[Solved] What did I do to TortoiseSVN???

[BigChimp]

Background: fpc and Lazarus are different projects. That's why you have both an fpc.cfg specifying paths and a Lazarus options screen (saved IIRC in environmentoptions.xml in the Laz primary config dir)...

[Avishai]

I knew that FPC & Lazarus were separate projects.  But I didn't know about FPC.cfg until late yesterday when Martin_fr told me about it.  It's like having the secret handshake.  And it still doesn't seem right that you have to hand edit FPC.cfg to get this arrangement to work.  And it doesn't explain what went wrong to begin with.  I'm OK with relocating the FPC dir outside the Lazarus dir but I don't understand why having it in the Lazarus dir would cause it to fail after months of working 'prefectly'.  Even now after following Martin_fr's directions, there are files that are not part of SVN Checkout.  Like mingw dir and Lazarus.exe and lazarus.old.exe.

The bottom line though is that I'm back up and running again thanks to Martin_fr's help so I'm a very happy old man. 

[BigChimp]

With mingw you mean the debugger? AFAIR, that's part of another repository:
http://svn.freepascal.org/svn/lazarus/binaries/

Lazarus.exe and lazarus.old.exe are not part of the SVN repository because they're not source files.
What if they were part of the repository? they would need to change (be recompiled and uploaded to the repo) every time another file in the repository changed...
Edit: Additionally, every lazarus.exe can be different because packages get compiled in. The packages you want may not be what everybody else wants

<advertisement>My fpcup downloader/installer gets all this stuff for you from svn. You're welcome to try it out; by default it installs under c:\development, leaving any other Lazarus/FPC installations alone</advertisement>

[Avishai]

Oh I'm not disagreeing.  I'm just not understanding.  I probably misunderstood what Martin_fr was trying so hard to explain, but I got the impression that he was of the opinion that it failed because having the FPC dir inside the LazSVN dir was somehow 'contaminating' the SVN process because it wasn't part of SVN Update.  Anyway, FPC dir is separate now as C:\FPC and I have C:\LazSVN and everything seems to be working as before so I'm happy.

So now it's back to trying to figure out why Wind32Themes and Mirroring can't coexist.  They do in MSVisual Studio and Delphi XE3, so they should be able to in Lazarus.  If I or anyone else can fix that, Lazarus can become a true 'ambidextrous' development tool for LeftToRight or RightToLeft.  Mirroring solves 'almost' all RightToLeft issues, but only with Themes disabled.

[Martin_fr]

And it still doesn't seem right that you have to hand edit FPC.cfg to get this arrangement to work.

You do not normally have too. But as I said. SVN is an EXPERT option.

You could also have gone to the FPC page, and downloaded an fpc only installer.

[/quote]  And it doesn't explain what went wrong to begin with.  I'm OK with relocating the FPC dir outside the Lazarus dir but I don't understand why having it in the Lazarus dir would cause it to fail after months of working 'prefectly'.
[/quote]

AI also said that it *can* work with fpc in the lazarus, but that in
- adds resource usage
- is inconvenient when trouble arrives (even if the trouble is something else)
- that the help you get, will expect that it is outside. Because that is what people think when you say svn (did not write that last one before)

My guess of what is wrong is, that it was related to your way of "converting" a snapshot install into an svn checkout...
Again possible (apparently) but it opens a lot of doors for problems.

The end is, if you (who obviously is not a major svn expert) use SVN (which is ok) then do in the expected way. Since it will take even more expertise to deal with other ways.
Even if they seem easier in the beginning. To quote a famous (in England) musical): "nothing's yours on easy terms" (If you buy on credit, you have to pay the rates later, or you will loose the goods).

[BigChimp]

So now it's back to trying to figure out why Wind32Themes and Mirroring can't coexist.  They do in MSVisual Studio and Delphi XE3, so they should be able to in Lazarus.  If I or anyone else can fix that, Lazarus can become a true 'ambidextrous' development tool for LeftToRight or RightToLeft.  Mirroring solves 'almost' all RightToLeft issues, but only with Themes disabled.

<just throwing out more suggestions>

Hmmm. Would looking at how other open source applications do this help at all (e.g. LibreOffice has RTL  functionality, IIRC)?

You might also ask at a Microsoft developer forum (e.g. a WinAPI or C++ forum)... who knows, perhaps there's an easy solution.

Searching the forums gives hits like
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vcgeneral/thread/057612e7-6cd4-44cf-a746-6370ace5de09
but no idea how useful they are?

[Avishai]

Thanks Martin_fr, as I said before I bow to your better understanding of SVN.  And you are absolutely right that I am not an SVN expert.  I doubt I even rate a novice level.  I wouldn't use it at all except that some of the updates directly impact what I am working on.

More than once I have been struggling to 'fix' a RightToLeft isssue and see a post on the Forum or in Bugtracker, do an Update, and the issue is solved.

[Avishai]

Thanks for the idea BigChimp.  I may take a look and LibreOffice but I doubt it will shed much light on the issue.  The problem with mirroring and Themes is with the Canvas and as far as I know the canvas is purely FPC/Lazarus.  But it won't hurt to look.  Who knows, maybe something will fall into place.

[marcov]

Hmmm. Would looking at how other open source applications do this help at all (e.g. LibreOffice has RTL  functionality, IIRC)?

I doubt libreoffice is a native app?
 

[Avishai]

I just took a look and looks like LibreOffice is descended from OpenOffice.

[BigChimp]

@marco: it is native, written in C++ IIRC. Parts of it are Java, probably implemented back when Sun thought everything should be Java. Efforts are underway to get rid of the Java part, and it is usable without Java (IIRC, the db module used Java, and jdbc connectors etc).

See e.g.
http://docs.libreoffice.org/
and
http://docs.libreoffice.org/vcl.html

IIRC, it does use (or did use) Qt on OSX; no idea if this still is true.

@Avishai: yes, LibreOffice was forked from OpenOffice.org during Oracle's stewardship of OpenOffice. Since then OpenOffice.org has been transferred to the Apache foundation.
LibreOffice seems to be much more active, open and provides more frequent releases.

[marcov]

@marco: it is native, written in C++ IIRC.

I meant native GUI, iow using GDI for most of its GUI on Windows. Since if it is owner drawn, how it achieves LTR is irrelevant for Lazarus-win32-win32

Parts of it are Java, probably implemented back when Sun thought everything should be Java. Efforts are underway to get rid of the Java part, and it is usable without Java (IIRC, the db
module used Java, and jdbc connectors etc).

Libreoffice can be run without Java afaik, if you forget about base and some other minor functionality.

[BigChimp]

@marco: it is native, written in C++ IIRC.

I meant native GUI, iow using GDI for most of its GUI on Windows. Since if it is owner drawn, how it achieves LTR is irrelevant for Lazarus-win32-win32

Yes. See e.g.
http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.documentfoundation.libreoffice.devel/45981
edit: search for gdi. Shows there's GDI in their cross-platform toolkit (amusingly called VCL)

Parts of it are Java, probably implemented back when Sun thought everything should be Java. Efforts are underway to get rid of the Java part, and it is usable without Java (IIRC, the db
module used Java, and jdbc connectors etc).

Libreoffice can be run without Java afaik, if you forget about base and some other minor functionality.

Ehm yes, that's what I just said I think.

[Avishai]

I took a look at LibreOffice on Youtube and it can display RightToLeft languages correctly but it is simply implementing BiDiMode.  Lazarus already has some BiDi support although it needs more.  But displaying text is only part of the issue of RightToLeft.  TPageControl is an example.  You can set BiDiMode:= bdRightToLeft and it will display R2L language correctly, but the Tab remain on the Left.  For true R2L, the Tabs must be on the Right.  Also the TForm itself must be R2L, at least under MSWindows.  Even a calendar is R2L.

Some Lazarus components can be made R2L by setting BiDiMode, but many of them can not be.  Mirroring (under MSWindows) takes care of this for most components and is the 'correct' way according to MS.  Mirroring swaps TWinControl canvas Left and Right.  In other word Left is in the top RIGHT corner and Right is the top LEFT corner.