Webbrowser: what changed

Revision 1 to 2. Removed lines have a minus sign; added lines have a plus sign.

Old	New		Line
1	1		This page summarizes various ways to display HTML pages from a Pascal program, ranging from calling an external browser to adding a component capable of rendering the html page into a form.
2	2
3	3		## Starting a web browser to show a page/URL
4	4
5	5		### OpenURL
6	6
7	7		OpenURL is simplest way of opening URLs in general. This procedure will detect the default web browser and open URL from parameter in it. It can be used for mail addresses of the form 'mailto:aname@AnAddress?subject=:::A subject line', web addresses 'http://' and files 'file:///'.
8	8
9	9		``` pascal
10	10		uses LCLIntf;
11	11		...
12	12		OpenURL('http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org');
13	13		```
14	14
15	15		### Finding the default web browser
16	16
17	17		Every platform has a mechanism for its default web browser. The LCL unit lazhelphtml contains a class [[THTMLBrowserHelpViewer]] to start a web browser for the LCL help system.
18	18
19	19		You can use its method FindDefaultBrowser to find the default browser and the parameter to start. For example:
20	20
21	21		``` pascal
22	22		uses
23	23		Classes, ..., LCLProc, LazHelpHTML;
24	24
25	25		...
26	26
27	27		implementation
28	28
29	29		procedure TMainForm.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
30	30		var
31	31		v: THTMLBrowserHelpViewer;
32	32		BrowserPath, BrowserParams: string;
33	33		begin
34	34		v:=THTMLBrowserHelpViewer.Create(nil);
35	35		v.FindDefaultBrowser(BrowserPath,BrowserParams);
36	36		debugln('Browser=',BrowserPath,' Params=',BrowserParams);
37	37		v.Free;
38	38		end;
39	39		```
40	40
41	41		This gives for example under Ubuntu (Linux):
42	42
43		-	~~`Browser=/usr/bin/xdg-open Params=%s`~~
	43	+	```text
	44	+	Browser=/usr/bin/xdg-open Params=%s
	45	+	```
44	46
45	47		Under Windows:
46	48
47		-	~~`Browser=C:\windows\system32\rundll32.exe Params=url.dll,FileProtocolHandler %s`~~
	49	+	```text
	50	+	Browser=C:\windows\system32\rundll32.exe Params=url.dll,FileProtocolHandler %s
	51	+	```
48	52
49	53		Under macOS:
50	54
51		-	~~`Browser=/usr/bin/open Params="%s"`~~
	55	+	```text
	56	+	Browser=/usr/bin/open Params="%s"
	57	+	```
52	58
53	59		### Starting the browser
54	60
55	61		Once you know the command line and parameters you can use [[TProcessUTF8]] to start the browser:
56	62
57	63		``` pascal
58	64		uses
59	65		Classes, ..., LCLProc, LazHelpHTML, UTF8Process;
60	66
61	67		...
62	68
63	69		implementation
64	70
65	71		procedure TMainForm.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
66	72		var
67	73		v: THTMLBrowserHelpViewer;
68	74		BrowserPath, BrowserParams: string;
69	75		p: LongInt;
70	76		URL: String;
71	77		BrowserProcess: TProcessUTF8;
72	78		begin
73	79		v:=THTMLBrowserHelpViewer.Create(nil);
74	80		try
75	81		v.FindDefaultBrowser(BrowserPath,BrowserParams);
76	82		debugln(['Path=',BrowserPath,' Params=',BrowserParams]);
77	83
78	84		URL:='http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org';
79	85		p:=System.Pos('%s', BrowserParams);
80	86		System.Delete(BrowserParams,p,2);
81	87		System.Insert(URL,BrowserParams,p);
82	88
83	89		// start browser
84	90		BrowserProcess:=TProcessUTF8.Create(nil);
85	91		try
86	92		BrowserProcess.CommandLine:=BrowserPath+' '+BrowserParams;
87	93		BrowserProcess.Execute;
88	94		finally
89	95		BrowserProcess.Free;
90	96		end;
91	97		finally
92	98		v.Free;
93	99		end;
94	100		end;
95	101		```
96	102
97	103		## Integrate web browser component in application
98	104
99	105		### TurboPower Internet Pro
100	106
101	107		Lazarus provides the package TurboPowerIPro (lazarus/components/turbopower_ipro/turbopoweripro.lpk) with the following features:
102	108
103	109		- It contains a control to put onto a form. When you install the package in the IDE, you get some new components in the palette, so you can drop them onto a form just like any LCL control.
104	110		- It is written completely in Pascal and therefore works on all platforms out of the box without any extra installation.
105	111		- You have the full control, what files/urls are opened.
106	112		- It does not have all the features of a full webbrowser. No multimedia stuff, javascript or flash. This must be implemented by you.
107	113
108	114		There are some examples in lazarus/components/turbopower_ipro/examples demonstrating how to open a local html file with some images, hyperlinks and history buttons. See the [[IPro tab]] on the [[Component Palette]].
109	115
110	116		### WebView4Delphi
111	117
112	118		[[WebView4Delphi]] allows to embed Chromium-based web browsers in your Delphi or Lazarus applications using the WebView2 runtime. It uses many of the tricks from CEF4Delphi and you will notice many similarities if you used it.
113	119
114	120		There are a few things pending like the "windowless mode".
115	121
116	122		### TWebBrowser WebKit (macOS Cocoa)
117	123
118	124		TWebBrowser control is implemented only for the LCL Cocoa widgetset for macOS by wrapping the WebView class that's part of every Mac's WebKit framework. Note that by default macOS blocks calls to insecure HTTP sites. You can relax this restriction by setting the NSAllowsArbitraryLoads key in your application's [[macOS property list files\|Info.plist]] file, but for testing you might stick with HTTPS sites. This control does not add any bulk to your app and does not require installation of any additional libraries. Everything it needs is already on your Mac and is accessible via the FPC CocoaAll unit. [Source](https://macpgmr.github.io/MacXPlatform/lclwebbrowser-src.zip).
119	125
120	126		### QT Webkit
121	127
122	128		When using the Qt widgetset, you can use the Qt Webkit to embed a browser into a LCL form. Lazarus demo is available on [FPC Qt4 Binding Web Page](http://users.telenet.be/Jan.Van.hijfte/qtforfpc/fpcqt4.html).
123	129
124	130		### THtmlPort
125	131
126	132		[[THtmlPort]] is a Lazarus/Free Pascal version of Dave Baldwin's HTML Components, including THtmlViewer, TFrameViewer and TFrameBrowser.
127	133
128	134		### HtmlViewer
129	135
130	136		The [HtmlViewer](https://github.com/BerndGabriel/HtmlViewer) component for Delphi and Lazarus, set consists of:
131	137
132	138		- THtmlViewer
133	139		- TFrameViewer
134	140		- TFrameBrowser
135	141
136	142		### fpCEF3
137	143
138	144		[[fpCEF3]] is a Chromium Embedded Framework for Free Pascal.
139	145
140	146		### CEF4Delphi
141	147
142	148		[[CEF4Delphi]] is updated Chromium Embedded Framework, which supports Lazarus.
143	149
144	150		### GeckoPort
145	151
146	152		[[GeckoPort]] is a Lazarus/Free Pascal version of Takanori Ito's Gecko SDK for Delphi, including the TGeckoBrowser component.
147	153
148	154		### LazActiveX
149	155
150	156		[[LazActiveX]] allows to import MS Internet Explorer type library.
151	157
152	158		### LazWebkit
153	159
154	160		[LazWebkit](http://sourceforge.net/p/lazwebkit/wiki/Home/) is a project focused to provide browser and composer web content features for Lazarus IDE based projects. Currently it's implemented only for GTK2 widgetset.
155	161
156	162		## See also
157	163
158	164		- [[Executing External Programs]]
159	165		- [[fphttpclient]] Part of fcl-web that can be used stand-alone to retrieve HTTP-Content
160	166		- [[fpbrowser]] web browser written in Lazarus
161	167		- [[fpwebview]] cross-platform library for Linux, macOS and Windows for building desktop applications using Pascal and web technology
162	168		- [[Windows Programming Tips\|Using Windows native WinInet for web retrieval]]
163	169		- [[macOS NSURLSession]] - the replacement for [[macOS NSURLConnection\|NSURLConnection]] for web retrieval.
164	170
165	171		---
166	172		From the Free Pascal wiki, page "Webbrowser", as it stood on 2022-02-18 after a change by PierceNg, out of the wiki's dump of 2024-05-26. Copyright stays with the author who wrote it, according to the old wiki's [[Licensing]] page. If you have concerns about this material, [message the admin](/wiki-contact).

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