Using Lazarus for production systems

[os.garcia.ch]

Hello all,

I have been a developer for quite a while now and I found Lazarus to be a very atractive solution to my needs.  Now, before I dump into it I would like to know from those of you with much more experience than I if Lazarus can be or should be used on production systems, in other words, is lazarus stable enough to create a formal application or should I rely on it mainly for teaching purposes.

I have a couple of applications that running perfectly fine on windows.  But some changes need to be made and I am thinking of using Lazarus.  Theses applications run on Windows XP and access a and MS Access database on a server over the network.  The applications were created with Visual Basic 6.0

Some of the changes that need to be done, for example will be some clients will be using Windows 7, and others Windows XP, the server will be changed to a MySQL or Firebird server and extra modules need to me added to the application.

Would you say Lazarus is stable enough to create such an application?  Thanks in advanced.

Oscar

[Phil]

Try one of the daily snapshots (see link at right). For example, today's:

Lazarus-0.9.29-27722-fpc-2.4.0-20101017-win32.exe

This is probably pretty close to what the forthcoming 0.9.30 + 2.4.2 will look like.

Some platforms are more stable than others. Windows is probably pretty solid. However, a couple of caveats:
 - Try to avoid using ported packages that are not part of the core Lazarus distribution.
 - Avoid COM - this has never worked very well. I don't know how you're accessing your Access db in VB6, but a common way is via COM. However, if you're switching to a different db, you'll use normal library calls, so COM won't be an issue.

If you hit bugs, please report them using the Bugtracker link at left.

Thanks.

-Phil

[Leledumbo]

I don't know how you're accessing your Access db in VB6, but a common way is via COM. However, if you're switching to a different db, you'll use normal library calls, so COM won't be an issue.

We have ODBCConn package actually.

[garlar27]

brudjuz has shared with us a real-life solution with Lazarus, you should read it http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org/index.php/topic,10827.msg53736/topicseen.html

Also, we have made a POS System migrated from FOXPRO. Now our system runs smoothly in Windows and Linux, and it communicates with a server (which is also built with Lazarus) through TCP. For DB connection we use ZEOS-DBO. For TCP connection and Serial Port communication we use Synapse and Synaser.

We are really happy with Lazarus.

[os.garcia.ch]

Thank you all.  Interesting case brudjuz worked on, and I think that is a good example of what Lazarus can do.  I'll start looking into it as Phil said, I will try to stay away from components that do not come with Lazarus, I believe that is the same across any programming language.

Thanks again.

[garlar27]

One more thing... many people who's new to Lazarus try to make functions and procedures for basic things that are already included in Lazarus or in the Free Pascal Compiler so don't forget to check the Wiki, the blogs and here (http://lazarus-ccr.sourceforge.net/ specially http://lazarus-ccr.sourceforge.net/docs/rtl/, http://lazarus-ccr.sourceforge.net/docs/fcl/ and http://lazarus-ccr.sourceforge.net/docs/lcl/)

[rmendoza83]

Hi friend, how are you? because I can give my opinion on the case, lazarus is mature enough for commercial applications of any kind.

For example, I work for a company dedicated to serving the electric power throughout the country, and am in a software development lab specialist. Well, basically my job is to create applications using free software to help serve internal and external to the company.

Since I am the project leader of the laboratory, it gave me the task of choosing the development tools to use and do not hesitate to use any instant in fpc and lazarus without really knowing the potential he had and leaving me by the experience he had with Delphi, coupled with that too the wonderful comments and experiences of users of this community.

Note that among the applications we have developed the most important of all, which discusses a number of stored data recorders tension lines of electric current, is able to detect and generate textually where failures occur and a set of values Electrical allow high-caliber decision so to speak. It is noteworthy that generates reports in PDF templates, explanatory reports with lazreport, connection to a postgresql database, under multiuser connections via TCP / IP, etc etc etc. In short this application is used as a vital tool to respond to the national body electrical failures. In a summary you would recommend for the beginning of a project lazarus following:

- Use non-native components lazarus as Zeoslib (connection to multiple databases), powerpdf (create pdf files), reportman activex (cross-platform report generator).

- If you are migrarte from ms access, to keep the same philosophy of using firebird embedded link.

- Use updated libraries to the database connection and ADO, divorce is a bit ODBC.

Well I'm on hand to support you in ideas and suitability to the tool. Expected to help serve you this comment.

Greetings.

(**********)
...In Spanish...
(**********)

Hola amigo, que tal? pues te puedo dar mi opinion respecto al caso, lazarus esta suficientemente maduro como para realizar aplicaciones comerciales de cualquier tipo.

Por ejemplo, yo trabajo en una empresa dedicada al servicio de la energia electrica de todo el pais, y estoy en un laboratorio de desarrollo de software especializado. Pues basicamente mi tarea es crear aplicaciones utilizando software libre que ayuden a prestar servicios internos y externos a la empresa.

Como soy el lider de proyectos del laboratorio, pues me dieron la tarea de escoger las herramientas de desarrollo a utilizar y no lo dude por ningun instante en utilizar fpc y lazarus sin realmente conocer el potencial que tenia y dejandome llevar por la experiencia que tenia con delphi, aunado a eso tambien los maravillosos comentarios y experiencias de los usuarios de esta comunidad.

Fijate que entre las aplicaciones que se han desarrollado tenemos la mas importante de todas que analiza una serie de datos almacenados en los registradores de las lineas de tension de corriente electrica, es capaz de detectar y generar textualmente donde ocurren las fallas y una serie de valores electricos que permiten tomar decisiones de alto calibre por asi decirlo. Cabe destacar que genera plantillas informes en pdf, reportes explicativos con lazreport, conexion a una base de datos en postgresql, multiusuario bajo conexiones via TCP/IP, etc etc etc. En fin esta aplicacion se utiliza como una herramienta vital para dar respuesta de fallas electricas al ente nacional. En un resumen te recomendaria para el inicio de un proyecto con lazarus lo siguiente:

- Utilizar componentes no nativos de lazarus como: zeoslib (conexion a multiples base de datos), powerpdf (generar archivos pdf), reportman activex (generador de reportes multiplataforma).

- Si vas a migrarte desde ms access, para que mantengas la misma filosofia de conexion utiliza firebird embebido.

- Utiliza librerias actualizadas de conexion a base de datos como ADO, trata de divorciarte un poco de ODBC.

Bueno yo estoy a la orden para apoyarte en ideas y adecuacion a la herramienta. Espera que te sirva de ayuda este comentario.

Saludos.