Lazarus Release Candidate 1 of 2.2.0

[prof7bit]

Please create a bug report.

https://gitlab.com/freepascal.org/lazarus/lazarus/-/issues/39388

[prof7bit]

I identified two consecutive commits on the fixes branch:

2019-05-01 90ecaf0 broken
2019-05-01 ff9c822 OK

Btw: I needed FPC 3.0 to build these old versions, could not get it to build with 3.2

[prof7bit]

For some strange reason the bug will NOT disappear if I use current fixes and just revert 90ecaf0, it won't make any difference.

But it will work reliably when I checkout the complete source tree of ff9c822 and build it and the bug will come into existence when I checkout the immediately following 90ecaf0 and build it.

[BSaidus]

Hi,
Execuse me for this but, I'll ask anyway 

     1. WHEN WILL BE THE RELEASE, please.
     2. WILL this release support (FreePascal) cross build for aarch64-FreeBSD ??

I'm excited .

[PascalDragon]

     2. WILL this release support (FreePascal) cross build for aarch64-FreeBSD ??

Support for aarch64-freebsd is only available in the development version of FPC. If you install 3.3.1 you can use aarch64-freebsd already now.

[Martin_fr]

     1. WHEN WILL BE THE RELEASE, please.

We are running a bit behind....

[Milsa]

Do you planning RC2 or final release?

[12398890]

     1. WHEN WILL BE THE RELEASE, please.

We are running a bit behind....

what's the situation now? when will be the release?

[PascalDragon]

what's the situation now? when will be the release?

The release will be when it's finished. Questioning about it doesn't speed up things.

[Martin_fr]

when will be the release?

There are currently time restraints with some individuals from the build team. This makes it harder to coordinate things. Hence the actual release process has made very little advances since we announced.

I am afraid, it may be another couple of weeks...

[trev]

Like any sane programmer, I'd rather it is released when it is ready and not before :-)

For those who can't wait for some reason, ther4e's always fixes and main (trunk) branches for your programming delight.

[JuhaManninen]

The fixes_2_2 branch is ready for release, meaning serious crash bugs have been fixed and there is no pending work with any issue.
Some minor bugs may get fixed before the release build actually happens, but the fixes_2_2 branch can now be recommended for everybody. It is easy to build with FPC 3.2.2 on common platforms.

[dbannon]

I am seriously sorry to raise this issue this late in the process. But its prompted by the recent release of Ubuntu 21.10.  For some time now, the Lazarus SysTray has worked in two modes on Linux, either using the traditional SysTray or, added a few years ago, the AppIndicator model.  Sensibly, we test for the existence of traditional system tray and default to it if it looks OK to do so. 

On most current distributions, that test fails and they end up using the AppIndicator.  Ubuntu and its derivatives has been an exception, the test says "Yep, I can do Traditional SysTray" and it does it, well, until now.

Sadly, the release of Ubuntu 21.10 has broken that pattern. It claim to be able to use the SysTray and while it displays the icon, the popup menu appears in what seems a random place. Its a Wayland issue IMHO.

I believe that the solution is to change the default, U2110 and most current distributions can do the AppIndicator fine and its probably time that happened. Some old installs will have trouble with that approach, I suggest there will be many, many times more U2110 (and derivatives) users than people using, for example, Ubuntu 16.04.

The AppIndicator model works fine for other major distributions I have tested, Fedora, SUSE, Debian.

The default decision, which ever it is, can be overridden by setting an env variable before starting a Lazarus app, eg LAZUSEAPPIND=YES   (or NO, INFO).

So, my question is, should I rush a quick change to the default decision, choosing AppIndicators instead of traditional SysTray to try to get into Lazarus 2.2 or not ?  It will involve no really new code, just a reversal of the decision about which path to choose first.

And, yes, I have logged a bug report with Launchpad, I did so several weeks ago when I saw this problem in a beta release. No response ....

Davo

[dbannon]

Further to my question about Linux SysTray -

I have attached a patch and tested my suggested solution on current Ubuntu 21.10 Gnome and Mate, Debian Bullseye Gnome and Mate, Fedora 34 Gnome and on older systems, Ubuntu 16.04, MXLinux 193 (KDE and XFCe)

All appear to work as expected. The older systems can use the AppIndicator model "out of the box", they have the Unity Based AppIndicator installed and can be forced back to the traditional System Tray with the env var.  Newer systems seem to be using the Ayatana AppIndicator and most do not work as expected when forced back to traditional System Tray.

Please remember that the Traditional System Tray was a richer model than AppIndicator provides, the recommendation, for some time now, has been to use only a popup menu, no right click, no animation in the icon etc. Don't blame me, its the Gnome people and their preference for a "simpler UI"

For sake of discussion, if we don't make this change, anyone using System Tray on Ubuntu 21.10 and later will need to start their apps with

Code: Bash  [Select][+][-]

1. LAZUSEAPPIND=YES ./myapp <enter>

Try telling your end users about that !  In some (actually very few today) cases, this is a change in behavour, so a 2.2 release is when it should happen. There is every reason to assume it must happen sooner or later.

EDIT: My patch does not introduce any new code. It removes a test where we ask X if it can do traditional systray and alters the debug messages that appear only when EnvVar is used. From memory, that X test was controversial when I added it to the unit a year or so ago. It was then intended (by me) to only be transitional.

EDIT2 : sorry, a hunk fails in that patch, I had a debug statement I forgot about.  So SysTray.patch works but does not clean out unnecessary code.  The new, SysTray21a.patch does a better job !
Davo

[JuhaManninen]

And, yes, I have logged a bug report with Launchpad, I did so several weeks ago when I saw this problem in a beta release. No response ....

Where is the bug report?  I cannot find it in the tracker:
 https://gitlab.com/freepascal.org/lazarus/lazarus/-/issues
What is Launchpad?