Rollo62

Have you also added the featured file "Sqlite driver" in the deployment? https://youtu.be/--HfSCnp24o?t=163

Is that always guaranteed? I would think that the compiler may decide to copy by value for small records.

Hi there, via WholeTomato https://www.wholetomato.com/blog/2024/11/14/how-to-query-file-attributes-50x-faster-on-windows/?utm_source=Eloqua&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Article-250314-WT-50xfaster

Would you please explain a little, how the 64Bit IDE is integrated into the existing system? I understood that both have two separate registry entries, which would make sense, but what about the installation files & binaries? a.) are all these files land in completely separate, external installation folders, outside the normal "Embarcadero/Studio/23.0/bin" folder with all different libraries and *.dll, or b.) is this just another internal folder or *.exe aside the normal "Embarcadero/Studio/23.0/" or "Embarcadero/Studio/23.0/bin" folder a.) would mean that more or less double the size or installation, all files 32-/64-Bit, even if they maybe same. b.) would mean that most libraries, dlls, etc. are maybe shared and the new 64BitIDE is more or less a new *.exe, which is using that. Would be great to know how much the degree of re-use for the new 64BitIDE files there is, Is this doubling the size, or only a fraction? I cannot find any information from Embarcadero to this.

Thats what I think too, but have you tested it already for cross-platform, without issues? Better I wait a day or two.

Oh my, I'm still on Delphi 12.11 and wanted to upgrade to 12.2. My 12.11 was (is) very stable, so I hesitated with the move. Now I have to jump to 12.3 immediately and skip 12.2, will Delphi 12.3 be as stable as 12.2, I doubt it. Shall I update to 12.2 or better directly to 12.3 then? I hope to get some early responses here on stability for Android, iOS, before I decide this.

Hi there, I'm wondering if there have been any changes to the Now() function recently, related to the timer resolution. The Now() returnd TDateTime with Millisecond resolution, while officially they state the resolution is only 1 Sec. https://docwiki.embarcadero.com/Libraries/Athens/en/System.SysUtils.Now Note: Although TDateTime values can represent milliseconds, Now is accurate only to the nearest second. This topic is quite old, so already here discussed on SO https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14573617/how-accurate-is-delphis-now-timestamp With GetTimerTick() I can reach 7-16ms timer resolution, basically. !! And before somebody recommends high performance: I'm perfectly fine with the 15ms resolution and I want to use it. With Now() I can see similar results on all platforms, according to my tests, which is much better than the 1 Sec. stated in the docs, pretty much like the 7-16ms resolution. So what does the 1 Sec. really mean then, is this the worst-case scenario that might happen, while its perfectly 15ms all day long? Perhaps there have been changed something recently, in Delphi or Windows or other Platforms? Windows: System.SysUtils.Now(): is based on GetLocalTime(SystemTime); https://learn.microsoft.com/de-de/windows/win32/api/sysinfoapi/nf-sysinfoapi-getlocaltime https://learn.microsoft.com/de-de/windows/win32/api/minwinbase/ns-minwinbase-systemtime - I cannot find any restrictions like 1 Sec. there, not even a 15ms note. TThread.GetTickCount64: is based in GetTickCount64; https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/sysinfoapi/nf-sysinfoapi-gettickcount64 - Which also had no restrictions, aside the known 15ms resolution. Macos/iOS: mach_absolute_time Android/Linux: clock_gettime(CLOCK_MONOTONIC, @res); Other Platforms were way beyond these accuracy - All should reach 1ms without problem. From the behaviour I can see in my tests, I would assume that Now() reaches the same 15ms resolution meanwhile on my current Win11 PC. Is this a safe assumpttion, or are there any other known restriction, which officially state the 1 Sec. resolution? This is why I think the following - Now() and GetTickCount64 both reach about 15ms resolution - Perhaps Now() could show resolution 1 Sec. in rare cases, e.g. under heavy load. - If that is true, I would also expect that also GetTickCount64() might break down to 1 Sec. resolution, under heavy load. Maybe somebody can clarify the situation, under current Windows versions, are there any official statements, aside from Embarcadero's docs? If there were such insights for the other platforms, I'm happy to see them too, but only Windows seems to be worst here.

Thanks, that very helpful. It is what I expected, of course the all should be derived from a deeper hardware clock, with the same resolution. But this is just my assumption, Raymonds article leads to this conclusion too: - GetTickCount64 is based it's same name Windows kernel function, and - Now() is based on Windows GetLocalTime() function. which all belongs to that same group and leads to the same timer resolution of 10 to 55ms ( I believe that is more realistic, but I will stay with 15ms the average ). My quick measurements here show tolerances of approx. 1S = 7-8ms, where within 3S = 21-24 ms I should stay within 95% for all time resolution outliers. But its just a rough test on a virtual machine and no scientific result, but it shows that the resolution shall be far below 1 Sec. With a upper/lower limit of 3S I could catch only very few outliers, and within 4S it showed no more outliers at all. Because of that I would safely assume that a tolerance of 4S = 28-32ms is a realistic worst-case scenario for my virtual machine, which matches to Raymonds note. All in all, that is what I expected and good to know that there is at least an official statement from Microsoft too. It may be possible that Windows system timer functions gets massively blocked by various extra loads, which may then have a good reason. I don't expect any realtime accuracy from those kind of timers in that group anyway. Perhaps the 1 Sec. Note from Embarcadero ist just stupid a "Warning", that the Now() Function is not intended for any precise measurements, although it do support ms resolution. Yes, time is relative ... good that you remind me that. Thats why I can perfectly live with 15ms timers too, in about 99.9% of uncritical cases Regarding TStopwatch.Timestamp(), this is based on the following system functions, whereas I want to avoid the macOS "mach_absolute_time()" function for obvious reasons https://en.delphipraxis.net/topic/13126-apple-gettimertick64-mach_absolute_time-how-to-handle-the-nsprivacyaccessedapitype-privacy/?tab=comments#comment-102072 class function TStopwatch.GetTimeStamp: Int64; //## MSWINDOWS: if FIsHighResolution then QueryPerformanceCounter(Result) else Result := GetTickCount * Int64(TTimeSpan.TicksPerMillisecond); //## MACOS: Result := Int64(AbsoluteToNanoseconds( mach_absolute_time ) div 100); //## POSIX: clock_gettime(CLOCK_MONOTONIC, @res); TStopwatch relies also on GetTickCount as fallback, instead of GetTickCount64, which I hope is only a relict of older Windows versions and would not be seen on any modern ( 10yr ) PC anyway.

Hi there, I was looking into the GetTimerTick64 function and see that under Apple products, the mach_absolute_time function is used, to get a precide timer. Unfortunately Apple requires privacy declarations of mach_absolute_time: mach_absolute_time NSPrivacyAPITypes NSPrivacyAccessedAPICategorySystemBootTime For the usual usage of GetTimerTick64(), I would say the 35F9.1 would be most relevant. I would say this is used in any apps using some kind of internal timing or timerticks behaviour, that will fall under these requirements. Regarding such funktion, I think they can easily automatically test for this, if your app uses the function, or not, so it should already give a warning in an automated test from Apple Review. I do not use the absolute boot time, which they claim to be dangerous, but only derived timer ticks informations, which fall under the exception. My questions are: - Does the exception above mean, that you don't need to give such informations in the manifest? Or do you need to put it there anyway, no matter of exception or not, to declare that you make use of the mach_absolute_time() funtion. - Did Delphi already took care of this somehow ( I cannot see any of such entries in any manifest )? - How do you handle this, does anybody include these markers in the manifest? - Is anybody aware of, that Apple was rejecting an App in the Review, because of this? - If yes, how did you solved this with Apple? Perhaps you could share some logs or noted from their review, how they explain such issue to you. This would be interesting to clarify, before tapping into another Apple booby trap.

Oh yes, I have forgotten about this thread, not considering that this is also related to GetTickCount64() & mach_absolute_time() Thanks, then I know which direction to go.

Thanks, I will look into it. Strange, I have never seen such a Transporter issue yet, but time will come Does it clearly tell you the reason of the rejection?

Thanks for the proposals, but again, I'm not looking for QueryPerformanceCounter, but about the Now(); behaviour. Moreover I'm looking for a cross-platform sulution, not Windows alone. I dont need high performance for this task, the 15ms would be fine. It could be even OK, if 1 Sec., if this happens only very very rare ( but I would like to avoid that ). I hope that someone knows exactly where the 1 Sec. comes from and what conditions will make it to show up.

Like said, I know about performance counters, but I want to use Now() and GetTimerTick64() for other tasks, accepting the 15ms tolerances. The question is about, what the Now() 1 Sec. tolerance really means nowadays, is it gone or is it a valid case?

Hi there, sorry for the little joke in the title, but what currently makes me headaches is the fact that after May will be broken. I used iOS as stable debugging platform for many years now, which seems to breakdown hard in a few days. The alternative Android was never that stable for debugging over the same many years, getting better now, but no replacement. The big problem now is, that Apple seems to enfore the use of their latest tools after 01.05.2024, which would make the use of XCode 14.3.1 for releases impossible. For the possible XCode changes and reasons I figured out the following possible facts for my record. Perhaps they were not all correct, maybe only a few, so please feel free to correct me, if you have more insights into the XCode ecosystem. In general, there seems to be a huge change in the new XCode debugging system. Overview of the changes seen in XCode 15: Topic Old (Xcode 14.3.1) New (Xcode 15) Comments Debugging platform partly still 32-bit using 64-bit only The new debugging platform seems to remove older 32-bit code internally completely. Debugging Framework GDB-based LLDB-based New debugging framework based on LLDB, incompatible with older GDB-based framework. Edit: LLDB-ready https://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Alexandria/en/LLDB_Debuggers Debugging Libraries libgcc.dylib, libc++.dylib, New debugging libraries, incompatible with the older libraries used by D12.1. libstdc++.dylib libc++abi.dylib Edit: LLDB-ready https://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Alexandria/en/LLDB_Debuggers Symbolication Manual Automatic Xcode 15 introduces automatic symbolication, incompatible with manual symbolication used by D12.1. Debugging Protocol GDB protocol LLDB protocol New debugging protocol, incompatible with the older GDB protocol used by D12.1. Edit: LLDB-ready https://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Alexandria/en/LLDB_Debuggers Breakpoint Handling Software breakpoints Hardware breakpoints Uses hardware breakpoints, incompatible with the software breakpoints used by D12.1. Debug Information STABS debug format DWARF debug format New debug information format, incompatible with the older STABS format used by D12.1. Edit: LLDB-ready https://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Alexandria/en/LLDB_Debuggers I would like to know if this huge XCode change is really upcoming soon, and what can we do about it in the near future? Is there any workaround in sight? I'm afraid, that we have to wait for the next Delphi Update or Patch, which maybe changes a lot of the internals ( libraries, PAServer, workflows, ... ). Are there any news from Embarcadero, about this topic, so that we could see any light in the tunnel? Would be great if there is a way, to make XCode 15 compatible with Delphi, or vice versa. My considerations so far: - Use Android for Debugging, even if it not that stable. Perhaps there are ways to improve Android debugging too. - Forget Mobile debugging, rely only on Logging ( the worst case for me ). - Still use XCode 14.3.1 for debugging, while releasing under XCode 15. This is problematic, because I think XCode 14.3.1 dosen't allow to use iOS 17.4, and perhaps two versions cannot switch easily on the macOS host. Are there any tested workflows, like xcode-select --switch /Applications/Xcode14.app/Contents/Developer and xcode-select --switch /Applications/Xcode15.app/Contents/Developer ? That also means, we would possibly need two sorts of devices with iOS 16.x ( DEBUG + Log ) and iOS 17.4 ( RELEASE + Log ) for proper tests ( Permanent upgrade / downgrade is not an option ). - Embarcadero already had worked out a stable Update 2, to simply make iOS 17.4 debuggable and testable. ( The best case for me ). - Any smart hack, to make XCode 14.3.1 producing releases still? Perhaps, setting a build-ID could do the job, but I'm completely unsure about that. When Apple finds such hacks, this may also be considered as infringement and lead in blocking the app in the store, which could be even harder. - Other ideas / news / thoughs, are there any ? Edit: See above table, it seems that Delphi >= Alexandria can already make use of LLDB debugging system: https://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Alexandria/en/LLDB_Debuggers

Thanks, but that was already clear. The problem is, that simulators are not behaving exactly like devices, especially with sensors and hardware stuff, this is why I rarely use them.

Python seems most natual to me, since all 3 libraries may support it or have wrapper for that. Moreover is Python maybe also a natural way to use these kind of libraries ( but I'm not a Chemist ), so to put a Delphi UI on top would have a lot of benefits IMHO, while still keeping the full force of Python to C++ underneath. The additional burden to install and requiring Python-Libs for such project seems minor to me. Esspeciall when you think of combining Chemistry with AI features, I think you are already right in the Python world.

I'm still testing porting from 10.3.1 to 10.3.2 In one FMX project for Macos, when just opening and compiling the working project, I've got some messages when compiling under Macos64 (Of coarse it works well under all other platforms). 1.) This message is strange, because the Imports folder is not there at all, not even the 20.0\ folder, because I installed the IDE under d:\Prj\... Under d:\Prj\Embarcadero\Studio\20.0\Imports I have that folder (which is almost empty, just a subfolder with one VCL related file "\Idl\StdVCL.idl". 2.) Its strange because of the reference to kernel32.-dll I have searched my settings, compiler, linker, deployment, registry, but I'm not lucky and couldn't find where these locations are maybe set. My BDSCOMMONDIR environment variable points to a folder close: C:\Users\reg_w\OneDrive\Dokumente\Embarcadero\Studio\20.0, but thats working at all other platforms. Then I decided to completely migrate via an new, empty project, like I described here: Create new FMX app, removed orignal unit1 and added my units from the old project. So now I got a more informative message, but still similar: compiling OK, linking failed The empty project runs, but when I add my units, something went wrong. I'm not recalling to have anything affecting linking in my code, but I haven't checked that yet. Which screw could I turn to remove this linker error, I hope somebody has a clue ? Edit: As usual, just when I prepare and sended a thread, it hits me in the face what this could be. The folder seems to be related to Spring4D .. To get Spring4D compiled, I used the following addition to switch to PUREPASCAL, which seemed to compile fine. I'M using the development branch, from not too long ago (2 weeks), haven't checked for changes. {$I Spring.inc} {$IFDEF MACOS64} // <--Addition {$DEFINE PUREPASCAL} {$ELSE} {.$DEFINE PUREPASCAL} {$ENDIF MACOS64} unit Spring.Events; So probably I have to c heck what happens with Spring4D in my Macos64 tests ... How can I switch S4D to Macos64 in the right way ?

This topic has nothing to do with Macos, FMX, Spring4D, Kastri or whatsever. This error was caused by a region, which was a leftover from Copy-Paste code from Windows, which I shouldn't do in the first place. The Region {$REGION 'Windows helper functions'} function SetThreadExecutionState(esFlags: EXECUTION_STATE): EXECUTION_STATE; stdcall; external 'kernel32.dll'; was hiding this Windows-Kernel related kernel reference, which was never used anywhere, but this one line never showed up as an error at this point. This tells me, that using regions to hide code, may also hide code to spot obvious failures sometimes.

Yes, but not because its irrelevant. But that's because even the last snoozer has realised that by now.

@Kas Ob. Yes, I have read about CloudFlare a lot of positive things, but I'm not yet an active user. Your proposal will add additional cost, I think minimum 5$ per month, right? My question would be, how far do I get with their free tier service? As far as I understand, this will be an unlimited, somehwhat protected DNS server, perhaps thats already solving such issues. Is the free tier usable for a commercial server, with not too wild traffic?

Hard to say. One effective approach could be behavior-based rate limiting rather than relying solely on IP tracking. Since these hackers are making two requests at a time from each IP and cycling through thousands of addresses, you could analyze request patterns to flag suspicious behavior. For example: - Track request timing and frequency per IP: Legitimate users rarely hit your site with precise, repetitive timing (e.g., two requests exactly every 24 hours). You could set a threshold where IPs making requests in a tight, unnatural cadence (say, under a second apart) get temporarily soft-blocked (e.g., delayed responses or a 429 Too Many Requests status) without affecting users with more organic patterns. - Fingerprinting beyond IP: Use a lightweight client-side fingerprinting technique (e.g., based on HTTP headers like User-Agent, Accept-Language, or even subtle timing differences in TCP handshakes). If the same fingerprint appears across multiple IPs in a short window, it’s a strong signal of VPN rotation from a single source. You could then throttle or block those requests without needing a CAPTCHA. - Perhaps you need only a few countries, so you could block most of all other country requests - or something like Fail2Ban https://github.com/fail2ban/fail2ban

@Anders Melander I found an older case of yours, here at DevExpress. https://supportcenter.devexpress.com/ticket/details/t812550/an-av-occurs-if-the-spell-checker-whose-usethreadedload-property-is-set-to-true-reloads Which speaks against FreeAndNil too.

Thanks, that sounds like I would never consider this in the first place. This is why I am asking for a simple, generic example to better understand why this would probably make sense. Do you know a specific place in the VCL/FMX code, where it is used like that?

Ok, you both are right, but I still wonder why its used in so many places, if its that unnecessary. The "reduce" was intended as fast fix, if you have no other choice to complete rework or repair anything in time, but you have to ship an update fast, used more or less like as a debugging tool. There must be at least one real use-case, where FAN makes perfectly sense. Yes, I already mentioned this use-case, so is this the only one? Why are there so many places using FAN during Create/Destroy, without any lazy injection? I only can think of critical timing or race-condition protection somehow.

Thanks, its clear then, how the capture of anonymous methods work. We came from the question how FreeAndNil might be helpful here, in this kind of situations, right? Aren't there any situations where FAN can be useful, perhaps with an Assigned( FVar ) guard, were everybody can agree on? I can see much use of FAN in Delphi RTL, Spring4D and all many places all around, but at the same time everybody disagrees on its usefulness & better to avoid it, thats strange ... Where and why is it useful then, if not in situations where I want to check and mark the validity of a lazy Field or the like, for example by Assigned()? I cannot think of much use-cases, where I would ever need this. - If I use it in the case where I inject an object to a class, not by DI, but by method or property, then this would make sense to protect a Field by FAN, IMHO. - In a use case where I purely manage a Field myself by Create/Destroy, it doesn't make much sense if there is no possibility of delayed access to it. So maybe somebody has a clean example, to show where it makes sense?