I am able to open a CHM file by passing a ShortInteger and casting it as a Word for the dwData parameter. I.E.
Unit Help; //this is where the Id's are set with their description
Interface
Const
Address_File = 35; //delphi identifies Address_File as a shortint
etc..
Call get help pass my ID
GetHelp(Address_File); //call get help pass my ID to open to the Address_File topic
GetHelp procedure
procedure GetHelp(HelpID : Word);
begin
Application.HelpFile := ProgramPath + 'help.chm';
HtmlHelpW(0, PWideChar(Application.HelpFile),HH_HELP_CONTEXT , HelpID);
end;
HtmlHelpW function
function HtmlHelpW(hwndCaller : HWND; pszFile: PWideChar; uCommand : Integer;
dwData : DWORD) : HWND; stdcall; external 'hhctrl.ocx' name 'HtmlHelpW';
As I pass different ShortIntegers I am able to initialize the help file at different sections.
However I can't figure out how the values are mapped. There are some sections in the chm file that I want to be able to map to but the short Integer or context ID associated with them is not documented in the program or is not mapped.
Free Pascal comes with a chmls.exe util that has a command that tries to recover the alias (context) data:
chmls, a CHM utility. (c) 2010 Free Pascal core.
Usage: chmls [switches] [command] [command specific parameters]
Switches :
-h, --help : this screen
-p, --no-page : do not page list output
-n,--name-only : only show "name" column in list output
Where command is one of the following or if omitted, equal to LIST.
list <filename> [section number]
Shows contents of the archive's directory
extract <chm filename> <filename to extract> [saveasname]
Extracts file "filename to get" from archive "filename",
and, if specified, saves it to [saveasname]
extractall <chm filename> [directory]
Extracts all files from archive "filename" to directory
"directory"
unblockchm <filespec1> [filespec2] ..
Mass unblocks (XPsp2+) the relevant CHMs. Multiple files
and wildcards allowed
extractalias <chmfilename> [basefilename] [symbolprefix]
Extracts context info from file "chmfilename"
to a "basefilename".h and "basefilename".ali,
using symbols "symbolprefix"contextnr
extracttoc <chmfilename> [filename]
Extracts the toc (mainly to check binary TOC)
extractindex <chmfilename> [filename]
Extracts the index (mainly to check binary index)
This might be a start, since at least you'll know which pages are exported using an ID, and maybe the URL names will give some information.
The util is in recent releases (make sure you get 2.6.0) and also available in Free Pascal source, which should be convertable to Delphi with relatively minor effort.
Basically the chmls tool was created out of various test codebases. The testprograms decompiled and printed contents of different CHM sections and were used while creating the helpfile compiler, chmcmd, which is also part of FPC.
In Delphi, calling a help file is rather easy. In any VCL Forms application, you can set the HelpContext property of almost any control to a unique Context ID, which corresponds to a particular topic in the Help File. The Help File was compiled with these mappings, but when you decompile it, these mappings are no longer there. You must have access to the original help file project in order to know these ID's.
Set HelpContext of controls to the corresponding Context ID in the Help File
Set HelpType of controls to htContext to use the HelpContext ID
Assign Application.HelpFile to the appropriate location of the CHM file
When pressing F1 anywhere in your application, the help file will open based on the Help Context ID on the control, or its parent control
If you don't have the original project, and you don't want to re-create it, then you would have a long task of iterating through the Context ID's of your help file. Try to call the help file starting from 0 through 1,000 or possibly 50,000, depending on the size of it.
A practice I implement is a set of constants in a designated unit called HelpConstants.pas which is shared across our common application base. Each constant name uniquely and briefly describes the topic which it represents. Upon starting the application, I dynamically assign these Context ID's to their corresponding controls (usually forms) and VCL takes care of the rest.
I got the utility Marco suggested from
https://github.com/alrieckert/freepascal_arm/blob/master/packages/chm/bin/i386-win32/chmls.exe
(download by selecting View Raw).
I was able to extract all the context tags from the .chm help file and add the one I was interested in to my C++ Builder program by calling Application->HelpJump().
HTH
Related
I am working on a project where I need to play a video from a file in Delphi. I often work from home and school, and I have the problem that at home, my USB is drive 'J' and at school my USB is drive 'D'.
I manually go and change it every time. Is there a way for Delphi to automatically get the video from where ever it is?
Each sector has an image component laid over it for selecting the sector.
*Note, I know I can search for a specific file's location in Delphi, but I have over 24 different places where I need to play different videos, so searching would probably be my last resort, unless I use a procedure and set constants for each sector to differenciate between them.
The code currently looks as follows:
procedure TtForm.imgSector1Click(Sender: TObject);
begin
//Variables,this is for initializing them when I create them later.
//Procedures
SectorDeselect; //Procedure to turn all sector borders white
// Video
WindowsMediaPlayer1.Controls.stop;
WindowsMediaPlayer1.URL := 'J:\IT\PAT\phase 2\Videos\Footage1.mp4'; //Where my problem lies
WindowsMediaPlayer1.Controls.Play;
// Sector Info. The memos and Rich edits
redSectorInfo.Lines.Clear;
redSectorInfo.Lines.Add('');
// Sector. Highlighting the sector borders surrounding the sector
SectorBordr1.Brush.Color := clGreen;
SectorBorder10.Brush.Color := clGreen;
end;
I would suggest adding a TEdit control in your app's UI to let you specify the base drive/path for the files on the machine the app is currently running on. Your code can then construct individual file paths at runtime that are relative to that base path. Don't use hard-code paths in your code.
You can then save that base path into the Windows Registry in a new key you create, ie HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\MyApp. Or, you can save the path in a configuration file (INI, XML, JSON, etc) created in a subfolder in your Windows user profile, like %APPDATA%\MyApp. Your code can then read in that base path each time the app is run.
If the files are stored on a USB drive, an alternative solution would be to simply enumerate the available drives at runtime, such as with GetLogicalDriveStrings(). For each drive, append a relative path for a given file onto the end of it, and then check if that file exists, such as with FileExists(). If so, you now know which drive to use for all of the files until the next time your app is run (you can save the drive path between runs, as described above). If the file is not found, move on to the next drive.
What about adding a parameter on the CommandLine?
Start
D:\myfolder\myfile D
OR
Start
J:\myfolder\myfile J
GUI files can accept a parameter. Capture it with code like:
DriveLetter := ParamStr(1);
I have an existing database with blobs contain OLE compound files. I have a requirement to read these OLE compound files and open them in the Delphi 7 TOleContainer control.
Note that I don't have the source of the app that reads and write to the database. The database remains in active use, so my solution will be used on an ongoing basis, not just for a one-off data extraction.
TOleContainer has a SaveAsDocument method, and by experimentation I have found that, for a given file, this method produces OLE compound files which are identical to those created in the database when that file is added.
However, TOleContainer does NOT have a corresponding LoadFromDocument method. It has other Load* and Create* methods, but none seem capable or suitable for loading the output from SaveAsDocument.
The delphi 7 implementation of SaveAsDocument is this, from the OleCtnrs.pas module:
procedure TOleContainer.SaveAsDocument(const FileName: string);
var
TempStorage: IStorage;
PersistStorage: IPersistStorage;
begin
CheckObject;
if FModSinceSave then SaveObject;
FOleObject.QueryInterface(IPersistStorage, PersistStorage);
if PersistStorage <> nil then
begin
OleCheck(StgCreateDocFile(PWideChar(WideString(Filename)), STGM_READWRITE
or STGM_SHARE_EXCLUSIVE or STGM_CREATE, 0, TempStorage));
OleCheck(OleSave(PersistStorage, TempStorage, False));
PersistStorage.SaveCompleted(nil);
end;
end;
Please provide an implementation of LoadFromDocument which is capable of loading the output from SaveToDocument, and which I can use to patch OleCtnrs.pas. Or else point me to an existing solution.
Thanks!
You have to load the file by using TOleContainer.CreateObjectFromFile. Do not use TOleContainer.LoadFromStream/File, that only works with files that are saved with TOleContainer.SaveToStream/File. Files saved that way get a Delphi specific header containing a four byte code (BDOC) and size (and maybe something more).
According to the documentation for Delphi 2007 (should be the same for ), you can use 'TOleContainer.LoadFromStream'. From the Delphi 7 help file (emphasis mine):
Call LoadFromStream to load an OLE object from a stream. If OldStreamFormat is true, LoadFromStream loads OLE objects saved by a TOleContainer object as well as OLE objects saved using the current format; if OldStreamFormat is false, LoadFromStream will not load OLE objects saved by the library. If there's already an OLE object in the container, it is destroyed and any changes the user made to it are discarded.
How can I make a single executable package that contains DLL and Image Resource Files?
Then how do I extract them from my Executable at Runtime?
Option 1 using the IDE (Delphi 2007 or Higher):
You can click the Project menu, then select Resources..., which you can load any file into. For your purpose this would be RC_DATA.
Option 2 without the IDE
If you do not have the above option, you will need to use the BRCC32 (Borland Resource Compiler) to create a .RES file from RC file, which you then link to your Application. To link Resource files without using the IDE, try the following:
Lets say for example we want to add a a couple of DLL files, and the name of the DLL files are MyLib1.dll and MyLib2.dll, to add this open Notepad, and type the following:
MYLIB1 RCDATA "..\MyLib1.dll"
MYLIB2 RCDATA "..\MyLib2.dll"
Make sure the ..\xxx.dll paths are correct, so obviously you need to edit that.
Now you need to save this as a .rc file, so File>Save As..(make sure the dropdown filter is All Files .) and name it MyResources.rc. Now you need to use the Resource Compiler to generate the Res file, using this console command:
BRCC32 MyResources.RC
You can write that command by using the Command Prompt, Start Menu > Run > cmd.exe, alternatively you can find the BRCC32.exe inside the bin folder of your Delphi setup and drag the MyResource.RC file onto.
This will create a Res file named MyResources.RES which you can include inside the Main Delphi form of your Application, like so:
{$R *.dfm}
{$R MyResources.res}
you can extract the resources by using something like this:
procedure ExtractResource(ResName: String; Filename: String);
var
ResStream: TResourceStream;
begin
ResStream:= TResourceStream.Create(HInstance, ResName, RT_RCDATA);
try
ResStream.Position:= 0;
ResStream.SaveToFile(Filename);
finally
ResStream.Free;
end;
end;
What I've found out to be convenient, is to use a .zip container.
Then you'll have two implementations:
Append some .zip content to an existing .exe, and the .exe code will retrieve the .zip content on request;
Embed the .zip content as a resource, then extract on request each content.
Solution 1 will add the .zip content after compilation. Whereas 2 will add the .zip content at compilation. For a setup program, I think solution 1 makes sense to me. For a way of retrieving some needed files (libraries, and even bitmaps or text) which are linked to a particular exe release, solution 2 could be envisaged.
Using .zip as format make it easy to parse the content, and allow compression. Using a tool like TotalCommander, you can even read the .zip file content with Ctrl+PgDown over the .exe. Very convenient.
You'll find in this link how you implement solution 1, and in this link (same page, but another post) how to use the TZipRead.Create() constructor to directly access to a .zip bundled as resource. You'll find in our repository how it works with working applications: e.g. how we embedded icons, textual content and graphviz + spell-checker libraries in the SynProject executable.
About performance, there is no difference between the two solutions, at least with our code. Both use memory mapped files to access the content, so it will be more or less identical: very fast.
I am an engineer and not a software programmer, so please excuse my ignorance.
I have written a Delphi(7SE) program to read “real” datatype from a USB port connected to two digital thermometers.
I have completed this much of the program.
What I have not completed as yet is explained by the following:
I wish to save this “real” data to a Binary File(s). A text file would be fine as well, but i'm concerned about having a big data file.
I also wish to read this data back from the Binary/Text File to display the data using my Delphi application.
I don’t think this would be too difficult. I currently save my data in .CSV format.
The twist here is that the binary file should contain data from different sessions initiated by the user of my application.
So when I click on say, a button called “ historical” data, a new window/form would pop up that would show different session times that I had started & stopped from earlier times. Then a session would be selected and data then retrieved for displaying.
Can this be done in one binary files or would you have to use 2 files: one for the “real” data and another which indexes the different session times?
My requirement for this way of saving binary data is that I would not have to keep typing in filenames and therefore keeping track of many data files.
For example a thermo.hst(historical data) and a thermo.idx (index file) file would contain all the information such as actual temp data, time of read data, session start & end times etc.
Any useful pointers and hopefully code with as much detail would be greatly appreciated.
I hope this sample code isn't too late to be helpful.
(I've added this as another answer from me so that I can cleanly list the code. If this or my previous post answers your question, please click the answer icon so I get reputation points!)
Below is some rough code that shows how to read the sections in an ini file and find the largest filename. I confirmed it compiles and seems to return valid values, but you'll need confirm it does what you need. It's more to show you the idea...
Note that if your data filenames have an extension, you'll have add code to remove the extension in my sample code using something like: FileName := ChangeFileExt(Filename, '').
// Call with an open inifile. Returns the name of the next filename, or '' if trouble
Function GetNextFileName( const IniFile: TInifile):String;
const
BASE_FILENAME = 'File.'; // sections in the ini file will be [File.1], [File.2], ... [File.100], etc.
var
Sections: TStringList;
NumericPartAsString: String;
NumericPartAsInteger: Integer;
ListIndex: Integer;
LargestFileNumberSeenSoFar: Integer;
begin
Result := '';
Sections := TStringList.Create;
IniFile.ReadSections(Sections); // fills StringList with the names of all sections in the ini file
if( Sections.Count = 0) then
Result := BASE_FILENAME + '1'
else
begin // find largest extension
LargestFileNumberSeenSoFar := -1;
ListIndex := 0;
while ListIndex <= (Sections.Count - 1) do // for every string (which is also a filename) in the string list:
begin
NumericPartAsString := StringReplace(Sections.Strings[ListIndex], BASE_FILENAME, '', []); // remove base filename
if (NumericPartAsString <> '') then
begin
NumericPartAsInteger := StrToIntDef(NumericPartAsString, -1);
if (NumericPartAsInteger > LargestFileNumberSeenSoFar) then
LargestFileNumberSeenSoFar := NumericPartAsInteger;
end;
inc(ListIndex);
end;
if (LargestFileNumberSeenSoFar > -1) then
Result := BASE_FILENAME + IntToStr(LargestFileNumberSeenSoFar + 1);
end;
Sections.Free;
end; { GetNextFileName }
procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
var
IniFile: TInifile;
NewFileName: String;
begin
IniFile := TInifile.Create('c:\junk\ini.ini');
NewFileName := GetNextFileName(Inifile);
if (NewFileName = '') then
ShowMessage('Error finding new filename')
else
ShowMessage('New filename is ' + NewFileName);
IniFile.Free;
end;
By using a database, you've in part just renamed part of the problem from "typing in file names and keeping track of many data files" to "typing in data set name and keeping track of many data sets."
In both cases, as an example, either the user or the program has to create a new file/data set name, and choose from a list of files/data sets to open later. And in both cases you have to make a call to a function named something like "DeleteDataSet".
You might re-consider whether you really need a database (with associated learning curve for API, how to define the data structure, update it in the field when something changes, browse the data in a viewer, access the data programatically, proprietary format, database maintenance, repair tools, installation, etc.) I'm sure that you could learn all these, and they might be valuable in future projects. But, maybe a simpler approach would be more appropriate and adequate for this one-time project by a non-software engineer.
If you're willing to have a proliferation of many unique, standalone data files on one folder, I'd encourage you to stick with what's working: use one CSV file per data set. (Have you run into speed or size issues with CSV files containing a single data set thus far? That would be an enormous amount of data!) One nice thing about CSV files is that you can just pop them into an editor to view or edit...
And, then, add a second file that contains filenames, and other descriptive information. This file would be a simple TIniFile:
[My Name one]
Date=06 June 2010
StartTime=12:30pm
StopTime=3:15pm
FileName=Data1.csv
[My Name two]
...
The tools available in Delphi for TIniFile will let you easily manage this list, including ReadSections into a string list that you can just assign to a combo box for the user to select a data set. (See example below) And, like the CSV files, you can just edit the .ini file in any text editor.
You'll need to build a UI to allow a user to delete a dataset (section in the ini file and associated .csv file). To give you an idea how the ini file would be used, here's the pseudo-code for deleting a data set:
(In IDE Object Inspector, set ComboBox.Style := csDropDownList to prevent user from typing in a name that doesn't exist.)
Load a combo-box that shows available data sets.
1. ComboBox.Items := IniFile.ReadSections;
In the combo-box's OnSelect event handler:
2. DeleteFile(IniFile.ReadString(CombBox.Text, 'FileName', ''));
3. IniFile.EraseSection(ComboBox.Text); // remove the section from the inifile
Heck, that's not a lot of code, even after you add a bit of protection and error checking!
Maybe the above solution will be voted down by others here as trying to put a round peg in a square hole or re-inventing the wheel. And I might agree with them. There are good arguments against this approach, including proliferation of many files. But, if it was me, I'd at least consider this approach as keeping-it-simple and not requiring anything new but that you learn the TIniFile object, which is quite powerful.
The data can be interleaved. Just start every block (a set of history) with a header that identifies the block and contains its length. When reading you can then easily separate that.
You can hold an additional index file next to this for fast access if you require, but if this is the case, I would start studying some embedded database. (TDBF, sqlite or embedded firebird).
I would also head in the database direction if I expected that my querying would get more complicated in the future.
If it is all about logging, the data doesn't get gigantic and the performance of the view is fine, I would keep the binary file and avoid the hassle of having users to install and maintain a databsae solution. (TDBF is maybe an exception to that, since it is completely statically linked)
My program written with Delphi 7 compiles OK, but when I run it it gives me the error message:
Project1.Exe raised exception class EReadError with Message 'Property Persistence does Not Exist'. Process Stopped.
This only started after I installed the TMS Component Pack to use with this project. Thanks for any help.
Open the Form in Delphi IDE
Use Alt + F12 to edit the .DFM source
Search the "Persistence" property
Delete the line with "Persistence" property
DFM example:
SomeComponent1 = TSomeComponent
OtherProperty = OtherValue
Persistence = True
AnotherProperty = AnotherValue
end
Also you can use the great DFMCheck 1.4 tool, by Andreas Hausladen. To check any other missing property like that:
http://andy.jgknet.de/blog/?page_id=177
This is most likely caused by the compiled & installed package being out of sync with the actual .pas file. If you have source code then rebuilding the packages will probably fix it.
Set a breakpoint(F5) and step the program(F7/F8).Get to the location where you get that exception and then give us more information about it(show some code).
This error means that it's trying to load something (usually a form) from a DFM resource and it comes up with a value for a property that the component it's creating doesn't have.
If it only happened when you started using TMS components, the solution is simple: don't use them. Send as much information as you can about the error and the project that caused it to the authors and see if they can find a way to fix it. Until then, use something else.
If you're using text DFMs (right click on the form, check "Text DFM", save), you can use Search|Find in Files to find all instances of Persistence in your DFM files. Just set the search string to "Persistence" (I usually tell it to ignore case), the file mask to "*.dfm", and check the "All files in project" checkbox.
If you're not already using text DFMs and don't want to manually open all forms and check the box and then resave them, you can use CONVERT.EXE (in the ($DELPHI)\Bin folder) to convert them en-masse. Run CONVERT with no parameters from any command prompt to see the options. By default, CONVERT will save .DFM as .txt, but you can have it work in-place (rewriting the binary .DFM as the text .DFM) by using the -i switch. (I usually back up the .DFMs to a different folder first, then convert them. If no errors are reported, I can then delete the backed up .DFMs later.)
I had similar problem with TMS when I upgraded to a new version:
If you think that some particular component is causing the problem,
delete it , compile project without it, place it on the form/frame again.
If that doesn't work for you:
Things you need to do in order to fix the problem , so you can use Designer and new properties, because that's what you really want , don't you ? :-) :
Uninstall TMS Component Pack ( or whatever you're using )
Re-Install TMS Component Pack
Build & Install the packages
Add appropriate TMS .lib files to your Application Project ( I'm using C++ Builder )
Add appropriate TMS .pas files to your Application Project . For example I had a problem with TAdvSmoothCalendar component , so I've added the AdvSmoothCalender.pas to my project.
Cheers!
I hope it works for everyone with a similar problem :)
I had similar problem with nuiGui Delphi Framework,
To Solve this, create a include file with some properties and use it in your class.
/// include class 'Basic.inc'
private
function GetWidth: Integer;
published
property ClientHeight : Integer Read FHeight Write FHeight;
//property ClientWidth : Integer Read FWidth Write FWidth;
//property OldCreateOrder : Boolean Read FOldCreateOrder Write FOldCreateOrder;
end;
...
/// main class like this
TuMemoFrame = class(TUniFrame)
UniMemo1: TUniMemo;
UniMemo2: TUniMemo;
UniButton1: TUniButton;
procedure UniButton1Click(Sender: TObject);
private
public
{$Include Basic.inc } // <---
end;