Rave and unicode

I read very often in the newsgroups or in email about supporting unicode in Rave ....

The status is at the moment:

• Rave for Win32-developement doesn't support unicode
• Rave for the .net-Framewok support unicode

Rave for Win32

Rave is based on the VCL, no surprise. and the VCL isn't unicode-ready at the moment.
There is an interesting article in the blog from Hallvard about "unicode and VCL" with Danny Thorpe. It's not new but unchanged in the year 2007....
In the Delphi-Roadmap from CodeGear is the support of Unicode for the Win32-plattform for the first half of 2008 announced:

Delphi "Tiburón"
Time Frame: First Half 2008
Theme: Delphi and VCL development with Unicode and Generics

Delphi Win32 Unicode This means that the IDE, the VCL, and all types of development should be made fully Unicode-compatible. The standard string in the Delphi language will become a Unicode string, meaning that the IDE, the VCL – that is, the entire product – will be Unicode-based. Developers around the world will be able to develop applications for use in any language using the Unicode standard.

meaning: when the VCL inside Delphi supports unicode Rave should support unicode as well .... but this need a lot of patience.
But Nevrona have done good work in the past, since Rave is working with unicode strings and such in .NET, the conversion to the unicode for Win32 will be a lot simpler (i.e. Nevrona already have code to handle strings of different character length).



Rave for the .net-Framework

that's easy
Rave for the .net-Framework supports unicode because .net framework supports unicode ...

But don't forget that you need the right font with unicode-support... I recommend that you work inside Rave with the FontMaster. Insert a GlobalPage and name the Page into GPFonts and here you can insert FontMaster for every Font / Size / Style (I called the components in my Rave-projects FMArial12bold, FMArial10, FMArial10bold ....) and define the FontMirror of the (Data)Text and (Data)Memo to this FontMaster. Now you can define very easy on one place (!) the correct font with unicode-support. And this is the only way at the moment to change the font of (Data)Text/Memo-component inside the Rave Scripting. And you have in all your reports of the application a good corporate design-feature included.
You see, a lot of advantages for using the FontMaster-component in the Rave-Project!

RAVE 7 BEX and Delphi 2007

I read in many newsgroups in the last few months threads with the subject "Rave 7 BEX and Delphi 2007".

Rave 7 BEX is binary compatible with Delphi 2007 for Win32. However, the current installer from Nevrona Designs does not automatically install into Delphi 2007. You'll need to install the package dclRave.bpl from the BDS2006 files included with Rave 7 BEX within the Delphi 2007 IDE.

But please make first the following : modify the RpDefine.pas (remember, you have the source with BEX!) like the following

in the RpDefine simply change the last statement to be a >= instead of just the equal

{$IF CompilerVersion >= 18.0} { Delphi 10.0 }
CompVer = '10';
{$IFEND}


CodeGear haven't created a MajorRelease in the compiler-area with Delphi 2007; the version have only changed from 18.0 to 18.5 and all (*) the BDS2006-files working without any changes in Delphi 2007.


that's all!

I admit that my production environment is BDS2006Arch and not Delphi2007 but I have test the installation of Rave BEX 7.05 in a VMWare-machine with Delphi 2007 Enterprise without any problems! I created an application with dbx4, Rave7 and an oracle connection and it works fast, as expected from the Win32-Compiler Delphi


keep hacking and coding with CodeGear Delphi
(some years ago a friend of mine have a great signature: "Delphi or notepad"


:-)


(*)
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
But, in practice, there is.

Rave BEX and BE - the differences

yesterday I received an email about the question for a version 7.5 BEX because in Delphi 2007 is Rave BE in the version 7.5 included.

Many rumors are on the different newsgroups about this. In fact, there are differences, but with BE bundled with Delphi (7, 8, 2005, 2006 and 2007) you have a full version of RAVE and can create reports (and deploy, of course) in your application.

The greatest differences are:
• Source code – the BEX version comes with full component source code (not the IDE source, like Delphi).
• “Archived” Code Based Components (including the powerful Shell-components) are included with the BEX version for backwards compatibility.
• More frequent updates.
• Support for TeeChart Pro – the BE version only supports the bundled TeeChart.
• Improved Scripting
• The BEX have backward compatibility, meaning a Rave 4/5/6 Project can be used in the Rave 7 BEX-version with all code- and class-changes.
• Since the latest version of BEX (not BE) you have a new JPEG-render, especially interesting for store the reports with a small file size
in the database and you can view this file without installing a pdf-reader (e.g. on a server, where you should only install important app's!)


So we are getting a “reasonable” version bundled with all Delphi-version since V7 and if any of the above matter to you, then you should consider getting the BEX version on the nevrona.com-page. Especially the source and the technical support is very valuable!


But now back to the question about 7.5 of RAVE BEX....
If you have are a good observer then you have in the past noticed that with Rave 6 the BEX version had 6.0x and the bundled version of RAVE BE in Delphi 2005 and and later had 6.5 and in in version 7 it's the same, meaning the Rave 7.05 BEX is not older then the Rave 7.5 of Delphi 2007, and believe mit there aren't differences in the rav or ndr-file between 7.05 and 7.5.... and Jim Gunkel have written about the next Rave Version 8 (see an earlier blog here) and not about 7.1 or 7.5 BEX ....

iPod Protection against theft

My brother-in-law have sent me today a funny link for the security of my iPod.
Funny the idea with a Zune to secure the iPod....
I admit that I love my iPod (o.k. exactly I have in the meantime two of these cool music player) and use especially the shuffle for hearing my Huey Lewis and the News songs (only this artist is on my shuffle with 512KB mem) ...
With a cool design, cool features, good quality and a good marketing you can win in the windows-market new users; but you must offer not only the player, all the additions around equal important then the other keys! Please, CodeGear learn from the iPod-success and Delphi will get the success which this cool and productive IDE and the Pascal-language have earned, it's not to late for this. If the pascal-language haven't advantage the C#-Architect Anders Heijlsberg didn't include a lot of AlGol/Pascal/Modula into the language C#...

alternative to YouTube

I found yesterday a great alternative to youToube: Dailymotion ....
Better quality of the videos/sound and IMO better videos then yT, and in my area where I searched better movies of HLN.org

CodeGear Delphi.PHP and Borland IntraBuilder

well, it's over ten years old and I admit that I don't work with IntraBuilder anymore, meaning it's here@home not a software, it's a shelf-ware

Who knows this IDE ? I think less people....but I'm not alone : Dr.Dobbs have an article about this from 2001.

This product was a cool and powerful designed JavaScript IDE that was clearly ahead of its time, like other tools from Scotts Valley:
ObjectVision from Borland, a great tool to move from DOS ot Windows AND to the basics of objectoriented working.

10 Years ago there was an IDE for JavaScript that puts the likes of Adobe Dreamweaver or ActiveState Komodo to shame, believe me. Okay, not the full AJAX but IntraBuilder would have been a natural testbed for testing early HTTPRequest and other AJAX framework ideas.

With the new spirit in Scotts Valley (I love this area and hope to visit SV again) and the loyal customers around the world they can go into this area with Delphi.PHP and Ruby, it's not to late but after the splash of the availability of Delphi.PHP I wait for the waves in the internet-area...
Andreano have insert in his blog great ressources to read and learn about the possibilites, try the examples with the Trialversion!

EKON - 11 CodeGear-conference in Frankfurt

End of september is "EKON 11", the german BorCon or new "CodeGear-Con" (http://entwickler-konferenz.de). This is my 10 EKON where I visit / speak (only 2001, after 11/9 I don't go to the conference... ).
This year I make a Rave-session and a session about DBX4, the new database-framework, released with Delphi 2007.
I planned a session about "WebParts with Delphi for Microsoft SharePoint" but the .net2/3-support in the Developer Studio isn't available and I don't know the release date (before or after EKON11).... -> perhaps next year.