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Author Topic: Help Needed(Closed)  (Read 8937 times)

JLWest

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Help Needed(Closed)
« on: March 03, 2021, 11:05:09 pm »
Need to find out if this runs or a UNIX and/Mack

Win 10 should work.

Unzip in one dir and edit the Config.txt to match where it was unziped (hopefully).

Thanks.

The help file isn't 100% correct.
« Last Edit: March 07, 2021, 05:24:40 pm by JLWest »
FPC 3.2.0, Lazarus IDE v2.0.4
 Windows 10 Pro 32-GB
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MarkMLl

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #1 on: March 03, 2021, 11:16:54 pm »
Please give us some indication of what it does and what resources it requires.

sudo rm -rf / is frowned upon :-)

MarkMLl
MT+86 & Turbo Pascal v1 on CCP/M-86, multitasking with LAN & graphics in 128Kb.
Pet hate: people who boast about the size and sophistication of their computer.
GitHub repositories: https://github.com/MarkMLl?tab=repositories

JLWest

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #2 on: March 03, 2021, 11:51:06 pm »
It just needs the FreePascal directory mapped in Config.txt and the install directory mapped in Installation.txt

Both of these files are in yourinstalldirectory/files

The freepascal directory is the dataset.

If it runs clicjk on Dataset then sidebar select freepascal and click on the Set button.

From there just click on the freepascal items use help
FPC 3.2.0, Lazarus IDE v2.0.4
 Windows 10 Pro 32-GB
 Intel i7 770K CPU 4.2GHz 32702MB Ram
GeForce GTX 1080 Graphics - 8 Gig
4.1 TB

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #3 on: March 04, 2021, 10:49:56 am »
My specs:
OS: Ubuntu 20.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus/FPC: Trunk rev 64674

It doesn't work until:
Code: Pascal  [Select][+][-]
  1.  Procedure TForm1.VerifyInstallPath;
  2.   Var
  3.    Found : Boolean = False;
  4.    Path  : String;
  5.   begin
  6. {$IFDEF WINDOWS}
  7.    Path := INSTALLPATH + 'QuickList.exe';
  8. {$ELSE}
  9.    Path := INSTALLPATH + 'QuickList';
  10. {$ENDIF}
  11.    Found := FileExists( Path );
  12.    if ( Not Found ) then begin Halt; end;
  13.  end;
  14.  

And see attached screenshot.
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #4 on: March 04, 2021, 10:55:42 am »
And if I cross-compile to i386-win32, see attached screenshot under wine.

PS: Is it supposed to be this disorganized?
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #5 on: March 04, 2021, 11:01:32 am »
It also doesn't help when you LowerCase() all the file paths because Linux/*nix has a case sensitive file system.
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #6 on: March 04, 2021, 11:59:10 am »
Hey there,

Could you please put this on GitHub of some other site where we can do Pull Requests to help you with your code?

It feels like it's very Windows centric and it will need a ton of cleanup if you want it to be cross-platform.

I can give some help with Linux, since that's what I code in, but I can't give you any help with macOS, sorry.

Cheers,
Gus
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

MarkMLl

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #7 on: March 04, 2021, 12:28:22 pm »
Could you please put this on GitHub of some other site where we can do Pull Requests to help you with your code?

I'd suggest that for something of uncertain use that needs as much fettling as this does Dropbox would be more appropriate. It hardly shows our favourite development tools in a good light, and it would be unfortunate if somebody stumbled across it and assumed that it was the best this community had to offer.

MarkMLl
MT+86 & Turbo Pascal v1 on CCP/M-86, multitasking with LAN & graphics in 128Kb.
Pet hate: people who boast about the size and sophistication of their computer.
GitHub repositories: https://github.com/MarkMLl?tab=repositories

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #8 on: March 04, 2021, 01:11:00 pm »
Hey Mark,

I'd suggest that for something of uncertain use that needs as much fettling as this does Dropbox would be more appropriate. It hardly shows our favourite development tools in a good light, and it would be unfortunate if somebody stumbled across it and assumed that it was the best this community had to offer.

Yes the code if god awful to look at and the UI screams of... well it just screams at you, doesn't it, but I'm not gonna deny help on those parameters.
I will, nonetheless, deny help if I have to work without any VCS support. And Dropbox is a very sh*tty VCS.

Cheers,
Gus
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

JLWest

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #9 on: March 04, 2021, 09:27:10 pm »
@ gcarreno
Incorporated your VerifyInstallPath, Work great thanks.

This attached zip shows the 1. Opening form and 2. Normal operations form.
This is how it looks or Win 10

 
FPC 3.2.0, Lazarus IDE v2.0.4
 Windows 10 Pro 32-GB
 Intel i7 770K CPU 4.2GHz 32702MB Ram
GeForce GTX 1080 Graphics - 8 Gig
4.1 TB

JLWest

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #10 on: March 04, 2021, 09:42:26 pm »
It also doesn't help when you LowerCase() all the file paths because Linux/*nix has a case sensitive file system.

Linux has a case sensitive file system. If everything is lowercase why would that create a problem. I think I'm consistent. Everything on disk is lowercase. When I create or load files they are always lowercase. Display is whatever the user specifies for names.
FPC 3.2.0, Lazarus IDE v2.0.4
 Windows 10 Pro 32-GB
 Intel i7 770K CPU 4.2GHz 32702MB Ram
GeForce GTX 1080 Graphics - 8 Gig
4.1 TB

JLWest

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #11 on: March 04, 2021, 10:23:14 pm »
Hey Mark,

I'd suggest that for something of uncertain use that needs as much fettling as this does Dropbox would be more appropriate. It hardly shows our favourite development tools in a good light, and it would be unfortunate if somebody stumbled across it and assumed that it was the best this community had to offer.

Yes the code if god awful to look at and the UI screams of... well it just screams at you, doesn't it, but I'm not gonna deny help on those parameters.
I will, nonetheless, deny help if I have to work without any VCS support. And Dropbox is a very sh*tty VCS.

Cheers,
Gus

In defense of the UI design.

First you have to look at it as it should appear. A Screen shot was posted.
if you are looking up a Free Pascal item just click on the name "ContainsText".

It's displayed. What could be simpler?

It has a two level UI design. Items are either a main item or a sub item. Sub items have lower level items.

It also allows for unlimited items and will handle duplicate names. You can have an Insert under Listbox and one under String.

'Audit' will check the data items.'
'Delete' allow deletions of items, subitems,
'Edit' will allow you to edit any item.
'Save' is used in some operations and is displayed 'Red' when active.
'New' allows the creation of new main item.
'New Sub' allows the creation of new sub with a single sub item.
'New SI' allows the creation of a new Sub Item.
'Rename' allows the rename of a item or Sub
'Set' Activates the Selected DataSet. You can have unlimited, phone book, passwords ect.
'Index' displays every item on the system, its location on the system and the FPC use clause system.
'MM' is just the 'Main Menu' Items
'AllTags' Same as Index displayed in the LBWork listbox.
'To CVS' builds CVS files out of ALLTags
NEW DS creates a new DataSet - Phone Book
X DS Deletes a DataSet.

Upper right hand corner. 
 Click help after clicking any other button and it will display help. You can edit the help file as save by clicking the small 'f' icon next to the  help button.

No the UI isn't windows compliant. It meant for a quick lookup and easy access of information.

Now I don't have to use Google, SourceForge and Wiki for FreePascal Documentation.

Another advantage is finding information on a FPC function or procedure, like 'Pos'.
 
Click on 'Index' scrool to Pos. On this system its in strings but it in 'system' of FPC.

As for the bad code. 'No defense, no apologies'.

At this point I don't know what I'm going to do with this other that I use it every day for FPC reference.
 

FPC 3.2.0, Lazarus IDE v2.0.4
 Windows 10 Pro 32-GB
 Intel i7 770K CPU 4.2GHz 32702MB Ram
GeForce GTX 1080 Graphics - 8 Gig
4.1 TB

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #12 on: March 05, 2021, 10:15:03 am »
Hey JL,

Linux has a case sensitive file system. If everything is lowercase why would that create a problem. I think I'm consistent. Everything on disk is lowercase. When I create or load files they are always lowercase. Display is whatever the user specifies for names.

You're only thinking about your code, your directory choices, that's a tad blind to the environment around you (not to mention user input), but that's for another talk, nevermind.

Specifically I decided to drop your code under /home/gcarreno/Downloads/QL, which means that I edited the files to have full paths and not relative paths.
So when you LowerCase() all your path strings, my /home/gcarreno/Downloads/QL is now /home/gcarreno/downloads/ql, and that for any case sensitive file system is 2 different paths. You do know what case sensitive means right?

On Windows /home/gcarreno/Downloads/QL and /home/gcarreno/downloads/ql are the same paths because NTFS is case insensitive.
On any Linux/*nix /home/gcarreno/Downloads/QL and /home/gcarreno/downloads/ql are different paths because most, if not all, the filesystems are case sensitive.

Do you now understand?

Cheers,
Gus
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #13 on: March 05, 2021, 10:34:13 am »
Hi JL,

@ gcarreno
Incorporated your VerifyInstallPath, Work great thanks.

You're quite welcome!
After a while it hit me, why are you looking for yourself under the folder where the Operating System launched your app. It's like making sure that you see yourself in front of a mirror, or touching yourself to make sure you exist.
In any system, this will only fail if you're looking for the wrong thing, like you were, so it makes no sense.
You already have the Application.Location folder, which you use in VerifyInstallPath(), so why look for the executable?
Wouldn't make more sense to look for the files folder and to see if there are files there?
And you don't even do anything with the fact that you can't find yourself, you just exit, again, what?!?!?!?

This attached zip shows the 1. Opening form and 2. Normal operations form.
This is how it looks or Win 10

Sorry, but that UI is still quite awful. It looks like the version of a good UI but for a person with vision impairment. I have quite a high level of Myopia and Astigmatism, so I'm not being ableist, it's just that awful, sorry.
When you do a UI, it should be compliant with normal standards first and then you can have an Accessibility modifier, not the other way round.
And to be honest it really doesn't differ from the my Ubuntu version, apart from what's known about gtk skewing buttons, labels and edits sizes and fonts.

Cheers,
Gus
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

Gustavo 'Gus' Carreno

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Re: Help Needed
« Reply #14 on: March 05, 2021, 11:07:29 am »
Hi JL,

In defense of the UI design.

First you have to look at it as it should appear. A Screen shot was posted.

I've already commented on the UI looks on another reply.

if you are looking up a Free Pascal item just click on the name "ContainsText".

{Very long winded explanation of something that should be intuitive}

From what I've seen from looking at a bit of your code and now this long winded explanation, you're making the user do stuff that you could do in programming.
I don't think the notion of "programming to ease human life" as quite sunk into you.
Why does the user have to click on the button Dataset? This should be a check on FormCreate() or implemented via the very intuitive File->Load paradigm.
Why is information flow form right to left, when most of the standards make it left to right? Is this a eastern/asian focused application?
If you look at most standard UIs, you'll have a TListBox on the left with your options and then the info panel on the right, right?

And lastly, your UI should thrive to be intuitive, not the kind of UI that doesn't have Main Menus, Context SubMenus and has to be explained by 15+ paragraphs.

At this point I don't know what I'm going to do with this other that I use it every day for FPC reference.

The point I'm trying to make is: If this is a tool YOU use and YOU are comfortable with, keep at it and that's all right. It's your baby, you love it no matter what other's say.
BUT If you're gonna release it into the wild, then you have to take criticism like all the rest of us.
Conventions were invented to normalise our day to day usage of things, that's why Microsoft invests million in studies about UIs.
Then we all, in the wild, read them, understand them and IMPLEMENT them, because we want to be kind to our users.
But we also want to be kind to our fellow programmers because we want our babies to be maintained after we die, or leave a company, so we also have nice looking and READABLE code.

All that I've criticised about your UI and code should not be taken as a personal attack, just a though love approach to make you consider getting out of your blinders and pay attention to the world around you.

MarkMLI was right when he said that your app is not the best this community has to offer. He said that because of your complete disregard of the standards that have been agreed and fought over the years by more intelligent and kinder programmers that came before us.

So in conclusion, if you want this little utility app to be accepted, first you'll have to comply with standards and then explain, to all of us, why your thing is better than the self-updating resources that we have now?

Cheers,
Gus
Lazarus 3.99(main) FPC 3.3.1(main) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
Lazarus 3.0.0(stable) FPC 3.2.2(stable) Ubuntu 23.10 64b Dark Theme
http://github.com/gcarreno

 

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