reader to read the byte information of the xnb file into the appropriate Xna class. The byte information in an xnb file is designed to be used in a specific Xna class, no other. There are no Xna classes in metro.
All this to say there are no type readers in the metro environment that read these xnb files. You would have to write your own. It's not that hard though, that's similar to what I did. I now process an fbx file into xnb by building an Xna project, then my xna project writes the runtime model's data to my own binary file, which I read from my metro app. But I could've simply read the xnb also. I just would have had to study the contentManager's & Model class' type readers to see how the byte info was distributed.
After all is said and done, it just means I don't have to learn the FBXSDK which would be the standard way (and arguably preferred way) of bringing in model info.
EDIT - sorry, didn't clue into the use of the mono framework. I don't know anything about that... Maybe they do have a way of importing xnb files.
Are you on the develop3D branch? I think you need to add a dummy Content project and add it to that project, not your assets, build that project first, then you need to reference that project in your MonoGame project.
I didn't succeed on that yesterday as I'm using the current stable but one of the MonoGame guys told me to do just that yesterday. Here are some instructions:
https://github.com/mono/MonoGame/wiki/MonoGame-Content-Processing
In MonoGame content pipeline is not present, at least as off now.
Its very easy.
1)Create a xna project in VS2010
2)add all your assets over there.
3)Rebuild your project. Go to bin/x86/debug/content and copy all contents from there
Now go to your VS2012 Mono Project bin/x86/debug look for content folder, if its there copy all content there else create a content folder and copy all content there.
Now without changing even single line of code just run your project and you will find everything working great!!!
Let me know if you find any difficulty doing that.
I have two PCs both with XE2. I thought that I had installed identically on both but have problems installing 3rd party packages on one while the other is just fine.
I want the same on both anyway. The easist would probably just to "migrate" the working set-up by moving in into my Dropbox folder. Can I do that? If so, how?
If not, can I (easilly) backup my registry settings on one machine and then import them on the other?
I suppose I could just sort out the problem on the one PC, but am not having much luck so far. I would rather invest the time in only having one Delphi setup. And since I am moving lots of other stuff to DropBox anyway ...
The tool for this is now built into Delphi XE8 and higher.
It's found here:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Embarcadero\Studio\20.0\bin\migrationtool.exe
Online documentation:
http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Rio/en/Settings_Migration_Tool
Install CnPack wizards from http://www.cnpack.org
From the CnPack toolbar select IDE Config Backup/Restore (image below) and save this file somewhere safe
Copy the components to the second delphi machine . Keep the exact same directory structure.
I store my components as follows this helps backing up, moving etc., but you can use your own structure
D:\components_bds\DCU
D:\components_bds\BPL
D:\components_bds\ComponentsThemselves
Use the restore config file from CnPack to restore your components on the new machine
This is also useful if your testing components that you plan to remove later and keeping a backup of your installation incase something goes wrong you can save time with new delphi installation if hard drive dies. Keep a copy on flashdrive or somewhere safe
You may compare/diff the config file created by cnPack using a tool like Beyond Compare and see what the differences are to find out why third party components give problems on one of the machines. It may be a Delphi registry/installation problem or a problem in the paths of the thirdparty components. Components need to be installed in an order perhaps it did not find the needed dcu or dll it depends on.
I don't know of any way to do so with DropBox. Here's an old post I made (related to Delphi 7, but with correction of registry keys still applicable) in the CodeGear newsgroups; hopefully it will help.
(It probably goes without saying, but back up the existing registry settings on the destination machine before starting by using RegEdit and exporting them, just in case. You'll at least be able to get back to the point you're at now if something goes wrong by deleting the imported entries and then importing the saved ones.)
You can't, without some difficulty anyway. (Especially if you have
third party components installed, as they may have placed files in the
%SYSTEM% folder you may not know about.)
You may be able to (for going from the old computer to the new
computer running the same exact version of Windows!) by exporting the
registry keys under HKCU\Software\Embarcadero and
HKLM\Software\Embarcadero from the old machine, and then after
installing Delphi on the new machine (in the exact same folder
location) importing that registry file.
Many of the compiler, linker, and other settings are configured on a
per-project basis, and should transfer over when you move your source
code to the new machine.
Third-party components are a problem, as I mentioned above. You may be
able to get away with using the registry export/import if you copy
each third-party component set from the old computer into exactly
the same location on the new machine before importing the registry
file. You'll probably have to track down some .BPL files that end up
in the $(BDS)\Bin and possibly other folders under the $(BDS)
tree; the IDE will tell you about missing stuff when you try and start
it. Make sure you answer "Yes " when asked if you want to try and load
it again next time!
Most of my development is hobby stuff or wannabe releases. Instead of dying trying to move my XE2 Pro from my Dell Inspiron N7110 Win 7 machine to my new Win 10 SSD machine, I'm seriously thinking of switching to Lazarus. I've used Lazarus 2.x with Indy 10, ZeosLib, and Firebird and successfully created a working distributed internet system. I also created Lazarus version of my XE2 Blackjack program. When compared to XE2, Lazarus (IMO) has only two weakness and neither are deal breakers for me. BTW, I have successfully duplicated Lazarus (with all installed components) from one machine to another simply by copying and pasting the Lazarus directory and it works. Try that with Delphi.
Sam
Our application requires quite a few tools and utilities we have written to support our product. Things like data converters, backup utilities etc. Currently, each of these utilities is a separate Delphi Project. On top of that, many of these projects also have a corresponding DUnit project for unit testing, which also have to be a separate project. We currently have 13 separate Delphi projects. These projects are all in one Project Group.
Is this necessary? Do we have to have so many separate projects, or is there a way in Delphi to have multiple entry points into the same project?
Also, sometimes it would be convenient during development to just write some code and 'run' it. To do this now I end up hacking the project file; commenting out the normal behaviour and replacing it with the code I want to run. Is this the only way?
We use Delphi 2010 if that makes a difference.
You can do either of these pretty easily:
Combine your projects into a project group, to be able to work with them together more easily.
(My preference) Separate your projects into different units (instead of project files), create a single application that uses all those units, and call different functionality based on command-line parameters (see ParamCount and ParamStr in the documentation) You can then easily write unit tests by testing each of the units (pun not intended) separately.
Regarding your edit: Delphi is a compiled, not interpreted, language. You can't just "run" code without compiling it, unless you can use functionality that's in your app using the Evaluate/Modify menu item during debugging. (Set a breakpoint and run your app. When it hits the breakpoint, use Ctrl+F7 to open the Evaluate/Modify dialog. Note that this has limited functionality due to the nature of the optimizer and compiler.
Organize your project in one or more Project Groups, and you could use project (exe) parameters to execute just some part of your exe.
As it was already mentioned you can convert mini projects into units. Then use compile conditionals ($ifdef etc.) to select which unit is being included in the compiled program. It would be also handy to be able to automatically switch the name of the generated executable file. I think it would be possible to create a relatively simple OTA (Open Tools API) plugin that could control all those features.
To run small parts of code you can create a separate lightweight console project where you can paste the code to the main function.
We create via "Tools | Options | Environment Variables" Variables like that:
$(Sources) = D:\Sources\Delphi
$(OurLib) = $(Sources)\OurLib\Src
$(OurApp1) = $(Sources)\Applications\App1\3.x
$(ThirdParty) = $(Sources)\ThirdPartyComponents
We use these Variables in the project search path like that:
($OurApp1)\Src\Core;($OurApp1)\Src\GUI;($OurApp1)\Src\Plugins;$(ThirdParty)\JVCL
But this is broken (meanwhile fixed) since Delphi 2009 as these variables are not evaluated completely anymore (see QC #73276). So the files in the directories are not found by the compiler. A workaround: Use only complete directories in the environment variables.
We use this approach because on all developer machines and the build servers the files can be found and we only have to point $(Sources) to the right place.
We don't have anything in our global library path (except the Delphi defaults), because that wouldn't be in the version control and isn't reflected on other developers or build machines.
One problem is: If one unit in $(OurLib) decides to include another new unit maybe in a new path, all projects break because they don't find this new unit. Then we have to go through all projects and add the search path. (BTW: I really hate the search path editor...wouldn't be a simple memo field much better to edit than this replace/add/delete logic?)
Another thing we do is not adding many units to our project. Especially everything from $(OurLib), but we often have units like plugins which add functionality only by including them. For different editions of our products, we want to include different units. As Delphi always messes up $IFDEFs in the uses clause in the .dpr we help us by including units named like "IncludePlugins" which then include the units depending on IFDEFs.
But not including units in the project makes navigating to a pain. The units don't appear in the project, they are not found by Ctrl+12 (Show Units), they are not shown in code completion etc.
Has anybody a better way to cope with these problems?
We use only relative paths, any libraries are always below the libs subdirectory while the project source code resides in the src subdir. So our search paths always look like:
..\libs\library1;..\libs\library2\common;
etc.
All libraries are added as svn:external to each project, so checking out the project will automatically check out the libraries as well and the search path will always point to the correct version of the library for that project.
Not perfect, but it works most of the time.
I have to agree about the search path editor, it is even worse for relative paths because you must not use the "..." buttons otherwise Delphi will insert an absolute path.
We use standard drive mappings.
Our current project is always on W: regardless if it is a network drive or a substitute.
This works great.
When you need to work on a different project, swap the W: and you can continue.
You can copy the search path out to an editor, modify it and then copy it back.
Your search path is much too big. It should contain only the things you want Delphi to recompile with your project. You don't really want to recompile the Jedi VCL every day, do you?
I create a single directory where all compiled units go. Say, C:\dcu. Specify that as the "unit output directory" in all packages. My "search path," then, is always just this:
$(Delphi)\Lib;C:\dcu
The compiler finds everything it needs, and it never finds any source code. The only source code it ever sees is in the files that directly belong to whatever project I'm compiling. The project's own source directories don't need to be on the search path because all of those files are already direct members of the project. The compiler knows exactly where they are.
For me, all a project's source files go in a single directory. If you want separate directories for different parts, like Core and GUI, then I would put those in separate packages so I could work on them and compile them separately. Even if the final program doesn't use the resultant BPLs, packages are still a good way of segmenting your project and defining dependencies.
When compiling units for one project doesn't automatically compile units for all the other projects, you're forced to change active projects. It takes a moment of your time, but it also serves as a mental reminder that you're "changing hats," too.
Although you're producing just one product, that doesn't mean you should have just one project in Delphi. You should have at least one project for each executable module (EXE, DLL, BPL) in your product. Use project groups to manage multiple projects in a single IDE session. No unit should be a member of more than one project.
I don't understand your part about plug-ins and different editions of your project. When you say "plug-in," I assume you're talking about separate executable modules, like DLLs or packages, that the customer can choose to include or not. Couldn't you turn your different editions' features into plug-in modules that simply don't include in the lesser editions? Then you don't have to worry about conditional compilation of your project; just have several different installer packagers that grab different sets of plug-ins.
I have always found it odd that this has never been addressed adequately. I suggested recently to David I that Delphi should allow the user to set up some sort of preferred development structure and that third party library publishers could be made aware of this so that they could automatically adjust their installers to install correctly in the preferred development framework. If the preferred development structure was stored in an XML file or similar, then, it could be copied from one computer to another on a development team.
As an alternative, it could make an interesting project to create a Delphi application that would allow a user to "refactor" their library installation in a high level way. You specify which folders on your system contain source or compiled components or whatever and where you want to keep source files or compiled units, hit Go and your system gets rearranged for you, while updating your Delphi environment so that when you start Delphi, it finds everything it should.
I've just recently discovered a way to have project specific environment variables in delphi builds using XE6, it's not quite as good as a full blown #define like in C but at least I can now have consistent search paths across multiple projects and create some shared option sets.
What I've done is setup environment variables in the same manner as the original poster and then override them in the dproj or optionset.
The BuildPaths.optset added to the project looks like
<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
<PropertyGroup>
<SVN_Root>..\..\..</SVN_Root>
<SVN_Riemann>$(SVN_Root)\Riemann</SVN_Riemann>
<SVN_Library>$(SVN_Root)\Library</SVN_Library>
<SVN_ThirdParty>$(SVN_Library)\Third Party</SVN_ThirdParty>
</PropertyGroup>
<ProjectExtensions>
<Borland.Personality>Delphi.Personality.12</Borland.Personality>
<Borland.ProjectType>OptionSet</Borland.ProjectType>
<BorlandProject>
<Delphi.Personality/>
</BorlandProject>
<ProjectFileVersion>12</ProjectFileVersion>
</ProjectExtensions>
</Project>
I've got simple java-based ppt->swf sub-project that basically works. The open source software out there, OpenOffice.org and JODConverter do the job great.
The thing is, to do this I need to install OO.o and run it in server mode. And to do that I have to install OO.o, which is allot of software (~160MB) just to convert the source PPT files to an intermediate format. Also, the public OO.o distributions are platform specific and I'd really like a single, cross platform set of files. And, I'd like to not interfer with a system's current settings, like file extension associations.
As things are now, my project is not particularly 'software distribution friendly'.
So, the questions are:
Is it possible to create a custom distribution of OpenOffice? How would one about this?
How lightweight and unobtrusive can I make the installation?
Would it be possible to have a truly cross platform distribution since there would be no OO.o UI?
Are there any licensing issues I need to be aware of? (On my list of things to check out, but if you them already then TIA!)
I have no idea to accomplish such task, but Microsoft has its PPT viewer that is for free and very small, maybe in .NET (C#) you can use some kinda function to save into a intermediate file that you need...
and by the way, how are you handling slide transictions?
I found a software that does that but you need MS PPT installed.
this was just an idea, now regarding your actually question:
you can create your own installation of OO, just jump to the Installation project and follow the lines.
I did not read 'til the end, but from the 1st paragraph it seams what you are searching for.
No, not unless you are neck deep coding in the OpenOffice project.