Lazarus 1.2 Release

[marcov]

Where can I download a Lazarus 1.2 with 2.6.4 ? 

At the link where you prepared fpc-2.6.4 binaries 

Can't find them on http://www.freepascal.org/download.var

As for the synchronization, it surprises me every time how planning and final release differ. We really don't need more planning, we need more sticking to planning.

[BigChimp]

Haven't seen an FPC 2.4 announcement on the forum here yet either.... 

[marcov]

Haven't seen an FPC 2.4 announcement on the forum here yet either.... 

Fixed.

[JuhaManninen]

I'm trying to re-produce the error since morning, I have installed Linux Mint (Latest version) and installed Lazarus from repositories, at first it gives error indicating that some packages has installed but not configured, and rebuilding failed because of non-writablelinux4sudan2
 directory permission

Now I can see your attachments. There was a config problem in some forum profiles. Good.

Are you sure the error comes when you rebuild Lazarus during installing packages or using Tools menu?
The initial installation from .deb package must be done with sudo obviously.

[GADZombie]

New Lazarus is installed and works fine. I have some observations:

Backup directory:
When default backup directory has subfolder (i.e. backup\files\) and this folder doesn't exist whole IDE crashes everytime it tries to save backup file. There is messagebox with error and ability to retry or ignore, but no matter what I will choose, it will crash then.

---

I have installed new Lazarus into old Lazarus path. Installer has uninstalled old version and installed new one. When IDE was run first time, it hasn't find my installed additional components. It was not on the component palette. But in Package->install/uninstall packages I can see those packages and it has green "plus" icon. The problem is I wish to install it and rebuild Lazarus, but the button to rebuild is disabled! To install them all I had to open manually my package, click 'compile' and 'rebuild' to make it work. Button for rebuilding should always be enabled.

---

When rebuilding Lazarus, there are some files made in Temp directory and left forever. It has name 'unit1.pas' and so on. There is also a backup folder made for those files. I know it because it failed to create it automatically (as I mentioned above) and I had to create it there on my own.


As for now other things looks ok. Lazarus works fine and is great! I think now the most important thing is to:
1) Create better debugging. This is what is much better in Delphi than in Lazarus. There must be a way to run functions during debugging to show their return value. Values returned by object method must be calculated and visible. Without this debugging is terrible.
2) In IDE there should be better inspect window to let the user see all values of properties of objects.
3) It will be good if whole layout would be in one window with docked windows rather than floating windows, like now. It's very annoying when you need to have many windows opened.

[valdir.marcos]

Backup directory:
When default backup directory has subfolder (i.e. backup\files\) and this folder doesn't exist whole IDE crashes everytime it tries to save backup file. There is messagebox with error and ability to retry or ignore, but no matter what I will choose, it will crash then.

You should open a bug ticket on http://bugs.freepascal.org/main_page.php

I have installed new Lazarus into old Lazarus path. Installer has uninstalled old version and installed new one. When IDE was run first time, it hasn't find my installed additional components. It was not on the component palette. But in Package->install/uninstall packages I can see those packages and it has green "plus" icon. The problem is I wish to install it and rebuild Lazarus, but the button to rebuild is disabled! To install them all I had to open manually my package, click 'compile' and 'rebuild' to make it work. Button for rebuilding should always be enabled.

You should open another bug ticket.
Have you tried the menu option \Tools\Build Lazarus with Profile: IDE Normal?

When rebuilding Lazarus, there are some files made in Temp directory and left forever. It has name 'unit1.pas' and so on. There is also a backup folder made for those files. I know it because it failed to create it automatically (as I mentioned above) and I had to create it there on my own.

You should open another bug ticket.

As for now other things looks ok. Lazarus works fine and is great! I think now the most important thing is to:
1) Create better debugging. This is what is much better in Delphi than in Lazarus. There must be a way to run functions during debugging to show their return value. Values returned by object method must be calculated and visible. Without this debugging is terrible.

You should open a feature request ticket on http://bugs.freepascal.org/main_page.php

2) In IDE there should be better inspect window to let the user see all values of properties of objects.

You should open another feature request ticket on http://bugs.freepascal.org/main_page.php

3) It will be good if whole layout would be in one window with docked windows rather than floating windows, like now. It's very annoying when you need to have many windows opened.

You can open another feature request ticket, but I - and many other people including many Delphi customers - disagree from you:

Video: How to configure Delphi 2010 to look, work, and feel like Delphi 7
"During my Delphi 2010 IDE videos I presented the return of Delphi 7 Component Toolbar. I received some questions about how to change the IDE layout to work like Delphi 7, below a Delphi 2010 screen shot reproducing the same Delphi 7 layout.":
http://www.andreanolanusse.com/en/how-to-configure-delphi-2010-to-look-work-and-feel-like-delphi-7/

"Delphi 2010 (code-named Weaver, aka Delphi 14; there was no version 13), was released on August 25, 2009 and is the second Unicode release of Delphi. It includes ... and the option to also have the old style component palette in the IDE":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embarcadero_Delphi

RAD Studio 2010 — IDE Features: "Old School" Tool Palette:
http://blogs.embarcadero.com/nickhodges/2009/08/06/39274

"See Enabling the Component Toolbar. See also the blogs "Old School" Tool Palette, by Nick Hodges and How to configure Delphi 2010 to look, work, and feel like Delphi 7, by Andreano Lanusse.":
http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/XE5/en/What%27s_New_in_Delphi_and_C++Builder_2010

http://www.andreanolanusse.com/pt/como-configurar-o-layout-do-delphi-2010-parecer-com-o-do-delphi-7/
http://flylib.com/books/en/2.37.1.12/1/#_/term_http://flylib.com/books/en/2.37.1.12/1/#_/term_

Your solution  is here since 2011-03-28:
v0.9.30 (2011-03-28)
    9.1 Multi Source Editor
    9.2 Docked IDE
    9.3 Code folding with hiding option for Comments
http://wiki.freepascal.org/New_IDE_features_since#Docked_IDE

[Leledumbo]

1) Create better debugging. This is what is much better in Delphi than in Lazarus. There must be a way to run functions during debugging to show their return value. Values returned by object method must be calculated and visible. Without this debugging is terrible.

Feel free to implement that. AFAIK this is due to GDB limitation, though I'm not really sure. Procedure/function should be possible since it's possible with C, but for methods, I guess it will require more effort.

3) It will be good if whole layout would be in one window with docked windows rather than floating windows, like now. It's very annoying when you need to have many windows opened.

3 choices are available already:

• Anchor docking
• Easy dock manager
• KZDesktop

[BigChimp]

As for now other things looks ok. Lazarus works fine and is great! I think now the most important thing is to:
1) Create better debugging. This is what is much better in Delphi than in Lazarus. There must be a way to run functions during debugging to show their return value. Values returned by object method must be calculated and visible. Without this debugging is terrible.

You should open a feature request ticket on http://bugs.freepascal.org/main_page.php

No, that won't help as work to improve debugging in Lazarus is actually ongoing. The people working on it are aware of the issues.

If you want to help, please post an offer for help on the Lazarus mailing lists or forum (probably in a debugger subsection) and the relevant devs will help you.

2) In IDE there should be better inspect window to let the user see all values of properties of objects.

You should open another feature request ticket on http://bugs.freepascal.org/main_page.php

No, see above.

The problems with docking are known as well and there are bug reports open for it.

[JuhaManninen]

... Button for rebuilding should always be enabled.

You should open another bug ticket.
Have you tried the menu option \Tools\Build Lazarus with Profile: IDE Normal?

No need for a ticket as this is by design. You can always build Lazarus from Tools menu.

1) Create better debugging. This is what is much better in Delphi than in Lazarus. There must be a way to run functions during debugging to show their return value. Values returned by object method must be calculated and visible. Without this debugging is terrible.

You should open a feature request ticket on http://bugs.freepascal.org/main_page.php

Don't create such an abstract ticket. It helps nobody, especially because the debugger interface has been improved a lot.
Now there is even a dedicated pascal debugger under construction.
Besides the debugging is pretty good now, I don't understand why you find it terrible. Maybe you tested some old version of Lazarus by mistake.
Only properties with accessor methods are not shown, everything else is (when using dwarf debug info).

3) It will be good if whole layout would be in one window with docked windows rather than floating windows, like now. It's very annoying when you need to have many windows opened.

You can open another feature request ticket, but I - and many other people including many Delphi customers - disagree from you:

No, don't ask him to open yet another duplicate ticket.

And yes, I agree the docking style is mostly a fashion. For example I like to have 2 editor windows that stretch from screen top to bottom, so I can see as much code as possible.
It would be difficult with a docked IDE.

In general it annoys me that so many people have a passion for opening new bug reports but very few people have a passion for solving them.
We could make a new rule that min 10% of bug reports coming from a person must include a patch. ... Ok, not very realistic.

[Martin_fr]

1) Create better debugging. This is what is much better in Delphi than in Lazarus. There must be a way to run functions during debugging to show their return value. Values returned by object method must be calculated and visible. Without this debugging is terrible.
2) In IDE there should be better inspect window to let the user see all values of properties of objects.

All that is on our list already. But none of it is trivial, and none of it is expected to happen soon.

GDB does not support the pascal style function call. So with todays GDB it can not be done.
Maybe / I have not tried: if you declare a function cdecl.... But it will probably create a lot of other issues.

Even if function calls are possible, that will not bring properties. DWARF (and stabs) do not have a way of encoding them (Well maybe the latest dwarf has, dont know). It can be added, or encoded as custom. But then, when it is added fpc needs to create it, and gdb needs to read it.

We are working on a replacement for gdb. But that is still a long way to go. And before we can start adding new features, it must be able to do what current gdb does.

So as much as we really want this. It is just a very long way to go.

[BigChimp]

Even if function calls are possible, that will not bring properties. DWARF (and stabs) do not have a way of encoding them (Well maybe the latest dwarf has, dont know). It can be added, or encoded as custom. But then, when it is added fpc needs to create it, and gdb needs to read it.

Dwarf 3 apparently does support C++ class and that the same support could be used for Pascal as well.... but this is getting out of my depth:
http://www.dwarfstd.org/doc/Debugging%20using%20DWARF.pdf

At least it wasn't enough for the Objective C guys so they wrote an extension:
http://llvm.org/docs/SourceLevelDebugging.html#debugging-information-extension-for-objective-c-properties

Edit: and finally ADA 95 extensions for DWARF2/3 may be informative:
http://redhawk.ccur.com/dwarf/ada95/ada.dwarf.2.pdf

I'll shut up now

[Martin_fr]

I have the dwarf 3 spec here. There is no property support in it. (I also have dwarf 4, but not yet searched it)

the link to object-c: This are user specified extension. Dwarf2 already specifies a range of tags, that can be used freely.

So if we have our own debugger, then fpc ran use those fields. However using those will break debugging with other debuggers.

Also, even if they get into lets say dwarf 5, then gdb needs to support them.

Last gdb I tested with fpc generated dwarf3 was gdb 7.6. It crashed on various watches.

Well it crashes on some dwarf2 too, but it crashed way more, with dwarf3.


So from this, you can make your own guesses, how long, until this will work with gdb .....

As I said we try to create an alternative, but that is not trivial either.

[BigChimp]

Bizarre format if private/language specific extensions blow up the debugger instead of just being ignored... My sympathies

[GADZombie]

Well, there is discussion and it's good. I didn't say "you must do it right now!". I just said it will be good to have those things.
Debugger is not bad, but in Delphi it is much better and all values can be shown. In Lazarus many of them is invisible - I see errors or nothing when I want to show tooltip with value of variable. It works fine for simple types, but for more complex or classes it works bad.

About window layout you are right but docked layout can be good for someone. I was using Delphi 5, 6 and 2010 so I really know how to work in old style and new. I like the new one because all windows can be docked and I can pick any of them using buttons on the edges. In Lazarus I use many opened windows and some of them are hidden under others. To find them I must move other windows or search for option in main menu to show them. This is not handy enough for me. And rather not only for me if there are a few projects that change Lazarus layout to docked windows! This is not fashion! Just every one likes something else. The best solution is to make an option to use old windows or docked windows, like it is in Delphi also. In newer Delphi you can switch between those layouts and this is the best solution.

You are saying that if I tell something is still missing, I should help the programmers to make it. Well... I just can't do it. I don't know how. But I am Lazarus user and I can say it loud what is good for me and what is not, so I did. I hope no one feels offended. It is just my opinion.

Ofcourse I very like Lazarus (I use it only for about half a year), but I use Delphi for more than 10 years and I just feel what is missing in Lazarus. But there are very good things also and that is why I chose Lazarus and I don't want to change it for anything. Rather I wish it will grow and be much better and better.

I'll try those projects that changes to docked windows. I saw one someday but it was pretty old and I read that not everything works fine so I didn't try it. Maybe others are better. But if there is newer version of Lazarus, will it be still working?

[BigChimp]

No problem about showing what your experiences are etc.

The thing is that a lot of people keep repeating what they want without contributing anything as well as without realizing that just repeatedly asking for things does not help.
You do realize that - so no problem

As for those project working with newer versions of Lazarus - try and report on the forum.... I know people tried KZDesktop recently...