I need to call an external program from Delphi 2006 code with a long list of arguments, specifically to concatenate mutiple PDFs into one file using PDFTK. The full string to be executed has over 512 characters, but both WinExec and ShellExecute have a 512 character limit.
Are there any alternatives to these procedures that have much larger limits?
Just use a temporary BATCH file, containing the commands to be executed.
This will allow also some enhanced features, like calling several PDFTK instance in a row, add backup or copy of files, just in the same process.
Run the batch as SW_SHOWMINIMIZED to have no black console window pop up.
Just found this #SwissDelphiCentre, which seems to work nicely:
procedure ShellExecute_AndWait(FileName: string; Params: string);
var
exInfo: TShellExecuteInfo;
Ph: DWORD;
begin
FillChar(exInfo, SizeOf(exInfo), 0);
with exInfo do
begin
cbSize := SizeOf(exInfo);
fMask := SEE_MASK_NOCLOSEPROCESS or SEE_MASK_FLAG_DDEWAIT;
Wnd := GetActiveWindow();
ExInfo.lpVerb := 'open';
ExInfo.lpParameters := PChar(Params);
lpFile := PChar(FileName);
nShow := SW_SHOWNORMAL;
end;
if ShellExecuteEx(#exInfo) then
Ph := exInfo.HProcess
else
begin
ShowMessage(SysErrorMessage(GetLastError));
Exit;
end;
while WaitForSingleObject(ExInfo.hProcess, 50) <> WAIT_OBJECT_0 do
Application.ProcessMessages;
CloseHandle(Ph);
end;
There are some limits on the length of the names passed to ShellExecute, but these are typically greater than 512 characters. It seems you just need to dynamically allocate the names rather than using a static char array.
If you want to go to the ultimate command line length then you can use CreateProcess which has a limit of 32,768 characters.
As another option you could consider writing the list of arguments to a temporary file. Then you would modify the external program so that it is capable of being passed the path to that file as its command line argument. You would obviously need to also modify the external program so that it could read the file and obtain the long list of files from the temporary file.
Related
with below example i am counting number of lines in .dfm file and the count is coming wrong because .dfm is saved in binary format.
if i open .dfm file and do right click and set text dfm to checked and the count is coming correctly. Below is the code
function TForm1.FindNumberOfLinesInFile(FileName: String): Integer;
var
contents : TStringList;
filestream : TFileStream;
outStream : TMemoryStream;
begin
try
try
Result := 0;
contents := TStringList.Create;
if edtFileToSearch.Text = '.dfm' then
begin
contents.LoadFromFile(FileName);
//i am binary
if pos('OBJECT', Uppercase(contents[0])) = 0 then // Count is coming wrong with this
begin
contents.Clear;
fileStream := TFileStream.Create(FileName, fmShareDenyNone);
outStream := TMemoryStream.Create;
try
ObjectResourceToText(filestream,outStream);
outStream.Position := 0;
Contents.LoadFromStream(outStream);
finally
FreeAndNil(outStream);
end;
end
else
begin
fileStream := TFileStream.Create(FileName, fmShareDenyNone);
Contents.LoadFromStream(fileStream);
end;
end
else
begin
fileStream := TFileStream.Create(FileName, fmShareDenyNone);
Contents.LoadFromStream(filestream);
end;
Result := contents.Count;
finally
FreeAndNil(fileStream);
FreeAndNil(contents);
end;
except
on e: Exception do Result := -1;
end;
end;
i have 2 questions
1)how to set text dfm value to checked in all dfm files(i have around 1000 dfm files)?
2)how load binary file correctly and count number of lines?
Delphi comes with a command line tool to do this, named convert. Open up a command prompt and ensure that your Delphi bin directory is in the PATH. Then type:
C:\projects\myprocject> convert
The output will be something like this:
Delphi Form Conversion Utility Version 5.0
Copyright (c) 1995,99 Inprise Corporation
Usage: convert.exe [-i] [-s] [-t | -b]
-i Convert files in-place (output overwrites input)
-s Recurse subdirectories
-t Convert to text
-b Convert to binary
So, you should be able to write:
C:\projects\myprocject> convert -i -s -t *.dfm
to effect the change required.
David's answer addresses the first of your questions: You can convert all of your existing binary DFM's to text using the command line tool provided with Delphi.
As well as addressing your immediate problem this is also highly recommended as it will make it much easier (i.e. possible at all!) to visually diff changes to your DFM files in version control.
As for the second part, if for some reason you still want or need to handle binary DFM files in your code is to use the TestStreamFormat() function to determine whether a stream is a valid resource stream and whether it is binary or text format, before calling ObjectResourceToText() function only if required.
This helper function to return the contents of a specified filename (of a DFM) into a supplied TStrings (e.g. a TStringlist) demonstrates this and might simplify things for you:
procedure GetDfmIntoStrings(aFilename: String; aStrings: TStrings);
var
istrm, ostrm: TStream;
begin
ostrm := NIL;
istrm := TFileStream.Create(aFilename, fmOpenRead or fmShareDenyNone);
try
case TestStreamFormat(istrm) of
sofBinary : begin
ostrm := TStringStream.Create('');
ObjectResourceToText(istrm, ostrm)
end;
sofText : ostrm := istrm;
else
raise EFilerError.Create(aFilename + ' is not a valid resource stream (DFM)');
end;
ostrm.Position := 0;
aStrings.LoadFromStream(ostrm);
finally
if ostrm <> istrm then
ostrm.Free;
istrm.Free;
end;
end;
I want to run a command that the user defined in an INI file.
The commands can be EXE files, or other files (e.g. DOC files) and parameters should be allowed.
Since WinExec() can handle arguments (e.g. "cmd /?"), but ShellExec() can handle Non-EXE files (e.g. "Letter.doc"), I am using a combination of these both.
I am concerned about future Windows versions, because WinExec() is deprecated, and even from the 16 bit era.
Here is my current function:
procedure RunCMD(cmdLine: string; WindowMode: integer);
procedure ShowWindowsErrorMessage(r: integer);
begin
MessageDlg(SysErrorMessage(r), mtError, [mbOK], 0);
end;
var
r, g: Cardinal;
begin
// We need a function which does following:
// 1. Replace the Environment strings, e.g. %SystemRoot% --> ExpandEnvStr
// 2. Runs EXE files with parameters (e.g. "cmd.exe /?") --> WinExec
// 3. Runs EXE files without path (e.g. "calc.exe") --> WinExec
// 4. Runs EXE files without extension (e.g. "calc") --> WinExec
// 5. Runs non-EXE files (e.g. "Letter.doc") --> ShellExecute
// 6. Commands with white spaces (e.g. "C:\Program Files\xyz.exe") must be enclosed in quotes.
cmdLine := ExpandEnvStr(cmdLine);
// TODO: Attention: WinExec() is deprecated, but there is no acceptable replacement
g := WinExec(PChar(cmdLine), WindowMode);
r := GetLastError;
if g = ERROR_BAD_FORMAT then
begin
// e.g. if the user tries to open a non-EXE file
ShellExecute(0, nil, PChar(cmdLine), '', '', WindowMode);
r := GetLastError;
end;
if r <> 0 then ShowWindowsErrorMessage(r);
end;
function ExpandEnvStr(const szInput: string): string;
// http://stackoverflow.com/a/2833147/3544341
const
MAXSIZE = 32768;
begin
SetLength(Result, MAXSIZE);
SetLength(Result, ExpandEnvironmentStrings(pchar(szInput),
#Result[1],length(Result)));
end;
Microsoft recommends using CreateProcess(), but I do not accept it as a real replacement for WinExec().
For example, given following command line:
"C:\Program Files\xyz.exe" /a /b /c
Since ShellExecute() and CreateProcess() require a strict separation of command and arguments, I would have to parse this string myself. Is that really the only way I can go? Has someone written a public available code featuring this functionality?
Additional note: The process should not be attached to the caller. My program will close, right after the command has started.
CreateProcess() is the replacement for WinExec(). The documentation explicitly states as much.
And BTW, the error handling in your original code is completely wrong. You are misusing GetLastError(). In fact, neither WinExec() nor ShellExecute() even report errors with GetLastError() to begin with. So, even if WinExec() or ShellExecute() are successful (and you are not even checking if ShellExecute() succeeds or fails), you risk reporting random errors from earlier API calls.
Try something more like this:
procedure RunCMD(cmdLine: string; WindowMode: integer);
procedure ShowWindowsErrorMessage(r: integer);
var
sMsg: string;
begin
sMsg := SysErrorMessage(r);
if (sMsg = '') and (r = ERROR_BAD_EXE_FORMAT) then
sMsg := SysErrorMessage(ERROR_BAD_FORMAT);
MessageDlg(sMsg, mtError, [mbOK], 0);
end;
var
si: TStartupInfo;
pi: TProcessInformation;
sei: TShellExecuteInfo;
err: Integer;
begin
// We need a function which does following:
// 1. Replace the Environment strings, e.g. %SystemRoot% --> ExpandEnvStr
// 2. Runs EXE files with parameters (e.g. "cmd.exe /?") --> WinExec
// 3. Runs EXE files without path (e.g. "calc.exe") --> WinExec
// 4. Runs EXE files without extension (e.g. "calc") --> WinExec
// 5. Runs non-EXE files (e.g. "Letter.doc") --> ShellExecute
// 6. Commands with white spaces (e.g. "C:\Program Files\xyz.exe") must be enclosed in quotes.
cmdLine := ExpandEnvStr(cmdLine);
{$IFDEF UNICODE}
UniqueString(cmdLine);
{$ENDIF}
ZeroMemory(#si, sizeof(si));
si.cb := sizeof(si);
si.dwFlags := STARTF_USESHOWWINDOW;
si.wShowWindow := WindowMode;
if CreateProcess(nil, PChar(cmdLine), nil, nil, False, 0, nil, nil, si, pi) then
begin
CloseHandle(pi.hThread);
CloseHandle(pi.hProcess);
Exit;
end;
err := GetLastError;
if (err = ERROR_BAD_EXE_FORMAT) or
(err = ERROR_BAD_FORMAT) then
begin
ZeroMemory(#sei, sizeof(sei));
sei.cbSize := sizeof(sei);
sei.lpFile := PChar(cmdLine);
sei.nShow := WindowMode;
if ShellExecuteEx(#sei) then Exit;
err := GetLastError;
end;
ShowWindowsErrorMessage(err);
end;
Although similar ShellExecute and CreateProcess serve a different purpose.
ShellExecute can open non executable files. It looks up the information in the registry for the associated program for the given file and will execute it. ShellExecute is also great for launching the default web browser and you can pass a URL to it it.
So if you were to pass an TXT file to ShellExecute it would open the associated program such as notepad. However it would fail with CreateProcess.
CreateProcess is a lower level function, that allows you to have better control over the input and output from the the process. For example you can call command line programs that have text output with CreateProcess and capture that output and react according.
Given the concerns you have you will need to use ShellExecute. You will however need to split the command from the parameters. This is would be the first non escaped whitespace character.
I personally rarely call ShellExecute or CreateProcess directly. I tend to use on of the following functions from the JCL that wrap these functions.
JclMiscel.pas
CreateDosProcessRedirected
WinExec32
WinExec32AndWait
WinExecAndRedirectOutput
CreateProcessAsUser
CreateProcessAsUserEx
JclShell.pas
ShellExecEx
ShellExec
ShellExecAndWwait
RunAsAdmin
JclSysUtils.pas
Execute (8 Overloaded versions and is the one I use the most)
From my Win32 app I'm reading and writing HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Embarcadero\BDS\9.0\History Lists\hlRunParameters, that is where the Delphi XE2 IDE writes run-time parameters.
This is the write code:
procedure TFrmCleanIDEParams.BtnWriteClick(Sender: TObject);
var
lReg : TRegistry;
lValue,
lKey : String;
i,
lNrToWrite,
lNrRegVals: Integer;
begin
.....
lKey := Trim(EdtRegKey.Text); // '\Software\Embarcadero\BDS\9.0\History Lists\hlRunParameters'
if lKey = '' then Exit;
if lKey[1] = '\' then lKey := Copy(lKey,2);
lReg := TRegistry.Create(KEY_READ or KEY_WRITE);
lReg.RootKey := HKEY_CURRENT_USER;
if not lReg.OpenKey(lKey,false) then
begin
MessageDlg('Key not found', mtError, mbOKCancel, 0);
Exit;
end;
if not lReg.ValueExists('Count') then
begin
MessageDlg('Value ''Count'' not found', mtError, mbOKCancel, 0);
Exit;
end;
lNrRegVals := lReg.ReadInteger('Count');
lNrToWrite := CLBParams.Items.Count; // TCheckListBox
lReg.WriteInteger('Count',lNrToWrite);
for i := 0 to lNrToWrite-1 do
begin
lValue := 'Item' + IntToStr(i);
lReg.WriteString(lValue,CLBParams.Items[i]);
end;
// Remove the rest:
for i := lNrToWrite to lNrRegVals-1 do
lReg.DeleteValue('Item' + IntToStr(i));
end;
Issues:
In RegEdit I see the key contents changing as expected, but the Delphi IDE does not pick up these changes
Some time (reboot?) later the HKEY_CURRENT_USER key has its old values
I think several things could be the reason, but I'm not sure which ones to attack:
I should not use HKEY_CURRENT_USER, but HKEY_USERS. If this is the case, how do I then get the proper S-1-5-etc that I need to use?
It's a Windows 7 64-bit issue, although both my program and the Delphi IDE are 32 bit. (How) do I then need to change the TRegistry.Create?
I read this Delphi: Read 64-bits registry key from 32-bits process post but that still does not tell me if/when to use different 'access keys'.
Do I always need to use this KEY_WOW64_64KEY value regardless of my app being 32/64 bit? I see that HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software is shared, not redirected. (How) do I need to treat these differently?
BTW UAC is off, it would be nice if my code worked with UAC on too.
The Delphi IDE will only read these values at start up. But you must make sure that you write the registry values after the IDE has finished writing to them.
You should be using HKEY_CURRENT_USER.
You should not be using an alternate registry view flag because that part of the registry is shared.
UAC won't have any impact here because HKEY_CURRENT_USER is writeable for the standard user token.
The only explanation that makes sense is that another process is modifying the values. My guess is that the Delphi IDE is that process.
I have run program with command-line parameters. How can i wait for it to finish running?
This is my answer : (Thank you all)
uses ShellAPI;
function TForm1.ShellExecute_AndWait(FileName: string; Params: string): bool;
var
exInfo: TShellExecuteInfo;
Ph: DWORD;
begin
FillChar(exInfo, SizeOf(exInfo), 0);
with exInfo do
begin
cbSize := SizeOf(exInfo);
fMask := SEE_MASK_NOCLOSEPROCESS or SEE_MASK_FLAG_DDEWAIT;
Wnd := GetActiveWindow();
exInfo.lpVerb := 'open';
exInfo.lpParameters := PChar(Params);
lpFile := PChar(FileName);
nShow := SW_SHOWNORMAL;
end;
if ShellExecuteEx(#exInfo) then
Ph := exInfo.hProcess
else
begin
ShowMessage(SysErrorMessage(GetLastError));
Result := true;
exit;
end;
while WaitForSingleObject(exInfo.hProcess, 50) <> WAIT_OBJECT_0 do
Application.ProcessMessages;
CloseHandle(Ph);
Result := true;
end;
If I understand your question correctly, you want to execute program in command-line and capture its output in your application rather than in console window. To do so, you can read the output using pipes. Here is an example source code:
Capture the output from a DOS (command/console) Window
Using DSiWin32:
sl := TStringList.Create;
if DSiExecuteAndCapture('cmd.exe /c dir', sl, 'c:\test', exitCode) = 0 then
// exec error
else
// use sl
sl.Free;
Ok, getting the command-line parameters, you use
ParamCount : returns the number of parameters passed to the program on the command-line.
ParamStr : returns a specific parameter, requested by index.
Running Dephi Applications With Parameters
Now, if what you meant is reading and writing to the console, you use
WriteLn : writes a line of text to the console.
ReadLn : reads a line of text from the console as a string.
Delphi Basics
If what you want is to execute a command-line executable, and get the response that this exe writes to the console, the easiest way could be to call the exe from a batch file and redirect the output to another file using >, and then read that file.
For example, if you need to execute the "dir" command and get its output you could have a batch file called getdir.bat that contains the following:
#echo off
dir c:\users\myuser\*.* > output.txt
you could exec that batch file using the API function ShellExecute. You can read about it http://delphi.about.com/od/windowsshellapi/a/executeprogram.htm
Then you can read output file, even using something like a TStringList:
var
output: TStringList;
begin
output := TStringList.Create();
output.LoadFromFile('output.txt');
...
Is there a way in Delphi to get the currect application's exe size in one or two lines of code?
Just for grins...you can also do this with streams Just slightly more than 2 lines of code. Generally the application filename including path is also stored into Paramstr(0).
var
fs : tFilestream;
begin
fs := tFilestream.create(paramstr(0),fmOpenRead or fmShareDenyNone);
try
result := fs.size;
finally
fs.free;
end;
end;
It's not as small as you want, but it needs no handles. I use this in all my "SFX" archivers and programs that must know their size. IIRC it requires the Windows unit.
function GetExeSize: cardinal;
var
p: pchar;
i, NumSections: integer;
const
IMAGE_PE_SIGNATURE = $00004550;
begin
result := 0;
p := pointer(hinstance);
inc(p, PImageDosHeader(p)._lfanew + sizeof(dword));
NumSections := PImageFileHeader(p).NumberOfSections;
inc(p,sizeof(TImageFileHeader)+ sizeof(TImageOptionalHeader));
for i := 1 to NumSections do
begin
with PImageSectionHeader(p)^ do
if PointerToRawData+SizeOfRawData > result then
result := PointerToRawData+SizeOfRawData;
inc(p, sizeof(TImageSectionHeader));
end;
end;
For the sake of future compatibility, you should choose an implementation that does not require pointers or Windows API functions when possible. The TFileStream based solution provided by skamradt looks good to me.
But... You shouldn't worry too much whether the routine is 1 or 10 lines of code, because you're going to encapsulate it anyway in a function that takes a filename as a parameter and returns an Int64, and put it in your personal library of reusable code. Then you can call it like so:
GetMyFileSize(Application.ExeName);
You can try this:
if FindFirst(ExpandFileName(Application.exename), faAnyFile, SearchRec) = 0 then
MessageDlg(Format('Tamaño: <%d>',[SearchRec.Size]), mtInformation, [mbOK], 0);
FindClose(SearchRec);
===============
Neftalí
Streams can also be used without a TFileStream variable:
with TFilestream.create(paramstr(0), fmOpenRead or fmShareDenyNone) do
aFileSize := Size;
Free;
end;
Ugly, yes.
I prefer using DSiFileSize from DSiWin32. It uses CreateFile internally:
function DSiFileSize(const fileName: string): int64;
var
fHandle: DWORD;
begin
fHandle := CreateFile(PChar(fileName), 0, 0, nil, OPEN_EXISTING, FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL, 0);
if fHandle = INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE then
Result := -1
else try
Int64Rec(Result).Lo := GetFileSize(fHandle, #Int64Rec(Result).Hi);
finally CloseHandle(fHandle); end;
end; { DSiFileSize }
Unfortunatly it is not possible to do that with only one or two lines of code without using some library.
The easy part is getting the application's exe file. You can find it in Application.ExeName
In general there are several possibilities for retrieving the file size:
Open the file and read the size of the stream. This can be accomplished using the 'old' Delphi functions FileOpen and FileSize, or with TFileStream (use the size property) or with Win32 API functions CreateFile and GetFileSize function. (Platform dependend!) Make sure you open the file with read-only access.
In a pure Win32 envinronment you can use FindFirst to get the file size. You can read it from TSearchRec.FindData.nFileSizeLow. If you want to be prepared for files larger than 2 GB (you should be) you have to use also the nFileSizeHigh part.
In Delphi.NET you can use the System.IO.FileInfo, like this: FileInfo.Create(filename).Length (one-liner)
In Linux you can use the lstat64 function (Unit Libc) and get the size from TStatBuf64.st_size. (two-liner if you don't count the variable declaration)
In the JCL library you can find many useful functions, including a simple function which returns the file size of a given file name. (It uses a method which suits the given platform)
uses IdGlobalProtocols;
var
ExeSize: Int64;
begin
ExeSize := FileSizeByName(ParamStr(0));
// or
ExeSize := FileSizeByName(Application.ExeName);
end;
I would like to modify the code provided by skamradt, to make it two lines of code as you requested ;-)
with tFilestream.create(paramstr(0),fmOpenRead or fmShareDenyNone) do
ShowMessage(IntToStr(size));
but I would prefer to use the code as skamradt wrote, because it's more safe
Shortest I could do. Note that the .Size is in bytes, so for kilobytes, divide by 1024.
procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
begin
with TFileStream.Create(Application.ExeName,fmShareDenyNone) do
ShowMessage(FloatToStr(Size/1024));
end;
Check out this link.