I'm a newbie trying to port an old turbo pascal program to FreePascal in linux. My reasons for doing this is old Pentium 233 motherboards are getting harder to keep running and I need be running on more modern hardware.. It's a massive program and I just don't have time to re-write the whole thing, that's why freepascal seems like a good solution. I have it working fairly well on windows, but I'm trying to get away from windows, and get it working on linux instead. I've managed to get free pascal installed on an Ubuntu x64 virtualbox VM and I can run the IDE, but I'm having difficulty getting it to work. I have several issues I just don't know how to solve

1. graph unit issues. In my windows port I'm able to use graph unit, in linux there is no graph unit in the x86_64-linux folder. It does exist in i386-linux, but I can't seem to compile my program for 386. In the windows version I have an option to use 80386, in linux I do not. I have tried to use the other graphic units found in graph under x86_64 linux. I was able to successfully compile with ptcgraph, but everything is blue, I figure it is using more colors than my old 16, so I changed a few colors to larger numbers and sure enough I can get other colors... so I could do global searches and replaces to solve the color issue.. but I have other issues with ptcgraph and/or linux.
If I try to use ggigraph, I cannot even compile it. It says "Error while linking" and it references the END. Line at the end of my main program.. I don't know why, there is nothing wrong with that line and it compiles with ptcgraph just fine.

2. I can't get my fonts to work with ptcgraph. I was using the turbo pascal graphic fonts, I was able to get them working in windows, but not in the linux version. I'm not sure if it's an issue with ptcgraph or linux or how to even start to figure out the problem.

3. with ptcgraph, I have no control of the keyboard. When I run from the compiler, I must pop up the terminal window on top of my graphics window to be able to use the keyboard, however if I try to run the compiled program on it's own, I don't have a terminal window.. and I just have no control over the program.. I have my graphic screen, but it ignores the keyboard, and I can't do anything with it. The windows version also has the Dos window, but it allows it to remain behind the graphic window and my keyboard still works.

4. not full screen. For some reason I can't get it to be full screen in linux at all.. Its always in a window. The windows version is ALMOST full screen, I would like to get rid of the windows bar across the top and make it truly full screen. I don't need a way to minimize it or to use any windows controls, when I'm done with it I can just close it and be back in windows.

Any suggestions on how to either use the original 'graph' unit or how to change to something else and retain functionality? All I want to do is make my program look and operate the way it did on DOS with turbo pascal. I don't want to redesign the entire thing. The windows version is close but as I mentioned I would love to get rid of the windows bar across the top of the screen and make it truly full screen.

James Richters wrote

4. not full screen. For some reason I can't get it to be full screen in linux at all..

Press F11. That is a almost universal shortcut for any X11 desktop environment and Window Manager to switch the active program to full screen.

If you are running the program in a Console login (ie: no X11 running), then in should be fullscreen as standard.

Regards,
Graeme

Thank you for the F11 suggestion.. F11 does make the IDE window full screen, Thanks!! That's very helpful. My program however does not respond to F11. There is no way to resize the window, make it larger or smaller or full screen, it's just a fixed size window.. this is the version using ptcgraph

Is there a way to get the linux text mode IDE to colorize things like the windows text mode IDE? Linux is just all yellow on light blue. The windows one for example will show comments in grey reserved words in white.. ect.. it makes it a lot easier to follow

James Richters wrote

Linux is just all yellow on light blue. The windows one for example will show comments in grey reserved words in white.. ect.. it makes it a lot easier to follow

Are they the same versions of the IDE? I don't really use the Text IDE, but I can say that the FreeBSD version behaves like the Linux version you describe.... the old Turbo Pascal IDE look and feel.

I've never tried the Text IDE under Windows.

Regards,
Graeme

Yes, they are both 1.0.12 included with fpc 3.0.0 Here are screenshots: https://github.com/Zaaphod/FPC-Parallel-Port/issues/1

I like the text ide because I understand it, it's pretty much like the Turbo Pascal ide. I tried installing lazerus and I cannot even compile my program with that... but it's not a windows program, it's a console application, so that's probably why I couldn't get it to compile with lazerus.

James Richters wrote

Here are screenshots: https://github.com/Zaaphod/FPC-Parallel-Port/issues/1

I just checked. My FreeBSD version looks like the Windows screenshot.

Also under Linux, load the IDE, then go to Options -> Environment -> Editor. Then under "Editor options" make sure "Syntax highlighting" is checked. If I uncheck that and open a new *.pas file, then mine is all blue and yellow text.

Something else to tweak. If you prefer the darker blue (Windows screenshot) instead of the lighter blue (Linux screenshot). Those colors are affected by your terminal program's console theme. eg: I use Mate Terminal here. Go to Edit -> Profile Preferences -> Colours. Change the Palette scheme to "Linux console" or "Rxvt". Those are my preferences. Some Linux systems default that to "Tango" which are much lighter colours.

I like the text ide because I understand it, it's pretty much like the Turbo Pascal ide.

I fully understand. Sometimes I use the Text IDE too, to get rid of all clutter and distractions seen so often in other IDE's or text editors. But I forgot all the keyboard shortcuts, then I get frustrated with it, and switch back to Lazarus or MSEide. MSEide is also a very nice, flexible and super fast IDE. They can all handle console programs without problems.

MSEide
https://sourceforge.net/projects/mseide-msegui/

You can download the IDE zip archive, unpack and run the binary. No need for any installations.

Regards,
Graeme

I checked and syntax highlight was already checked.. I did figure it out though.. all my pascal files were named with a .PAS extension and I keep forgetting that linux is extremely case sensitive with everything.. I saved one with a .pas extention, closed it then opened it and now that one file has the highlight, the others do not.. easy enough to fix that though.

Thank you for the help and suggestions to tweak the colors! I would have never figured that out! Nice I can customize it too. I can't figure out how to do that with windows. I would like to get a black background instead of blue.

Thanks also for the suggestion of MSEIde I will check it out!

James Richters wrote

forgetting that linux is extremely case sensitive with everything.. I saved one with a .pas extention, closed it then opened it and now that one file has the highlight, the others do not.. easy enough to fix that though.

You can also tell Text IDE what file extensions are Pascal files. I saw the setting somewhere under Options -> Environment I think.

But I would recommend you stick to all lowercase filenames.

I can't figure out how to do that with windows.

You can't with the default console window. You need to download a 3rd party console program. They tend to be MUCH better that the stock console under Windows.

Regards,
Graeme

Am 23.07.2016 02:40 schrieb "Graeme Geldenhuys" <

Of course you can do that with the Windows consoles as well. You need to go to the settings of the console in the system menu (the one at the window icon) and there the setting for the colors is somewhere (I don't have it in front of me right now though).
Just google for "change default console background windows" or something like that...

Regards,
Sven

In our previous episode, James Richters said:

It's probably the chosen terminal emulator. On my LTS "Terminal" terminal emulator, the IDE is also light blue, but in an xterm it is like Windows.