I am writing a subversion server hook application (command line) on Windows using FPC 3.0.4 and Lazarus 1.8.0 and I have now come to the auditing database connection I want to implement.

The database server is an MSSQLServer Express instance on a Windows 2016 Server and it runs on a non-standard TCP port.

In an earlier thread here in Feb 2016 I asked about how to use the TMSSQLConnection component (on a Raspberry Pi) and it was basically running after the help I got.

At the time the server I used was running as the default instance on port 1433 and the component probably assumes this if not told otherwise. So I did not think about this problem back then.

But now I have to address it, so:
How can I specify the port on the host where MSSQL listens? I find no property named "Port" in he component...

Secondly:
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On the Raspberry Pi I had to install a FreeTDS library in order to get a database connection. After I got that advice I included the apt-get install for the library in my standard script for setting up FPC/Lazarus on a Raspberry and forgot all about it. Always working afterwards.
But now I am back on a Windows 7 machine and here I don't have a clue as to how one installs the FreeTDS library.

Any pointers to how it is done?

[...] But now I have to address it, so: How can I specify the port on the host where MSSQL listens? I find no property named "Port" in he component...

Have you tried HostName:='hostname:port' ?

Mattias

Bo Berglund wrote

But now I am back on a Windows 7 machine and here I don't have a clue as to how one installs the FreeTDS library. Any pointers to how it is done?

You simply download the DLL and include it in the same directory as the EXE of your application, or install it to a global location like System32 directory.

ftp://ftp.freepascal.org/fpc/contrib/windows/

For more details:
http://wiki.freepascal.org/mssqlconn

And if all else fails, you can also look at the official Free Pascal documentation:

https://www.freepascal.org/docs-html/fcl/mssqlconn/tmssqlconnection.html

I've connected to SQL Server instances from FreeBSD, Linux and Windows - all without much trouble - once I followed the documentation.

Regards,
Graeme

Mattias Gaertner wrote

Have you tried HostName:='hostname:port' ?

Correct - as per the documentation. ;-)

https://www.freepascal.org/docs-html/fcl/mssqlconn/tmssqlconnection.hostname.html

Regards,
Graeme

I have tested this and no matter which of the included dll files in the zip I put into my project directory I always get the exception:

"... exception class 'EInOutError' with message
Can not load DB-lib client library "dblib.dll". Check your installation."

Something must be amiss.
I have downloaded zipfiles 0.95 and 1.00

Both of them contain:
Win32:
dblib_2000.dll
dblib_2008.dll
libiconv2.dll
Win64:
dblib.dll
dblib_2008.dll
libiconv.dll

I have tried the only one with the correct name (in Win64), did not work.
Then I renamed the Win32/dblib_2008.dll to dblib.dll, not working

Right now I am only at the very first step of the application, namely where I connect to the server:

SVNA is a class where I intend to handle the audit database:
constructor TSvnAuditer.Create;
begin
  FConn := TMSSQLConnection.Create(nil);
  FQuery := TSQLQuery.Create(nil);
  FTrans := TSQLTransaction.Create(nil);
  FConn.Transaction := FTrans;
  FQuery.Transaction := FTrans;
  FQuery.DataBase := FConn;
end;
procedure TestDbConnection;
begin
  SVNA.Server := 'servername:1433';
  SVNA.Database := 'databasename';
  SVNA.User := 'username';
  SVNA.Passwd := 'password';
  if SVNA.OpenConnection then
  begin
    SVNA.CloseConnection;
  end;
end;
function TSvnAuditer.OpenConnection: boolean;
begin
  Result := false;
  if (FServer = '') or (FUser = '') or (FPasswd = '') or (FDatabase =
'') then
  begin
    FErrorMsg := 'At least one of Server, Database, User or Password
has not been set!';
    exit;
  end;
  if Connected then
    CloseConnection;
  FConn.HostName := FServer;
  FConn.UserName := FUser;
  FConn.Password := FPasswd;
  FConn.DatabaseName := FDatabase;
  FConn.Open;   <== Exception here! Not finding the dll!
  Result := Connected;
end;

I had to use BOTH the dblib.dll AND the libiconv.dll from Win64 dir... I had no idea I was building a 64 bit app....

But this was not enough, I also had to do the following:

InitialiseDBLib('dblib.dll'); <== Had to add this

end;

And this required adding dblib to the uses clause.

This last part was from a discussion I googled:
http://www.pilotlogic.com/sitejoom/index.php/forum/forums-general/3849-cannot-open-tmssqlconnection-component which initially seemed to be about "CodeTyphon", whatever that is.

But with these items in place I got a connection and could execute a query.

Strange, I connect to MSSQL without InitialiseDBLib in both 64bit and 32bit applications. I only add dblib.dll and libiconv.dll to the exe.

Ondrej

Ondrej Pokorny wrote

Strange, I connect to MSSQL without InitialiseDBLib in both 64bit and 32bit applications. I only add dblib.dll and libiconv.dll to the exe.

You are right. I commented out the initialization line and it still works.
So I must have changed things in a different order, but I don't know how it happened.
In any case I don't get exceptions anymore, but I have not verified data retrieval either. I just ran a stored procedure via FQuery.Open of an EXEC string.

As a side thing, I was not aware that Lazarus was building 64 bit applications as default. That is why the 32 bit dll:s would not work I assume.

How do I set the project for a Win32 target?
I found one place in the project options (Compiler/Config and Target), but when I change it from "Default" to Win32 there is a warning saying this:
"The current FPC has no config file. It will probably miss some units. Check your installation of fpc."

But I have done nothing else than installing from the Lazarus 1.8 installer (lazarus-1.8.0-fpc-3.0.4-win64.exe), which also gets me fpc 3.0.4. So I don't know how to "check my installation".

On Linux I always build from sources and so I know for sure where .fpc.cnf is located, not so on Windows....

The easiest is to use 32bit FPC.

But I have done nothing else than installing from the Lazarus 1.8 installer (lazarus-1.8.0-fpc-3.0.4-win64.exe

You installed the 64bit version. Install the 32bit. Otherwise you have to setup a cross compiler (I never did that so I may be wrong): http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Cross_compiling

Ondrej

Ondrej Pokorny wrote

Strange, I connect to MSSQL without InitialiseDBLib in both 64bit and 32bit applications. I only add dblib.dll and libiconv.dll to the exe.

Same here.

Regards,
Graeme

Bo Berglund wrote

But I have done nothing else than installing from the Lazarus 1.8 installer (lazarus-1.8.0-fpc-3.0.4-win64.exe), which also gets me fpc 3.0.4. So I don't know how to "check my installation".

As Ondrej said... If you look at the name of the installer file, you installed the Win64 version of Lazarus and FPC. If you wanted the 32-bit version, download the installer file that mentions win32 in the name. If you do the latter, you can always later install the official FPC win64 cross-compiler which will then allow you to target both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows.

Regards,
Graeme

Strange, I wanted to have another look at the site from where I downloaded the installer, but now I can no longer find it! My memory tells me it was using a layout with a sidebar with a "Downloads" link that brought me to a page on the same site where there was a list of downloadable exe files. And there was also a bit of text explaining which file to grab. I thought it was the Lazarus home site... The actual download link I used from that site was (after examining my download history, downloaded 2017-12-19):
https://10gbps-io.dl.sourceforge.net/project/lazarus/Lazarus%20Windows%2064%20bits/Lazarus%201.8.0/lazarus-1.8.0-fpc-3.0.4-win64.exe

Now whatever I try search-wise I always end up at SourceForge download page or other with no extra text as to which one to select. Can't fine the one I got it from. Have the lazarus sites been redesigned in the last week?

In any case:
------------
The reason I selected the win64 file was that my earlier experience with installers like these was that if there were two to selct from (win32 or win64) it was in order to select which environment the program would run under (Windows 32 or 64 bit). In this case on my Windows 7 x64 laptop.
But I am not used to select installer according to capabilities (except for licensed or unlicesnsed etc). So it never dawned on me that it would also only build 64 bit applications....

Now that I have the win64 version installed how do I go about making it possible to build for both 32 and 64 bit environments?

In my Delphi XE5 environment I can do this easily in the project options where the target can be switched for each configuration.

In my experience, there are two methods to achieve this.

1) Use the win32 FPC compiler and the win64 FPC cross-compiler. In Lazarus you set up fpc.exe as your compiler. In the Project's Compiler Settings, it will pass a -T command line parameter to fpc.exe which in turn will execute the correct ppc*.exe executable to generate the appropriate binary for your project.

2) This option doesn't use a cross-compiler. Instead I start off with 64-bit versions of FPC and Lazarus. I normally use FreeBSD for development, but the same configuration can be applied to Windows or Linux. I install FPC is a specific directory layout so it supports multiple targets with one fpc.cfg file. For example:

c:\fpc-3.0.4
\x86_64-win64
\bin
\lib
\share
\i386-win32
\bin
\lib
\share

The fpc.cfg search paths and such with then use the built-in macros to resolve the correct path location. For example, my FreeBSD system have lines as follows:

-Fu/data/devel/fpc-$fpcversion/$fpctarget/lib/fpc/$fpcversion/units/$fpctarget

Adapt the fpc.cfg for windows to match your FPC install hierarchy and appropriate $fpc* macros.

In Lazarus IDE I then use "IDE Options -> Environment -> FPC" to select between the FPC compilers and related FPC Source directories.

The same can be done (actually even easier) in MSEide because MSEide has better IDE/Project macro support. So in MSEide I have different keyboard shortcuts to compile my projects for different targets. I don't have to toggle any global settings.

In my Delphi XE5 environment I can do this easily in the project options where the target can be switched for each configuration.

Delphi simply hides much of the underlying configuration from the developer - after all, I hope that is why you pay them so much. Delphi ships with different compilers (depending on the version you bought (Starter, Pro, Enterprise, Studio, Architect, add-on packages installed). Depending on the version, in then enables you to specify new targets in the Project Options dialog, which in turn uses different search paths and compilers.

CodeTyphon is a spin-off of Lazarus, which ships with many cross-compilers all ready for you out of the box. They did some excellent work in simplifying that process and getting later updates. This is closer to the experience you get with Delphi. There are some other stuff I don't like or agree with about that project, but that is a personal opinion and another matter.

Regards,
Graeme