Delphi 2007 - File Browser expert

We finally started using Codegear Delphi 2007 (Update 3) at work. It's a big step forward since we were using Delphi 7. First impressions are very good. I noticed the new file browser. This browser is like windows explorer docked into the IDE. One useful feature is that you can use all explorer shell extensions. For instance TortoiseSVN is a very important one since I'm using it daily for versioning. The file browser misses clearly one important feature, synchronizing with the active project. I always have to scroll to the project directory to do anything meaningful with it. Asking around in the opentools newsgroup I found out that there's no interface to this new file browser. So I decided to rewrite the file browser as an IDE-expert. Thanks to the components of VirtualShellTools (http://www.mustangpeak.net) I managed to build a new Delphi 2007 IDE expert. It supports 2 types of auto-synchronizing.

1) All folders are visible and the file browser expands the path of the current project.
2) Only the project folder is visible (by changing the root folder)

The auto sync mode can only be changed in the form menu which is only visible in undocked mode. (sorry for that)

I've added a file filter so it can display only the file types you want, just like the original file browser. But it's also possible to set an exclude filter. So you can show all files, except *.dcu and so on.

You can download this expert here. It's version 0.1 and more or less a test version. You can also download the installer here.

I know it's far from perfect, but hey, it's a start.

Please send bug reports to drastic@pandora.be

Execute Delphi code from javascript using TWebbrowser

I just bumped into some really neat code. This code allows you to integrate your delphi application with the TWebBrowser component. You just hook in your application as the host of the TWebBrowser component. This will allow javascript to use your Delphi functions. It's like the welcome page in the Delphi IDE.

Just check out this link on www.delphidabbler.com

A little bit about me

I was born in 1977 in The Netherlands and currently living in Belgium. I started to do some programming in Basic somewhere back in the late 80s on a GoldStar MSX. But finally got a pc in early 90s. I started doing pascal coding using Turbo Pascal v5.5. While at school we learned pascal programming in version 3! I was glad to move on to Borland Pascal 7.0. Together with a friend we started coding packet radio software for Citizen Band (27Mhz). Which was used by several hundreds of people world wide. In 1998 it was time to learn delphi. I've used several delphi versions: 3, 4, 5 and 7 and Turbo Explorer. We are still using Delphi 5 and 7 at work, but they have purchased Delphi 2007, so I can't wait to start using that one.

I've downloaded the trial of 2007 and I really enjoy working with it so far.

Let's get started

Okay,

The weblog will be focussed on Object Pascal (also known as Delphi), but CodeGear is now refering back to Object Pascal as a language and Delphi as the tool to build the applications.

My current environments are:

at home - Turbo Delphi Explorer
at work - Delphi 5, Delphi 7 and soon Turbo Delphi Pro and Delphi 2007.

So far my first post, more information about myself will soon be online..but I have to get started somewhere.