[Lazarus] Lazarus config woes

[Hans-Peter Diettrich]

Marco van de Voort schrieb:
> On Thu, Mar 31, 2011 at 12:50:05PM +0200, Hans-Peter Diettrich wrote:
>>> problem to share him config espicialy for IDE.
>> IMO the current config is not shareable, due to the many absolute pathes 
>> in it.
> 
> Interesting. How did you test this?

It bites me whenever I try to start any IDE without or with an empty pcp :-(

Now I've learned that I should exit the IDE after such startup problems, 
before consequential damage can occur. It's very inconvenient then, when 
I don't check the path of the source files, loaded into the editor, and 
start editing files in the default Lazarus installation :-(


> Did you try the lazarus-dir parameter
> approach?

What's that?

>  IIRC one can make everything relative to lazarus-dir and then
> pass lazarusdir on the cmdline (though that is mainly meant for portable
> versions, the problem is the same).

As suggested in a parallel mail, the IDE could include the Lazarus 
directory path from which it was compiled. This would eliminate the 
chance for loading inappropriate files (lpk...) from a different 
(inapplicable) installation.


> The only problem I see is that fpc will have to be installed in the lazarus
> dir everywhere.

The detached FPC is a big mess :-(

I'd prefer to indicate both the fpc binary and source path in a single 
reference, by e.g. pointing to the according fpc config.

Similarly for the Make path, when an installer didn't put all required 
tools into that bin directory (maybe a Windows-specific problem). That's 
why I still have to specify the fpc 2.2.4 bin directory for Make (which 
came with Lazarus 0.9.26). That's confusing, because that directory is 
in the global PATH, but Run issues error messages about tools not found, 
when I specify an different path for Make. Maybe a 32/64 bit issue, 
because the old (complete) bin directory is for 64 bit, while I found it 
less complicated to build all projects for 32 bit (the fpc default on a 
64 bit Windows!). AFAIR the show stopper was the debugger, which I 
couldn't make work for 64 bit apps.


>> Just my argument for splitting up the config, into something like 
>> shareable IDE settings (layout, shortcuts...), and machine or 
>> installation settings (with pathes).
> 
> I think this is horrible complication of afairs without much benefit,
> morever since usually most multiple lazarus installations will span multiple
> versions, it is flat out unworkable.

Huh?

Just when multiple versions are installed, the user settings (language, 
shortcuts...) should be shareable.


>> Currently I have to locate the default configuration directory, what's 
>> not so easy on Windows, and move or rename it, before I can e.g. install 
>> another snapshot or branch.
> 
> I never use the global dir. I simply use a batchfile to start lazarus that
> sets --lazarus-dir and pcp.

That's amusing ;-)

First everybody claims that a common config in the default place is a 
must, then you say that you don't use that config. So it's not only me 
who wants simplified procedures for using multiple Lazarus versions in 
parallel?


> I think that if you want to fix issues like this, the installer is the place
> to work. It should allow "advanced" or movable installs.

Which installer do you mean, for SVN checkouts???

It would help a lot, when a SVN checkout would start out-of-the-box, 
after Make, without any special configuring. As already mentioned, 
eventual non-standard behaviour could be made specific to non-release 
builds.

DoDi