Regression - Delphi 12 - Unable to debug dynamically loaded packages

[@AT 1]

I'm facing regression in Delphi 12 which blocks me in debugging EMS Server packages.  Debugger does not stop at any breakpoints in source code; debugger does not display any symbols in CPU Debug View when execution is stopped in the package, 

After short investigation I found that local debuggers (Win32, Win64) do not load debug symbols for dynamically loaded packages via LoadPackage function.

Issue is reproduced with Delphi 12 SP1 and is not reproduced in Delphi 11.3. 

 

 

Edited March 3, 2024 by @AT

[Stepan Drzka 0]

Hi, We encountered something similar with statically linked packages. In 11.3 it is working. Have you reported it to the Embarcadero yet? (I know that the Quality Portal is read-only these days).

[Marco Cantu 82]

We have received reports for this issue already. We don't have a ETA for the solution, but have been looking into it

[himitsu 4]

Unfortunately still no solution.

 

Quote

do not load debug symbols for dynamically loaded packages 

That's not quite true, because the log claims that the debug infos are being loaded,

but I also know that the log likes to lie.

 

Because it compiles with external TDS, the *.tds are deleted and yet the debug log claims that the debug infos are being loaded for this EXE/DLL/BPL, which can't be true because they are gone.

First of all, loading such packages with missing *.tds is really extremely slow

and then Delphi itself is too stupid to recognize the problem here, because they create a 1-byte DEBUG section in the actual compilation when the TDS is saved externally, but this "one" byte itself cannot of course contain any debug infos.

[mvanrijnen 136]

Is this fixed in D12.2 ?  

Would nice to know before i spent 2 days updating the dev environment .

 

[Uwe Raabe 2226]

Although there is one issue mentioned in this area (RSS-1044: Debug Delphi 12 IDE for Components design time), that issue lacks public access, so we don't know about the details.

 

A short test here still exposes the problem, but there might be other things involved having influence on it. I would like to hear from others if they could get it working with 12.2.

[mvanrijnen 136]

thats not good, having a problem with a RAD server package, which i would like to debug, gonna be a problem this week.

Maybe the right time to say goodbye to RADserver and transfer the code to MARS (the Rest Server, not the planet)

 

@Marco CantuWhats the status of this problem? 

 

 

Edited September 16, 2024 by mvanrijnen

[Remy Lebeau 1675]

On 3/25/2024 at 12:22 PM, Stepan Drzka said:

I know that the Quality Portal is read-only these days

That is because the old Quality Portal (quality.embarcadero.com) has been replaced with a new system (qp.embarcadero.com).

Edited September 16, 2024 by Remy Lebeau

[mvanrijnen 136]

On 3/26/2024 at 9:52 AM, Marco Cantu said:

We have received reports for this issue already. We don't have a ETA for the solution, but have been looking into it

So, here we are more than a year later, any news on this issue? 

 

[Vandrovnik 225]

On 7/14/2025 at 1:53 PM, mvanrijnen said:

So, here we are more than a year later, any news on this issue? 

 

[Anders Melander 2132]

They are probably too busy Getting Real Help For Free With Code Reviews, Pull Requests, And Git Commits. 🤡

[mvanrijnen 136]

Does someone ( @Marco Cantu) knows if this is solved in 12.3.x? 

We are sure gonna leave the whole RadServer concept because of the lack of support/maintenance. 
(probably going the MARS way)

Who releases a software development product which can debug?

(curious the way this went to production/release, Boss! We can not debug the radserver modules, oh, "nobody cares, just ship it,")

 

[Die Holländer 95]

14 hours ago, Anders Melander said:

They are probably too busy Getting Real Help For Free With Code Reviews, Pull Requests, And Git Commits. 🤡

The special guest forgot to mention one important development language on his site..

 

Bito: Supported programming languages 

 

Ah..

AI code review agent supported programming languages and tools

Edited July 16 by Die Holländer

[mvanrijnen 136]

Most funny thing is that nobody can confirm this is fixed.
Kind of confirmation of what a laugh the Delphi IDE is become ..........................

 

Time to make a list of critical question for the next Summit in Purmerend (Amsterdam for the commercial guys&girls).

 

 

[Kas Ob. 160]

34 minutes ago, mvanrijnen said:

for the commercial guys&girls

I don't know, but this sound like human trafficking.

[mvanrijnen 136]

19 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

I don't know, but this sound like human trafficking.

???

 

The summit is held in Purmerend (a place near Amsterdam), but it's called Delphi Summit Amsterdam, 

don't know where you were thinking of, but if it was ment as a joke, it's not a funny joke?

 

[Kas Ob. 160]

1 hour ago, mvanrijnen said:

don't know where you were thinking of, but if it was ment as a joke, it's not a funny joke?

It was a joke of cutting text out of context, and how this anything other than joke, (may be not funny though).

[mvanrijnen 136]

@Marco Cantu

 

I'm glad to say that we did fix the problem ...

 

 

[Jan Brandt 0]

How did you fix the problem? Is it in 12.3? In upcoming 13? I would like to know as I am experiencing problems with debugging Win64 bpls in 12.2 Patch 2. 

[mvanrijnen 136]

yes, it's not really a fix, but i (we)  removed RAD server from the equation. 

(moved from RAD server to MARS Rest library from @Andrea Magni, works amazingly well)

 

@Marco Cantu

@Ian Barker

I really can not get my head around the fact that EMB does not fix this, it renders the IDE almost useless if your using bpls in your application/solution

 

[Javier Tarí 43]

On 9/5/2025 at 3:13 PM, mvanrijnen said:

yes, it's not really a fix, but i (we)  removed RAD server from the equation. 

(moved from RAD server to MARS Rest library from @Andrea Magni, works amazingly well)

And how did that fixed the poblem? is it "fixed" because MARS is not in a BPL but in your own exe?

[Jan Brandt 0]

Interesting thing happened as my colleagues is able to debug the same code on his PC but not me. The main difference between our computers is version of Windows (I have 10 and he has 11). I wonder if it is because of Windows version or some Windows setting that causes me being unable to debug BPL (statically and dynamically loaded). 

Edited September 8 by Jan Brandt

[Sergio Govoni 0]

Hi all,

 

we have been struggling with an issue like this and we found a workaround that works in our environment.

 

In our case the problem appears not only with dynamically loaded packages, but also with runtime packages. For example:

• App.exe uses a class contained in Pkg.bpl
• App.exe loads Pkg.bpl as a runtime package
• Run App.exe using parameter host application in Pkg.bpl
• Breakpoints inside Pkg.bpl were completely ignored by the debugger

We have found that the project you want to debug must not be the last one compiled. If the last compiled project contains at least a requires reference to the package you want to debug, the debugger is properly activated.

 

Suppose we have:

• App.exe is the one we want to debug with runtime packages
• AppDebug.exe is an additional fake project in the same group

Steps:

• Build App.exe in debug configuration
• Build the fake project AppDebug.exe
• Run App.exe and see the breakpoint in Pkg.bpl

If you make changes in App.exe, recompile it, then recompile the fake project AppDebug.exe, and only then start debugging again. After restarting Delphi 12, you need to recompile both projects, ensuring the project you want to debug is not the last one compiled.

 

HTH

[Uwe Raabe 2226]

10 hours ago, Sergio Govoni said:

must not be the last one compiled

Sounds like an off-by-one error.

[Sergio Govoni 0]

15 hours ago, Uwe Raabe said:

Sounds like an off-by-one error.

Yes, and just to clarify my scenario: I don't have access to the source code of the main application (App.exe in the example), but I need to develop and debug a plugin (Pkg.bpl in the example) that the application loads at runtime.