Hi,

Yeah, a catchy title! ;-)

I want to know if anybody here has ever used FlashFiler in Delphi. Was it a good product, and do you think it would be worth the effort porting it to Free Pascal? Or is FlashFiler simply too old and outdated.

I mainly use Firebird RDBMS for all my database needs and think it is excellent. I use it in client/server and embedded form under Linux and Windows.

But I am also intrigued by the idea of having a true embedded database server - compiled directly into my executable for even easier deployment.

Any thoughts on this? Has anybody else started such a port?

Regards,
- Graeme -

I would say it's a decent database as nexus db for Delphi is a fork of it. But why not use sqlite? It can be fully embedded as well, there is at least 1 Delphi sqlite component set that does not require the sqlite dll.

I don't know about FlashFiler, but if you don't need your embedded database server to be accessable from outside, I'd suggest you SQLite as an alternative to Firebird ;)

Regards,
Sven

Allen Harrington works on B-Tree filer, which (if I am correct) is the original from Flash Filer.

Maybe you can ask about his experiences.

Michael.

If I understand Graeme correctly, he wants it compiled-in (i.e. without dll). SQLite is a separate DLL.

Michael.

If I understand Graeme correctly, he wants it compiled-in (i.e. without dll). SQLite is a separate DLL.

SqLite source can be downloaded and compiled with a C compiler (e.g. CBuilder) and its .lib file linked directly in a Delphi application using the {$L} or {$LINK} directive. Is FPC capable of linking a .lib file?

If I understand Graeme correctly, he wants it compiled-in (i.e. without dll). SQLite is a separate DLL.

Correct. We have an application that can be deployed in two ways. Client/Server which uses Firebird RDBMS and Apache Web Server. We also want to deploy that app as a single-user stand-alone app. We already have a built-in web server - now we are looking at a built-in (compiled-in) database server.

I'm thinking in lines of something more modern that TDbf for example.

Regards,
- Graeme -

If I understand Graeme correctly, he wants it compiled-in (i.e. without dll). SQLite is a separate DLL.

See
http://forum.lazarus.freepascal.org/index.php/topic,15712.msg84781.html#msg8 4781 for instructions on static linking of sqlite3. No dll needed.

Ludo

What about B-Tree Filer? :)

g.

Flash filer is ok, but you are better off with SQLite for most purposes these days.
2012/10/23 22:25 "Graeme Geldenhuys" :

geneb wrote

What about B-Tree Filer? :)

I'll read up on it, thanks.

Graeme.

A few years back I crossed roads with both flash filer and B-tree filer. B-Tree filer is nothing more than a record based file library that supports network access ms network and novel networks it was written for turbo pascal for dos and at that era novel had the biggest pie of the lan market. Flash filer was a rewrite of that library with SQL support and it was for windows only I think it did not had to support multiple network libraries as it was an embedded engine and a client server over tcp/ip so I do not think it used anything from the b-tree era other than know how.

Personally I think that flash filer is worth porting, I think it uses lex and yac for the SQL parser or some other parser construction kit which I would look to replace with the fpc's sql parser instead making it a bit easier to extend I think. I would start looking on the disk access and see how easy it is to port it to a stream based logic making supportable from multiple operating systems.

B-tree filer isn't worth the bytes on the disk for storage only as a piece of museum software on how things was in early 90's.

Regards.

stdreamer wrote

B-tree filer isn't worth the bytes on the disk for storage only as a piece of museum software on how things was in early 90's.

Little does he know...

Guess you weren't programming back in the early '90s or you would probably not make such statements...

Ralf

B-Tree Filer was the core of a POS application I worked on in the early 90's. It performed excellently on the Lantastic environment that the store used. The Turbo Technojock Toolbox was also used heavily. It would be nice if that would get ported at some point. It's great for text mode applications.

g.

Hi,

I wonder if we worked on the same POS application.

At any rate, flash filer is interesting if you want a 100% native pascal application, but linking SQLite is easy and much more standard. SQLite also has a large ecosystem of third party support, and is included by default with most operating systems.

Another option for an all pascal solution would be one of the available XML based data stores.

Thak you,
Noah silva
2012/10/26 22:43 "geneb" :

Noah Silva wrote

Another option for an all pascal solution would be one of the available XML based data stores.

That's already possible using tiOPF and the XML persistence layer. tiOPF also supports a TXT and CSV persistence layer (with the stacks of RDBMS persistence layers of course).

Regards,
- Graeme -

*FlashFiler was ahead of its time.* Client/Server database LAN-WAN. I have currently running quite well on Windows 8.1 applications. Worth rescue and do everything possible to port it to Free Pascal.

On Tue, November 25, 2014 23:45, julioferval wrote:

Hello,

*FlashFiler was ahead of its time.* Client/Server database LAN-WAN. I have currently running quite well on Windows 8.1 applications. Worth rescue and do everything possible to port it to Free Pascal.

Could you please clarify your idea behind this post? Do you have a working port to FPC which you offer to others? Or do you announce your intention to start working on it? Or do you ask if someone has worked on it already? Or...?

Regards

Tomas

In our previous episode, Tomas Hajny said:

(I think he replied on a msg from 2012 on nabble)