Dear Sirs ,
I want to suggest a directory structure for Lazarus which will be constructed during installation of Lazarus .
Justification :
( All of the directory examples are given with respect to Windows and its directory symbols . )
At present , Lazarus is installed in the C:\lazarus\ and its FPC in , as an example , C:\lazarus\fpc\2.2.2\ .
This structure is NOT allowing presence of different Lazarus versions ( such as 0.9.24 - 2.2.0 ,
0.9.25 - 2.2.0 ,
0.9.25 - ... daily snapshots ,
0.9.25 - 2.2.2rc1 ,
0.9.25 - 2.2.2rc2 ,
etc. .
)
to reside in the system simultaneously .
Installing one is removing the another .
Renaming is possible but difficult
( requires renaming from desktop icon ( with its
internals ) to operating system "All programs" list entries to PATH .
(A)
Suggested directory structure :
C:\Lazarus\
with its sub-directories based on
( Version of Lazarus - Version of FPC )
such as listed above :
C:\Lazarus\0.9.24-2.2.0\
C:\Lazarus\0.9.24-2.2.2rc1\
C:\Lazarus\0.9.24-2.2.2rc2\
C:\Lazarus\0.9.25-2.3.1\
etc. .
When Lazarus IDE "Environment options" panel is displayed for any version group it will be seen as follows , as an example :
Lazarus directory ( default for all projects )
C:\lazarus\0.9.24-2.2.0\
Compiler path ( e.g. ppc386.exe )
C:\lazarus\0.9.24-2.2.0\fpc\2.2.0\ ...
And , in "All Programs" list , and under the Desktop icons the names may be seen as follows ,
as an example :
Lazarus 0.9.24 ( 2.2.0 )
Lazarus 0.9.25 ( 2.2.2rc2 )
Lazarus 0.9.25 ( 2.3.1 )
etc.
(B)
It is seen that , all of the Lazarus variants
is using own ...\fpc\... directory which means
they are duplicates of others .
My other primary suggestion is to separate these
directories .
If a different FPC release is required , install it under the C:\fpc\ directory with its own version
number .
When there are different programs which they are
not in FPC releases , these programs may be located in a directory such as
C:\lazarus\0.9.24-2.2.0\bin\i386-win32\ ...
( when they are dependent on Lazarus version )
or
C:\lazarus\bin\i386-win32\ ...
( when they are independent from Lazarus version ) .
In that way , instead of holding ,
as an example ,
( 3 different Lazarus versions ) multiplied by
( 4 different FPC versions ) directories
which will be twelve directories .
there will be needed only
( 3 different Lazarus versions ) added by
( 4 different FPC versions ) directories
which will be seven directories .
In computing applications ( more replications )
is ( MUCH more difficulties ) .
(C)
Personally I tried to separate Lazarus and
FPC directories but I could not be successful
because it seems that Lazarus in some points
are constructing fpc related directory names
from parts . In this case , specification of
a different path from its default is not
matching to its constructed names .
Instead of such a name construction , a single
variable holding the fpc directory may be used
throughout in all of the sources .
Also changing FPC related directory names in
project related ( project1.lpi ) XML file is
not effective . It seems that Lazarus is NOT
reflecting the directory names in *.LPI file
into its internal names .
(D)
Such a directory structure may be very useful
because in a program development environment ,
during use of a stable version , it will be
possible to experiment with the new version(s)
without disturbing or destroying program
development process and without requirement
of a new computer for experimental works with
new version(s) .
Thank you very much ,
Mehmet Erol Sanliturk