Hi everyone

I've been using delphi 4, 5, 6 for years, and only recently discovered Lazarus. I will definitely use it.

It seems to me that this is a major package, but it has (to my mind) zero prominence on the web. I may have missed something, but here is why:

1. There is no mention of it on the Free Pascal page

2. When one eventually finds a link to it, this link goes straight to a forum page. (Which says to me: 'you need to be an expert to be here' )

3. No obvious 'getting started' example.

4. No info on how many users, downloads, use on projects (i.e no Advert)

Surely Lazarus is one of the major tools of Free Pascal? Personally - just to be controversial - I would say that Free Pascal is a major part of the Lazarus project, in the sense that a great IDE, with possibility of multi-platform execution, and the hiding-away of much of the GUI coding, is the big deal. (By 'hiding-away', I'm referring to the clunky connections to GUI toolkits that one sees in Python and Ruby.)

Best wishes (you have my support)

Mike Parr

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2010/1/23 Mike Parr :

It seems to me that this is a major package, but it has (to my mind) zero prominence on the web.

Being a Delphi user too, I used to mention Lazarus and Free Pascal to people in the Embarcadero newsgroups that complain about things like "delphi doesn't have cross platfrom support", "kylix is dead, so what do we us now" etc...

But apparently I pissed of way to many people doing that, and my time for reading those newsgroups is very limited lately (having a family and other responsibilities).

2.? When one eventually finds a link to it, this link goes straight to? a forum page.

This has been bugging me for age too. The link from the Free Pascal page should take users to the Lazarus wiki site instead. The standard Lazarus Website is definitely not a "product" page, but just a location for the forums. Which I also think should be closed and users should rather merge with the mailing list discussions. Having to many options of where to ask questions is also not a good thing.

4.? No info on how many users, downloads, use on projects? (i.e no Advert)

Download count is managed and found on Lazarus SourceForge project page. "use on projects", documentation, hints, etc are all on the Wiki page.

Not even the Lazarus LCL class documentation or the IDE Help/Documentation is available on the Lazarus website. So "official" Lazarus website should rather be the Wiki.

Of course, I had the same experience. OTOH you'll get many complaints about what's not working as expected in Lazarus, what could serve to assign priorities to the development items.

Right. In most cases the Search fields lead to forum entries, not to any real documentation. The Embarcadero pages are in similar disorder, but for other reasons.

+1

The documentation (online help) deserves much more work, before it can be presented to the public. I'm swapping between updating the help and the help editors...

DoDi

2010/1/24 Hans-Peter Diettrich :

Of course, I had the same experience. OTOH you'll get many complaints about what's not working as expected in Lazarus, what could serve to assign priorities to the development items.

And it's because of complains and negative messages like that, that I thought people should also see the positive of Lazarus IDE. Hence the reason I started the "New IDE features since" page on the wiki, to show that the IDE also has very good points, and more often than not, way before Delphi IDE got them. :-)

http://wiki.freepascal.org/New_IDE_features_since

At the first glance I was confused whether these are FPC or Lazarus features, mainly by the black background of the code windows.

I also couldn't find how to reach that page, from some typical entry page. It's a shame how Lazarus references are hidden in third or deeper level pages on the FPC site :-(

DoDi

Hans-Peter Diettrich wrote

I also couldn't find how to reach that page, from some typical entry page. It's a shame how Lazarus references are hidden in third or deeper level pages on the FPC site :-(

+100 :?

Hans-Peter Diettrich wrote

At the first glance I was confused whether these are FPC or Lazarus features, mainly by the black background of the code windows.

:-) I find the black background for the editor window much softer on my eyes. Over the years, computers have really screwed up my eyes, so now I'm trying to look after what I have left. :)

[Side note:
My efforts seem to be helping (and those scientists were not lying). I am using better lighting conditions, LCD instead of CRT monitor, softer color schemes in my OS and daily used applications, added rest periods (which means drinking more coffee :-/). Since I started this 5-6 years ago, my eyes have not gotten worse - for the first time since I started using computers).]

I also couldn't find how to reach that page, from some typical entry page. It's a shame how Lazarus references are hidden in third or deeper level pages on the FPC site :-(

The wiki searching ability really sucks. No advance search options at all! If it doesn't give you results, it does the opposite and gives you too much results. Either way, it is hard to find anything in the wiki. And the more pages get added, the worse the problem becomes.

In such cases I often try and use Google to rather do the searching for me.

Regards,
- Graeme -

I'm staring at monitors since 40 years now, and I found many "official" suggestions inappropriate for me, with regards to contrast, brightness, color schemes and other light sources. I prefer a bright environment for my desk, with no significant contrast between text on screen and printed or handwritten paper sheets before or beneath my keyboard. My eyes are degrading since several years now, and I cannot read any more text on a dark background, as found in many websites. I also found LCD displays less sharp than CRT monitors, but the bigger size of nowadays LCD screens allows to place them further away from my eyes, while my arms became too short to read newspapers without special glasses.

Perhaps there's a genetic difference between troglodytes and hunters, with regards to the preferred dark or bright background?

So it's not only me, who is lost in many web pages and wikis :-(

In such cases I often try and use Google to rather do the searching for me.

PasDoc has a nice full text search feature for the HTML documents (tipue), perhaps it should also be added to FPDoc?

DoDi

Hello Lazarus-List,

you wrote

> In such cases I often try and use Google to rather do the searching for me.

HPD> PasDoc has a nice full text search feature for the HTML documents HPD> (tipue), perhaps it should also be added to FPDoc?

The problem with this searchs like the wiki ones is not the "full text search" capability which is quite easy to be created in any environment, but the scoring of the searched terms. In current wiki (in example) is almost impossible to find something usable if you must use words like "object", "class" or "control", as they are present in almost all documents, so "full text search" is useless.

That's the reason I suggested to add "Sphinx" search engine to the Lazarus/freepascal wiki.

Also tipue is a javascript search which should no be used if you have more than 20-40 pages to search in.

Hans-Peter Diettrich wrote

my desk, with no significant contrast between text on screen and printed or handwritten paper sheets before or beneath my keyboard.

Reading black text on white paper is no problem for me. But trying the same on a computer screen is very harsh for me. White text on black background for computer screens is my personal preference. Apparently you use less electricity too, if you use black backgrounds. :-) Have you ever seen the "Black Google" site?

http://black-google.bpled.com/index.php

The original www.blackgoogle.com doesn't seem to work any more.

PasDoc has a nice full text search feature for the HTML documents (tipue), perhaps it should also be added to FPDoc?

fpdoc does have support for search engines. And I have used tipue with fpdoc. See the url belowe. Go into any of the section and you will see a search option at the top of the screen.

http://opensoft.homeip.net/fpgui/docs/

Tipue is quick and easy for small sites, but doesn't work for larger documentation, because all search docs get loaded for each page viewed - so it adds lots of size overhead to documentation pages.

I have on my todo list an item of using FTS support of PostgreSQL DB with fpdoc and NNTP news group archives (mainly for tiOPF project). But I haven't started that task yet.

Regards,
- Graeme -

JoshyFun wrote

environment, but the scoring of the searched terms. In current wiki (in example) is almost impossible to find something usable if you must use words like "object", "class" or "control", as they are present in almost all documents, so "full text search" is useless.

I have implemented a full text search with scoring support in DocView (fpGUI's INF Documentation Viewer application). Maybe that code and algorithm could be adapted for fpdoc and wiki search support too? Umm, I never even thought of doing that. :)

Also tipue is a javascript search which should no be used if you have more than 20-40 pages to search in.

100% correct. It adds a big size overhead to each page.

Regards,
- Graeme -

Actually this is only valid for CRTs. On LCDs, a black screen actually uses 1 Watt more than a white screen ;-)

-Fl?vio

Hello Lazarus-List,

you wrote

> environment, but the scoring of the searched terms. In current wiki > (in example) is almost impossible to find something usable if you must > use words like "object", "class" or "control", as they are present in > almost all documents, so "full text search" is useless.

GG> I have implemented a full text search with scoring support in DocView GG> (fpGUI's INF Documentation Viewer application). Maybe that code and GG> algorithm could be adapted for fpdoc and wiki search support too? Umm, I GG> never even thought of doing that. :)

Hmmmm... It would be great if I can put an eye over the code as I need a 100% freepascal/lazarus solution to index/search a "great" amount of text files (not only text files, but metadata associated with files, images, etc...).

In my search travel looking for ready made I had found one project that extract index terms (most relevant terms) in a collection of texts based in a dictionary, or not, of terms related to the generic topic about the documents, unfortunatly it was a Java product :(

JoshyFun wrote

Hmmmm... It would be great if I can put an eye over the code as I need a 100% freepascal/lazarus solution to index/search a "great" amount of

The code is available in fpGUI's repository on SourceForge, inside the 'docview' directory. See my signature for details on how to get the code.

Make no mistake, the docview code will not be a simple copy and paste and reuse in something like fpdoc. Some work will be required, because the search scoring system is specific built for INF files which already have pre-built dictionaries of all text found in INF files.

An alternative FTS and Indexing system implemented in Object Pascal is the IODA project [http://ioda.sourceforge.net/]. Maybe something useful can come from looking at that code as well.

I asked about a general (easy) implementation of FTS and Indexing back in Jan 2009 in the fpc-users mailing list. I still think a all-purpose FTS implementation in Object Pascal could be handy for many projects.

Regards,
- Graeme -

Hello Lazarus-List,

Tuesday, January 26, 2010, 3:14:54 PM, you wrote:

GG> The code is available in fpGUI's repository on SourceForge, inside the GG> 'docview' directory. See my signature for details on how to get the code.

I'll check it.

GG> Make no mistake, the docview code will not be a simple copy and paste and GG> reuse in something like fpdoc. Some work will be required, because the GG> search scoring system is specific built for INF files which already have GG> pre-built dictionaries of all text found in INF files.

Yes I know, INF uses a indexed word recreation for documents.

GG> An alternative FTS and Indexing system implemented in Object Pascal is the GG> IODA project [http://ioda.sourceforge.net/]. Maybe something useful can GG> come from looking at that code as well.

Oh! great! I'll check if I can create some class around this code in order to create a embedded FTS instead using the command line program.

GG> I asked about a general (easy) implementation of FTS and Indexing back in GG> Jan 2009 in the fpc-users mailing list. I still think a all-purpose FTS GG> implementation in Object Pascal could be handy for many projects.

Well, all-purpose would be almost "impossible" due the specialization needed for each language (in my case there is no one language, but many are possible) but a general one that can be used in non specialized cases.

Well, I think that the black google isn't that great idea to save energy. Gradually, all the CRT monitors will be replaced by LCD or other kind of tecnology.
But, the LCD keeps this back-lamp allways on, and the "black" dots don't mean energy saving.

(Sorry by any translation error).

2010/1/26 Graeme Geldenhuys

In television panels, they are slowly turning off lights locally for all-black segments.

But segmented lighting is only in the more expensive segment.

JoshyFun wrote

Well, all-purpose would be almost "impossible" due the specialization

"all-purpose" was probably not the best word to use. I was looking for a relatively simple implementation of FTL and Indexing to see how it works, and possibly use that simple implementation or create my own implementation that I could embed in applications (as you mentioned about IODA). I did not want to use external tools for everything, maybe only for the generation of Indexing database/text file over the text you want to FTS.

Regards,
- Graeme -

Fl?vio Etrusco wrote

Actually this is only valid for CRTs. On LCDs, a black screen actually uses 1 Watt more than a white screen ;-)

:-) I suppose the underlying good news is that LCD's already reduce the energy used dramatically compared to CRT monitors - irrespective of what is displayed on the screen.

Regards,
- Graeme -

----- Original Message -----

Paul Nicholls wrote

I saw FTL, and straight away read it as Faster Than Light!! hahaha

:-) Sorry, that was a spelling mistake. It should have read FTS (full text search). Either way, it would be nice to have a FTS implementation that is FTL. ;-)

Regards,
- Graeme -