Delphi new generation VCL

reddwarf · 2011-03-03 22:47:59

In the last month, there was made a very important step in Delphi's development. I am talking about www.ksdev.com - I was about to buy the VGScene units because I wanted to write programs for all platforms - but Codegear was quicker. They did not only buy the components, they bought all intelectual property from ksdev.com. So the dream of using open-source Lazarus with profesional (and relatively cheap) widgets was all gone. The only hope I have is that Codegear will bring Delphi further at last - to my mind there has been more false and strange development since Delphi 7 than real improvement. What a shame that Codegear introduced an out-of-box unicode-ready Delphi 10 years after Microsoft has fully supported it in Windows 2000... When everybody who needed unicode uses TntComponents, which makes porting old code to Delphi 2009+ a nightmare...

I hope that at some point Lazarus will be a real competitor to Delphi. But to my mind it was not a good decision to write the LCL. Some lightweight, easy and complete widgetset would be much better. LCL is just going to be very complicated for custom component writing. Maybe fpGUI at some point...

PS: everybody who wants to see all features of VGScene, use this link: http://www.ksdev.com/vgscene/index.html - the author hasn't deleted the main page yet.

Last edited by reddwarf (2011-03-03 22:49:23)

ab · 2011-03-04 06:31:45

And msegui/mseide is much more advanced than fpGUI for User Interface.
See http://developer.berlios.de/projects/mseide-msegui/
But both lack of MacOS support, which is a mandatory for some projects (if you are targeting outside the business world)...

There is also wxforms - see http://www.twinforms.com/products/wxfor … /index.php
The problem is that it's closed source, and there is no way of implementing its own components yet...
And... there is no update since some months now...
But for a simple UI, it works very well, with native look & feel!
If only it was released as Open Source, we could perhaps enhance it!

mse · 2011-03-09 06:12:19

ab wrote:

But both lack of MacOS support, which is a mandatory for some projects (if you are targeting outside the business world)...

If there are enough sponsors that can be changed. ;-)

Martin

ab · 2011-03-09 08:00:20

Since they are Open Source project, they just need some competent programmer which needs the MacOS feature, to implement it for the community...

Both FPC and mse are nice work.
MseGui is very well designed.

reddwarf · 2011-03-09 18:37:34

I tried MSEgui some months ago and I wasn't very impressed by the whole usability. But maybe it's because I just didn't go very deeply into it. As I see, the project is updated quite often, so I'll have to give it another try.

mse · 2011-03-09 20:16:12

Normally such comments about MSEide+MSEgui are caused because people forget to download and install the development environment. Please read README.TXT.

ab · 2011-03-10 06:59:06

mse wrote:

Normally such comments about MSEide+MSEgui are caused because people forget to download and install the development environment. Please read README.TXT.

Indeed.

And one other common misunderstanding is the axiom stating that 'MSEide=Delphi IDE' and 'MSEgui=VCL'.

One very good idea of MSEide is that it does not try to re-implement nor the VCL nor the Delphi IDE. It's why it fulfills so well its cross-platform goal, and why it's so light compared to VCL/Delphi clones (mostly Lazarus).

But it could be confusing for using it the first time.

Is there any MacOS port (using Carbon) scheduled?

mse · 2011-03-10 08:02:17

One of the design goals of MSEide+MSEgui was to double productivity compared with other development environments. This goal has been reached for my projects.

ab wrote:

Is there any MacOS port (using Carbon) scheduled?

I read that Mac people don't want to use "alien" applications and I don't need it my self at the moment.
MSEgui probably can be ported to MacOS running under X11 with little time and effort. I read that Carbon is deprecated, probably it is better to use Cocoa (FPC has a ObjectiveC compatibility mode AFAIK) and Quartz directly. I did not study MacOS architecture in deep up to now.
At the moment I am working on an OpenGL backend for MSEgui.

Martin

Last edited by mse (2011-03-10 08:04:08)

ab · 2011-03-10 20:23:17

X11 under MacOS would be 200% out-of-galaxy application, I suppose.

OpenGL is certainly a good direction. Are you using Glut?

mse · 2011-03-11 06:17:56

ab wrote:

Are you using Glut?

No. MSEgui uses a single window handle or render context per form. All widget event processing (focus in, focus out, mouse in/out...), widget clipping and the like, event loop... is handled internally in MSEgui and does not need OS support.

Arioch · 2012-04-04 09:12:14

reddwarf wrote:

What a shame that Codegear introduced an out-of-box unicode-ready Delphi 10 years after Microsoft has fully supported it in Windows 2000... When everybody who needed unicode uses TntComponents

Sorry for bumping old thread.
I think lack of Unicode in Delphi was more vocal than wide request.

While it was pity, it is still too much exagerrated.
Those who needed it had Tnt, but when Tnt ceased and were sold out, were there developers to frk and continue TnT as free project ? no.
Maybe there was some large widget library, who choosed Tnt mechanics as a base to grow their large wiget sets unicode-aware ? no.
So, frankly, no one cared mostly.

1st version of Windows NT - NT 3.1 - was in 1993. It was not in 1999. If Delphi needed Unicode support - they could start as early as Delphi 2 release - but back then next to no one though about Unicode, every one though about RAM economy. It was RAM prices going down as well as obsoletion of Windows 9x/ME familiy and MS Unicode Services for Win98 that made Unicode a feasible "least common". And it was not until somewhere around 2005, that old Windows line-up could be completely forgotten.

Yes, Delphi is a bit late to jump onto Unicode train. But they did not planned to make two EXE's from same sources, ANSI and Unicode, they wanted one-time swtch. And they wanted all 3rd-party VCL ecosystem to switch as well. And it would rather not done too early.

ComingNine · 2014-05-20 09:28:28

@ab

Could you help to comment whether "MSEgui (or MSEide+MSEgui)" can be used together with mORMot ?

In 2013 Martin mentioned about Delphi 7/Kylix compatibility, but there is not yet any news following...

ab · 2014-05-20 10:28:56

MSEgui is using FPC, so will depend on FPC support.

It will be soon available for the client part.
See http://synopse.info/fossil/tkttimeline/09ae8513eb?y=ci

ComingNine · 2014-05-20 11:03:15

Thank you for your comments !

I seem to read somewhere that you considered "MSEide+MSEgui" is "very well designed". You all build great softwares !

ComingNine · 2018-11-03 11:57:50

MSEide+MSEgui has been updated to 4.6.2. Could you help to comment whether it is possible to use mORMot with the current MSEide+MSEgui ?

https://sourceforge.net/projects/mseide … gui/4.6.2/

ab · 2018-11-03 20:34:02

I don't see why it would be incompatible to use MSEgui and mORMot, since mORMot is pretty stable with FPC trunk now.

mORMot Open Source

#1 2011-03-03 22:47:59

Delphi new generation VCL

#2 2011-03-04 06:31:45

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#3 2011-03-09 06:12:19

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#4 2011-03-09 08:00:20

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#5 2011-03-09 18:37:34

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#6 2011-03-09 20:16:12

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#7 2011-03-10 06:59:06

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#8 2011-03-10 08:02:17

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#9 2011-03-10 20:23:17

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#10 2011-03-11 06:17:56

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#11 2012-04-04 09:12:14

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#12 2014-05-20 09:28:28

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#13 2014-05-20 10:28:56

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#14 2014-05-20 11:03:15

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#15 2018-11-03 11:57:50

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

#16 2018-11-03 20:34:02

Re: Delphi new generation VCL

Board footer