I have this unusual requirement from a client, and I am not quite sure how to proceed.
My client needs to select a folder from his computer in IE and POST the files within that folder to the server. I was thinking of an ActiveX control. Could you point me to the right way? Thank you.
It's a bit of a tricky question; You can certainly upload files using WinHttp or WinInet (forget which works better for it) but you could run into issues with proxy settings.
If I were you I'd write a plugin using FireBreath, which would then work on all major browsers instead of just IE (works both as an ActiveX control and as a NPAPI plugin). There is a library for FireBreath that though poorly documented allows you to upload files via HTTP using libcurl and openssl, or you could figure out how to do it with WinInet/WinHTTP (do some google searches, several possible leads come up).
Related
I would love to be able to update my NodeMCU ESP8266-01 OTA, since they're located in awkward spots. I'm by no means an expert regarding the ESP or NodeMCU, but I haven't been able to find anything recent about OTA updates. I found some discussions about it going back to 2015, but it never seems to have been implemented.
I use my ESP with NodeMCU to control a PWM dimmer. I upload a precompiled version of NodeMCU with the NodeMCU Firmware FLasher, and then use ESPlorer to upload a custom lua file called 'init.lua'. I'm not even sure if this is the proper way to do stuff, but it works.
So the main question: Has OTA updating been implemented, or is it possible in some way?
Just to clarify, I don't think I want to update the firmware. As I understand it, firmware is what you build yourself, or on a website like https://nodemcu-build.com. I want to update the lua files that run on the ESP, that you normally upload through a program like ESPlorer.
I found some discussions about it going back to 2015, but it never seems to have been implemented.
Indeed, firmware OTA is not available yet. However, as you probably know, the need for firmware OTA is much lower with the NodeMCU firmware than e.g. with the Arduino platform. I'd argue that you're much less likely in need to replace/upgrade/extend the firmware with its built-in modules than the application code that runs on top of it.
Fortunately, it's quite simple to replace one or several Lua scripts (compiled or uncompiled) on the device and reboot it. All the web and cloud IDEs listed at https://frightanic.com/iot/tools-ides-nodemcu/ offer this. There's even a pending PR that'll bring FTP support to NodeMCU.
For a complete Lua provisioning system take a look at what #TerryE provided at https://github.com/nodemcu/nodemcu-firmware/tree/master/lua_examples/luaOTA
I've attempted to use the two Web IDEs listed in the link provided in Marcel Stör's answer, but I honestly failed to understand how to use either IDE. they also seemed like they weren't exactly what I was looking for, and required a server to connect to, or an extra program, which I wanted to avoid.
Edit: Apparently, I did end up using one of the two Web IDEs in the list. Since it's been a while since I did all this, it's a bit fuzzy in my head.
I eventually stumbled upon this GitHub page, which seemed to provide exactly what I was looking for: The ability to access the Lua files on the ESP through a webbrowser. I have personally changed the ide.lua file around completely, since I needed to call functions from it in the init.lua script. However, I think you can just upload the ide.lua script to the ESP, and add a line containing dofile("ide.lua") to your init.lua file.
If anyone is interested in my changes to, or my implementation of the ide.lua script, you can take a look at my repo Timmiej93 / QuinLED / Program code.
In fact there's a class for that to implement OTA i the NodeMCU its called the ESPhttpUpdate you can refer to ESPhttpUpdate for further details.
I am currently encoutering a very strange problem. In one of my applications I use OpenSSL and Indy in order to create a secure TCP connection to a host. I wanted to test if the application (and Indy) are recognizing if the OpenSSL-libraries are missing. Those libraries are placed inside the application folder.
The strange thing is that my application still works fine even though I have removed the libraries. I also removed OpenSSL itself from my computer and searched for any other appearance of the OpenSSL-libraries. There are no OpenSSL-libraries on my computer.
So what is going on? I call the Load() method from IndyOpenSSLHeader in order to load the libraries and guess what...they are loading perfectly. How can this be? There are no libraries on my computer ^^
Btw I did NOT set up a custom library path. I am using the default one which - as far as I know - should be the application folder.
I am using Delphi XE5 and Indy 10 for me application.
What is wrong here?
Thanks in advance!
If you are on iOS then Indy links to OpenSSL statically. On any other platform, there is no possible way that Indy can successfully use OpenSSL SSL/TLS without loading its library files first, so they have to be getting loaded from somewhere you missed. If you are running on Windows, use Process Explorer to see where they are actually being loaded from.
Indy defaults to using the OS search path to load external libraries. The OS defaults to looking in the app's folder, but it can also look in other places as well. You can use Indy's IdOpenSSLSetLibPath() function to specify where you want OpenSSL loaded from (there is a similar function for ZLib - IdZLibSetLibPath()). This is good to ensure your app loads the libraries only from your app's folder and nowhere else, in case someone maliciously deletes the libraries from your app's folder in an attempt to trick it into loading the libraries from another path on the OS's search path. It is also good for testing purposes if you just want to see how your app reacts when the libraries are missing, without having to actually delete them.
They may be statically linked into your binary.
Also, there is a lot of places where SSL libraries could be.
See this article (Search Order for Desktop Applications):
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms682586%28v=vs.85%29.aspx
Story:
I have written a HTML Merge Compiler that can merge resource's/assets into one single HTML file (minify it to the max) and compiles Javascript with the google enclosure compiler. I have written this compiler to speed up loading and interpreting the code and to obfuscate the code to protect a little bit (script kiddie protection). Major reason was/is speed and to make it compact.
This is working OK with reliable results and i use this in PhoneGap applications/games. I have also written a javascript library that encapsulate all platforms that works with standard HTML/CSS without the need to change the code, it works also in the browser, with a touchscreen or without or on any device or operating system. Write once, publish many ;-). The idea around it is that is working always, always operate the same but can use device specific things when available but does never fail (when something is not there, for example a vibrate functionality).
Anyway, most frameworks (like PhoneGap) concentrate on Mobile Platforms but i want to port it also to desktop platforms like Windows, OSX and maybe Linux. For Windows I have wrote an Delphi Application that loads the HTML in a TEmbeddedWB object (is Internet Explorer actually) but the 'problem' is that it is only suitable to Windows and IE is not the fastest browser around, especially when it is embedded (do not why it is slower than the browser itself). For example, when i load the compiled code in Firefox and/or Google Chrome it is blazing fast (you do not notice it is javascript ;-)).
EDIT:
Pre release of IE10 for Windows 7 is just launched, installed it and lag is gone!
You can download it from here:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35709
Introduction to my question:
I have tried XULRunner of Mozilla a long time ago but the first time was not a pleasure to me and also i tried it today again but can't get it to work. Get a parse error in the main xul file of the project, window is an undefined entity. ??? I create a sample project like: http://mdn.beonex.com/en/Getting_started_with_XULRunner.html
I do not know what to do about this error. Also i think documentation is not up-to-date? Most documentation is from around 2006.
The question, what i want to know:
Before i am going to waste my time (see also introduction), is it
possible to create frameless (full-screen) desktop executables with
use of XULRunner like with PhoneGap?
Is it possible to create cross-platform applications with XULRunner, i mean, does it really work seamless. Where can i find a ready-to-publish example of a XULRunner project and is it possible to load local HTML file(s) like in PhoneGap?
It is possible and allowed to access external resources?
Long story, but maybe there is somebody that have tried this before and can lead me to choose the right direction.
is it possible to create frameless (full-screen) desktop executables with use of XULRunner like with PhoneGap?
Yes. You use disablechrome attribute to remove the window frame and sizemode="maximized" to have it open full-screen. Alternatively you can use the full-screen API if you want your application to run in a normal window and only switch to full-screen mode on request.
Is it possible to create cross-platform applications with XULRunner
Yes. There are things like menus that work very differently on OS X but most of the time you don't need to care what operating system your application runs on (Windows, Linux and Mac OS X supported).
Where can i find a ready-to-publish example of a XULRunner project
See documentation for a XULRunner application example. For "ready-to-publish" you would need an installer which doesn't come with the platform.
is it possible to load local HTML file(s) like in PhoneGap?
Yes. The top-level window has to be XUL but you can use some very minimal code here - essentially a single <iframe flex="1"/> tag. You can load HTML pages into that frame then.
It is possible and allowed to access external resources?
Yes, XULRunner applications have full privileges and can access files on disk as well as web resources without any restrictions.
I have a Delphi VCL application which I'm using to show some pictures and I would like to know if there is any possibility to transform it into a browser plugin (like firefox, google chrome etc ) in order to load it remotely, like a java applet.
for all of them the answer is NO. even for IE it is sometimes difficult...VCL applications means win32/64 development in general, browsers are more 'related' to web development. you can reconsider and try to resolve this by using an already existing platform which can be easily integrated into web browsers like Shockwave (yeah, I don't like to give links to wikipedia...) or another similar tool.
You can use VirtualUI from CybeleSoft to run your Windows app in a browser. You still need to set up your backend server with database etc, and make sure that some operations are blocked - you don't want someone to browse through your server files ;-)
There are options:
ActiveX plugin (you might need to enable ActiveX support in browser or use a special plugin to enable it)
NPAPI plugin (will be deprecated in Chrome in late 2014). See question: How to embed Delphi VCL form into HTML page using NPAPI?
Take a look at the samples on Raudus. It might be what you are looking for. It will be interesting for you to read this about VCL compatible component set for the web.
Using the default TWebBrowser makes things easy to embed a web browser. Unfortunately the one that comes in by default is IE<n>.
I'm wondering how does one integrate a Gecko or WebKit one.
Are there VCL examples somewhere?
If not, how would one go about doing it?
Where's the best place to find the core for Gecko and/or WebKit in an embeddable format?
TWebBrowser is IE. It is not a plugable construction for browsers. You can have other browsers integrated in your application. See
http://www.adamlock.com/mozilla/
http://delphi.mozdev.org/articles/taming_the_lizard_with_delphi.html
http://ftp.newbielabs.com/Delphi%20Gecko%20SDK/
Time has moved on
This answer is from '08 and since then time has moved on. The links don't work anymore and there are probably better alternatives now.
A viable alternative is CEF - Chromium Embedded Framework which encapsulates the Chromium browser which by itself encapsulates WebKit. This library is provided as plain DLLs with an exported C API.
There's a delphi interface available at code.google.com/p/delphichromiumembedded
I've been using it with my own interface implementation and works great, though not so easy to properly use as THTML or IE, but great for whoever needs a powerful and embeddable browser.
Edit: Lars beat me to it, unfortunately
Well there is an ActiveX control based on the Gecko engine that tries to present an exact copy of the IWebBrowser API (which TWebBrowser uses).
You can find it here: http://www.iol.ie/~locka/mozilla/control.htm
Unfortunately it looks like it hasn't been updated in a while. The last version is based on Gecko 1.7.12 and I believe Gecko is currently up to 1.9.x (used in Firefox 3)
An alternative is THTMLViewer component. I have used this for some years.
This is now available free. the web siteis here http://pbear.com/htmlviewers.html. According to the songbeamer web site (http://www.songbeamer.com/delphi/) there is a Delphi 2009 version available.
Over the last three years I have come across very little in the way of embedding Gecko in Delphi. One library that showed up fairly late in the game (for me) was the GeckoSDK project on SourceForge. I did a lot of work early on trying to make embedded Gecko work correctly in Delphi. Our first attempt at a Gecko rendering engine based internal "browser" was built using Delphi and Gecko 1.8. We have since moved on and our browser is now a XULRunner application. I have pieces of code laying around on my hard drive yet from that early attempt that I have not deleted yet.
When Mozilla releases Gecko 2.0 I think it will become a lot easier to embed in Delphi. The XPCOM object system in Gecko makes it very difficult to embed because most everything returns an NS_RESULT. Strings especially were hard.
edit: I just looked through my old bookmarks (almost all of which are dead) and searched for a new url for the Japanese language "bagel" browser based on Gecko and found it here,
http://github.com/plus7/bagel/tree/master/Legacy.
This is probably your best bet for some excellent code to start from. Unfortunately the comments in the code are Japanese and the author never responded to questions.