Are you maintaining code that predates social media? Still talking to a database through the BDE? Locked to an old Delphi version because a critical component vendor vanished years ago? You’re not alone.

One of Delphi’s quiet superpowers is longevity. These aren’t fragile web apps that break on a library update, they’re workhorses. Boring, reliable, profitable workhorses.

This month we’re swapping war stories: the apps we keep breathing life into, the clients who depend on them, and how we honestly answer the question “how much longer?” If you’ve managed to modernize one of these old-timers — upgraded to FireDAC, moved to a newer Delphi version, refactored something you once thought was untouchable — we want to hear that too.

But let’s be honest: nothing lasts forever. Are you planning for the eventual end-of-life, or just hoping to outlive the code?

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, April 15, 2026 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the president of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since it was first released 30 years ago.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, March, 18 2026 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035

Tonight, we’ll share the details of how simply transferring files between a local computer and a remote software product suddenly took a dramatically increased amount of time when changing the access to the software–and what it took to resolve it.

The solution involves multiple moving parts; and yes, one of those is a Delphi application! And yes, it was built with AI!

(No wire cutters were used in building this solution.)

PRESENTER

DAVID CORNELIUS has full time job as a Delphi developer where he uses AI every day, manages online websites and applications through his business with the help of AI, and constantly shares tips and techniques on programming and technology with anyone willing to listen.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, February, 18 2026 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035

Using AI to help with research and documentation and testing has become a standard part of a developer’s daily job over the last year but in the last couple of months, AI’s capabilities has taken a dramatic leap. The latest versions of both Claude and ChatGPT are now being heralded by many as moving us from developers to product managers. Some are saying it’s the end of coding, many are skeptical.

Using Claude Code, we will attempt to build a working Delphi Windows app from scratch without writing a line of code ourselves. To keep it simple and familiar, we’ll use the VCL and a sample SQLite database. It won’t be a terribly complicated application (we only have an hour!) but it will use a third-party component or two, perform some manipulation of data, and show some refactoring of the project, all live and with audience suggestions.

• What is Vibe Coding? When Artificial Intelligence Becomes Your Pair Programmer
• Project repository with Claude’s generated project plan: VibeTracks on Github

PRESENTER

DAVID CORNELIUS has full time job as a Delphi developer where he uses AI every day, manages online websites and applications through his business with the help of AI, and constantly studies tips and techniques to help improve his use of AI.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, January, 21 2026
6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035

Last year, we discussed various solutions to several of the programming puzzles published every December. This year, we’ll do it again–but I’m going to use a different language other than Delphi (to be revealed at the meeting!).

I’d like to challenge each of you to tackle a few of them as well and we can share solutions, discuss various approaches, and laugh at all the AoC memes you can find on Reddit!

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, December, 17 2025
6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Round Table Pizza in Lake Oswego
16444 SW Boones Ferry RD
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
503-636-3350

We’ll answer many of these questions at tonight’s meeting–and show ways to add AI capabilities to an old Delphi application!

If it isn’t already, artificial intelligence (AI) will soon be a requirement in every business application. Employers want productive workers, but resist interrupting their regular duties to learn new software. If the job (or the software) is complicated, training is even more critical. It’s hard for seasoned employees to learn enhancements or program updates, but what about new hires? It becomes even more of an issue when the software is sophisticated or serves a complex industry. That’s where AI is changing the workplace.

Applications that offer a well-constructed AI interface allow employees to ask how to do a particular task. They don’t need to ask their supervisor or drag another employee away from their work. They can ask the application what to do using plain English language. In some cases, they can just tell the app to do something. No need to learn complicated tasks when AI can do it. In simple terms, just say something like, “Tell me which of our existing customers might buy XYZ product?”, or “Which supplier’s product has ABC features?” Think of the impact of creating complicated queries or custom reports.

Homer Jones is adding that kind of capability to his application, and will demonstrate what it takes to add real AI automation to an existing Delphi application. He will cover:

• deciding what features can be automated
• how to teach AI about the application
• developing tools that teach AI how to understand typical user questions
• how to cause AI responses to be correctly limited to the application
• and what role AI will play when dealing with the end user

You will see a live demonstration of real AI applied to a legacy application, and some of the code that runs behind the scenes.

Resources

• Recorded Meeting (1.7 GB)

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the president of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since it was first released 30 years ago.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, November, 19 2025
6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Cooper Mountain Ale Works
12562 SW Main St.
Tigard, OR 97223
​(503) 624-8900

JSON, or JavaScript Object Notation, is a lightweight, text-based, human-readable format that uses key-value pairs, arrays, and nested objects to exchange data among a wide variety of disparate systems. Unlike it’s name, it doesn’t really have anything to do with JavaScript but is completely language-independent. It is most known as the defacto format used by REST-based web services.

This month’s meeting will involve three different speakers, starting with a brief introduction of the JSON format and touching on its history and use. Then, we’ll dive into the details of the syntax with code with demonstrations using both Delphi 2007 (using SuperObjects) and Delphi 12 (using its native System.JSON library). Finally, we’ll explore and compare some of the many JSON libraries available for Delphi.

Resources

• JSON History (PowerPoint)
• JSON Explained (PDF)
• JSON Deep Dive with System.JSON (PowerPoint)
• SuperObjects vs Delphi System.JSON (PDF)

Github projects:

• TestJSON - Delphi project to test 17 different JSON libraries!
• JSONConvert - Delphi project to convert data from a SQLite to JSON

PRESENTERS

• David Cornelius - Introduction and library comparisons.
• Cyndi Lewis - Delphi 12’s native JSON library
• Homer Jones - SuperObject in Delphi 2007

CYNDI LEWIS is a former Delphi developer and project manager for a company that developed software for clinics that treated diabetic patients. These days, she occasionally does contract work.

HOMER JONES is currently the president of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since it was first released 30 years ago.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, October, 15 2025
6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Round Table Pizza in Lake Oswego
16444 SW Boones Ferry RD
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
503-636-3350

You may have seen the announcement, attended the webinar, read the “What’s New” page, and perhaps even downloaded it yourself. In any case, come to this month’s meeting to see demos and hear more about Delphi 13 Florence and why it was named that. Learn about the greater presence of the 64-bit IDE, the new NameOf() function, and WebBroker’s session management addition. And, of course, see the new if ternary assignment operator!

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, September 17, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
(503) 684-3160

This tool uses two different types of canvases (not all canvases are created equal!) to create a visual interface for placing data into the appropriate lines and boxes in IRS forms, and then records the positions in a file that is loaded by the client’s software in order to produce the completed forms.

PRESENTER

JONATHAN EATON is a long-time Delphi developer, project manager, and (formerly ASQ-certified) software quality engineer. He is currently doing contract work for a company that manages software for long-haul trucking companies, and (occasionally) another company that manages software for tree-farming and hazelnut growing and processing operations.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, August 20, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
(503) 684-3160

Both of these projects are directly related to his business and both are reported to have really slick user interfaces.

The Call Logging feature is for documenting incoming and outgoing calls from both clients and non-clients. It’s written so future enhancements will work with caller ID for automatic logging.

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the president of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since it was first released 30 years ago.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, July 16, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
(503) 684-3160

Embarcadero’s YouTube Channel is hosting an AI-focused series of webinars the week of June 16-20, called AI CodeCamp. These sessions cover topics such as embedding AI in your programs, training models to recognize images, enabling your app to allow AI to control it, and how to use AI in your every day life.

Let’s ride on the back of that theme by discussing how we use AI in various capacities and how we see AI changing the tech industry in general.

Additionally, the domain, pnwdelphi.org, has just been acquired and the slate is wide open on what to do with it. It’d be great to show Delphi’s prevalence in the Pacific Northwest (as the name implies) but it needs links and pictures and other content to fill it out. Check out the current “place-holder” site and follow the links to test sites I set up with a couple of AI website generators. Perhaps you’ll have an idea to share with the group!

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, June 18, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Buffalo Gap in Portland
9835 S. Macadam Avenue
Portland, OR 97219
(503) 244-7111
https://thebuffalogap.com/

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, May 21, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Buffalo Gap in Portland
9835 S. Macadam Avenue
Portland, OR 97219
(503) 244-7111
https://thebuffalogap.com/

Tonight’s presentation continues from last month’s where Homer will show his custom FTP server that runs as a Windows Service using Indy 10 components. The form-based server discussed last month needed a lot of modifications for logging and error handling. There’s a big difference between a form that allows you to see what’s going on, and a service that must run unattended in the background, and keep running even when a caveman is the user.

The production client application that uses FTP (Document Manager) will be discussed, including precautions taken to gracefully handle server hiccups. Part of that strategy is being able to switch file access between FTP and File Shares as needed.

Since this will be an upgrade to an existing production application, the installation of the FTP Server as a Windows service will be a little involved. Homer will show how an InnoSetup script installs the server app and not only makes it start automatically upon a Windows reboot but also start immediately upon the completion of the installation.

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since it was first released 30 years ago.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, April 16, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
(503) 684-3160

We’ll take a look at this and the other items in the What’s New list tonight–and get back to RAD Server next month.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, March 19, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Olive Garden in Lake Oswego
6355 SW Meadows Rd.
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
(503) 684-3160

This session will show some live customer data so it will not be recorded. The plan for next month is to use a test database with fictional data that we can show to a broader audience.

Download:

• Phone App Source - Three files make up the React Native source for the phone app Homer showed.

PRESENTERS

DAVID CORNELIUS will talk about RAD Server and show the Delphi code for building the RAD Server module. He is a professional programmer and an Embarcadero MVP, working with Delphi both at his full-time job and in his own business. He also builds websites and dabbles with Linux.

HOMER JONES will share his experience getting up to speed with JavaScript and the tools necessary to build an Android app and use the published JSON data. He is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since it was first released 30 years ago.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, February 19, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, January 15, 2025 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Round Table Pizza in Lake Oswego
16444 SW Boones Ferry RD
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
503-636-3350

People around the world have tapped into this delightful tradition, tackling the problems in a wide variety of programming languages. Challenges have been known to show up in interviews and college exams; some take it seriously and either stay up late or get up early to be the first to solve the daily puzzle, others just do as many as time allows for the fun of the challenge.

Here is an excellent (and fun to watch) video explaining what AoC is all about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ8DcbhojOw

At this month’s meeting, we’ll read through some of the challenges, discuss possible solutions, and try solving some of the problems together.

EDIT: There were a few slides in a PowerPoint that I was going to show but forgot to put it on the laptop I brought to the meeting; you can download it here. (Note: it may seem a little disjointed and incomplete but it does contain several links to interesting sites and was only going to be used to augment the time we spent in code.)

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, December 18, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

LOCATION

Round Table Pizza in Lake Oswego
16444 SW Boones Ferry RD
Lake Oswego, OR 97035
503-636-3350

The code base relies on a large set of libraries and custom components that have been manually updated and are already in place in Delphi 12. These provide a database abstract layer to hide many of the details; still there were several important differences handled almost completely by the scripts.

Come an watch a live demo of the conversion process of one of the smaller programs!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius develops software with Delphi, both at his full-time job and in his own business. He also builds websites and dabbles with Linux.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, November 20, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, October 16, 2024 6:15 - 8:00 PM

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, September 18, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, July 17, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

Enjoy the Juneteenth holiday and we’ll see you in July!

Bring your Delphi questions and join us for pizza!

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, May 15, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

_UPDATE: The Main Topic turned out to be Source Control. A few notes were thrown together at the last minute and a good discussion ensued.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides (with links!)

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, April 17, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

The input file, which contains a billion rows as the challenge name implies, is too large to host on Github, so a small program is provided to generate the file on your own system. Then, the idea is to write your program and submit it as a pull-request to the Git repository and compare your results with others for learning–and of course bragging rights for the fastest implementation!

I’m working on my submission and I thought it would be fun to discuss various approaches and even come up with our own during the meeting.

The challenge (for Object Pascal) lasts until May, so if you want to take ideas from this meeting and submit your own entry, we’d love to hear about it at a future meeting!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius develops software with Delphi, both at his full-time job and in his own business. He also builds websites and dabbles with Linux.

DATE/TIME

Wednesday, March 20, 2024 6:00 - 8:00 PM

The Chromium support files and libraries must reside in very specific relative paths. That becomes a consideration when distributing the application via an install program. We can touch on distribution if there is interest and time permits. The installation app was created using Inno Setup.

Drag and drop was done using Ray Konopka’s excellent DropMaster controls. We will cover a couple of things that, if overlooked, can come back to bite. Demonstration will be done using Homer’s actual commercial applications.

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing business management software to the Insurance Industry. He has been programming with Delphi since Delphi 1, and other languages before that going back to key-punched Hollerith cards, commonly called IBM cards by people who mistakenly thought IBM invented them. Old-timers know the heartbreak of spilling a deck of unsequenced cards.

It took a bunch of work and that experience will be shared, along with some of the details of how the site is put together, at the January meeting.

The Hugo “source” for the site, in Markdown pages and TOML config files, is all up on GitHub. This means that if you want to contribute, you can clone the site and create pull events. You can also look at the changes to the theme from its original and see how it was modified.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius develops software with Delphi, both at his full-time job and in his own business, Cornelius Concepts, LLC. He also builds websites and dabbles with Linux.

You’ll have to come to our November meeting and see for yourself why this can truly be said of this release. With many improvements throughout the whole product and many subtle ones that make your coding chore more efficient, the list of What’s New is quite long.

We will only scratch the surface at this month’s meeting but aim to interest you to learn more afterwards.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius develops software with Delphi, both at his full-time job and in his own business, Cornelius Concepts, LLC. He also builds websites and dabbles with Linux.

As the title says, this is an introduction. We will follow this in another meeting with more advanced capabilities, such as downloading files, accessing databases, and posting updates. That will be followed with writing a mobile application to utilize the services we publish.   NOTE: This month’s meeting is one week later than usual–the fourth Wednesday.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides
• Recorded Presentation

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

A third problem has to do with the message itself. The standard dialogs have no way to gracefully add emphasis to critical parts of the message. It’s important that messages do more than report errors. They should be instructive. If a user error occurs, it’s just smart programming to tell them how to avoid it in the future, or how to fix it, or where to find more information. If you do that, your phone rings less.

The new Message Dialog has the same syntax as the standard MessageDlg, but has more optional parameters for the enhanced features. Because the additional parameters are optional, the new message can be a direct replacement for the existing code. Instead of coding MessageDlg(...), you simply add a prefix to the command like: ABSMessageDlg(...). That’s all you need for a simple, backward compatible replacement. However, adding one or more parameters can enhance the user experience greatly. They permit adding a Vista TaskDialog style title to the text which can be any color. A custom caption can be placed on the dialog’s form. For additional emphasis, the message is in a TRichText object. You can do cool things like underline, bold, italic, and color important parts of the message. See the example screenshot above.

A demonstration of this new message dialog will include a code review, and instructions for creating a rich text message. Join us for pizza or salad and learn how to enhance your application messages.

POST MEETING NOTE: Homer has provided a copy of his source code for this demonstration, along with comments and a demo app. It was written in Delphi 2007 but should work with any newer version: ABSMessageDialog.zip

PRESENTER

Homer Jones sells insurance agency management software written in Delphi through his company Agency Business Systems.

At tonight’s meeting, we’ll look at the three sample Welcome Page plug-ins that come with Delphi, show how to make simple modifications to get our feet wet, then show how we can copy one to turn it into something useful.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

Strap in for a wild ride!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

We’ll also take a look at a small program in Go written to help automate parts of a website being built.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

Just about any industry you can think of uses EDI in some form or other. Generally, EDI “documents” (AKA “messages” AKA “transaction sets”) are transmitted from one business to another. For example, a subset of EDI, called HL7, can be used to transfer a patient’s lab test results from a medical laboratory to a doctor or a clinic. But it’s also used to transmit data from a device to a service; for example, to transfer readings from medical equipment such as blood glucose monitors or even treadmills (in a “wellness center”) to a service that stores the results in a database for later processing.

There are two big problems a developer will face when implementing an EDI interface:

• The first is, EDI messages are difficult to parse. Unlike some other data transfer protocols, such as XML or JSON, an EDI document cannot be fully parsed without a “map”, and this map can (and does) change from industry to industry and from user to user.
• The second is, EDI isn’t so much a protocol as a suggestion. It is part of the EDI “standard” that every user may “interpret” the standard to fit their particular needs. The result is, every EDI sender implements EDI slightly differently.

PRESENTER

Jonathan Eaton is a Delphi programmer and an author. He has worked on EDI systems in Insurance, Health Care, and Trucking. His brief presentation will highlight why EDI messages are difficult to parse, and one possible implementation strategy for dealing with an EDI system that will be receiving documents from multiple senders, each with their own “interpretation” of the EDI standard.

Our casual conversation will include things in Delphi we’re thankful for to keep with the traditional Thanksgiving season here in the U.S. Please come enjoy some pizza with us and learn about EDI.

Embarcadero is hosting a series of online discussions to weigh in on some of the hot topics in the Delphi programming language. The first one was whether to use the SysUtils procedure FreeAndNil or call Free explicitly on your objects. This is a long-standing debate with strong opinions on both sides. A quick internet search will reveal many arguments, some from long ago, and some more recent. Along with how you free an object is the question of if and how you should check to see if an object variable is nil or not–there wasn’t as much disagreement over the use of Assigned().

The next debate covered With, Goto, & Label. The webinar was a good discussion and revealed a surprising number still using goto but again there were arguments both for and against all sides. The are surprising results about the usage of these constructs. (After inheriting a project with a vast number of with statements, I have some pretty strong feelings about this subject!)

We’ll dive into these topics, find out what others have said, and look at some code to see why you might want to choose one technique over the other–and when. We’ll keep it light-hearted but hopefully learn some interesting things about the internals of Delphi in the process.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

“Rubicon allows Delphi and C++Builder developers to add full-text search capabilities to their database applications, retaining control of data and indexing and providing both simple wild-card queries and complex search expressions. The components work with all major databases supported by RAD Studio, and even text, RTF, and HTML files. Results can be ranked, matching words automatically highlighted, and with Rubicon’s pre-built indices, most searches take less than 1/10th of a second.”

In tonight’s presentation, Ann will talk about design decisions around making a custom search engine that responds using the Delphi REST components in a DataSnap server application. It will be connected to a PostgreSQL database running in the Amazon cloud and will show how to queue and run searches in a way that makes sense for a multi-user, web-based environment.

Some of the highlights will include:

• How to provide speed and scalability without massive server costs
• How to avoid multi-threading collisions yet provide a responsive experience for the user
• How to add UX value to what people assume is so simple (“just a search box”)
• How to cater for beginner through to advanced users.

Ann will be available for any questions we may have about the components or the server app show-cased during the presentation.

Download:

• ODUG Talk PDF
• Recorded Presentation - Part A
• Recorded Presentation - Part B
• Recorded Presentation - Part C

PRESENTER

Ann Lynnworth is co-founder of HREF Tools which sells a full-text search component for Delphi called, Rubicon.

With several people unable to attend this month, we’ve decided to move our topic to the September meeting.

A couple of smart guys in Brazil have created an open source library called, Skia4Delphi to make this API work in both VCL and Firemonkey applications. We’ll run their sample programs and perhaps even show some of our own creations at the June meeting.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

What about remote usage reporting? If you distribute a desktop app, how do you know how many people use it and how often?

There’s no one true way for everyone or every application. Join us tonight to share what works for you and hear ideas from others.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

No specific topic planned but we will, as usual, catch up with what we’re doing with Delphi and technology in general, share pizza and laughs, and evaluate the new location.

We’ll chat about technology, avoid depressing world events topics, and think about where we want to meet next month.

If you’ve ever right clicked a file in Windows Explorer and selected Properties, you may have noticed the Detail tab. Those details list the file’s metadata. Depending on the type of file, that metadata can have interesting information about the data in the file (the definition of metadata). Homer will show how to extract that metadata without displaying the actual contents of the file. For example, a PDF document might contain the name of the author, or the company, or other key words. A photograph might contain the same information plus the brand and model of the camera and lens that took the photo. Metadata schema has changed over the years; Homer will show three ways to extract.

PRESENTER

Homer Jones sells insurance agency management software written in Delphi through his company, Agency Business Systems.

Join us for the last ODUG meeting of the year!

Join David Cornelius and one of his technical reviewers, Jonathan Eaton, as they discuss the book and celebrate it’s release.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

Jonathan Eaton is an ASQ certified software quality engineer and a Delphi programmer who has worked on EDI systems in Insurance, Health Care, and Trucking; he is also a published author.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

• Delphi’s new Community Edition based on Delphi 10.4.2
• A quick look at Radiant Shapes and a discussion about other shape libraries.

LOCATION

We’re meeting in person at the old familiar place!

This month, Homer Jones will help decipher all this and give you a great solution to these issues commonly fought when writing Delphi VCL programs having just solved these for his customers.

PRESENTER

Homer Jones sells insurance agency management software written in Delphi through his company, Agency Business Systems.

Join us online and share your experience with us.

PRESENTER

Jonathan Eaton is a Delphi programmer, an author, and an ASQ certified software quality engineer. He spent about three years implementing and maintaining an FDA-compliant QM process for the software development of what the FDA would consider a “software component of a medical device”–in this case, a Delphi application, and later a website, that patients and clinicians could use to download and analyze patient data recorded by blood glucose meters and insulin pumps.

This month, Gene Juhos will be demonstrating the uses and benefits of using frames in Delphi.

Tune in to learn and share your experiences!

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3. Before that he used the Pascal language on the Apple Lisa. He started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, and CADOL. Currently, his business, Sysmatics, converts proprietary character based business applications to Delphi for several customers.

What’s in store for you this year?

Homer Jones has added some error checking and an SMS feature to his Windows software hosted in the cloud. We will start our meeting with the scheduled BlueJeans meeting shown below, then switch to a Zoom meeting to allow him to show code from his development machine.

PRESENTER

Homer Jones sells insurance agency management software written in Delphi through his company, Agency Business Systems.

Hopefully, some of these activities will involve Delphi somehow but we’re going to leave it open. Join us online the third Wednesday evening.

See you then!

We won’t have a specific topic but will just have an open discussion of how this strange year has affected your business or career. We may also look at the new features of the latest version of Delphi, 10.4 Sydney if people are interested.

Looking forward to seeing you all again!

Furthermore, since all restaurants are closed for in-house dining, All future meetings are suspended until further notice.

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3. Before that he used the Pascal language on the Apple Lisa. He started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, and CADOL. Currently, his business, Sysmatics, converts proprietary character based business applications to Delphi for several customers.

Further back this year, we explored another open source web server project, DMVC Framework, written by Daniele Teti, and will bring this out as time allows to compare the two.

Both of these web frameworks ease the work of getting a web server built in Delphi serving REST APIs to web and mobile clients. Come see the demos, ask questions, and decide which one is best for you!

PRESENTERS

Glenn Dufke, an Embarcadero MVP, who has a passion for Delphi and is very knowledgeable on related topics. He is moving his business to the Portland, Oregon area from Denmark!

David Cornelius, is a contract software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating client/server, e-commerce integrations for Retail Pro, and hosting Windows applications in the cloud. He programs mostly with Delphi and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts, LLC.

• Briefly go through how to set up RAD Studio to build and compile for Android Things and what you can do with it;
• Current status of Delphi, the direction it’s currently taking and what’s to come–most importantly why we should keep using the product and the cool new solutions we can build (it’s not just for maintaining existing customer solutions);
• Finally we will look at how you can couple Delphi as a back-end with multiple front-ends for different platforms and still access your data; we will also look at how you can build a REST Server and Client with MARS Curiosity – the open source REST server framework written by Andrea Magni.

If there’s time left, he will also demo TFrameStand and discuss what it can do to build powerful and dynamic multi platform user interfaces the easy way.

Don’t miss our meeting in July!

TIME CHANGE!

To accommodate as many people as possible, we are moving the start time for this month’s meeting to 4:00 pm.

PRESENTER

Glenn Dufke, an Embarcadero MVP, who has a passion for Delphi and is very knowledgeable on related topics. He is planning on moving his business to the Portland, Oregon area from Denmark!

• Pill dispenser for the Age(d)s
• Socket head screw safety wire hole deburring machine.

We’ll probably have some left-over time, so if you have any hardware projects to add to the discussion, feel free to bring them and share with everyone.

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3. Before that he used the Pascal language on the Apple Lisa. He started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, and CADOL. Currently, his business, Sysmatics, converts proprietary character based business applications to Delphi for several customers.

We’ll fill the rest of the time by covering any previous topics that you’d like. If you’ve missed a recent ODUG meeting and would like to ask questions or see demos of things that have been missed, come to this meeting and we’ll dig stuff out of archives and get you caught up. (If you send a note to the presenter, he’ll make sure to get your questions prepared early to save time during the meeting.)

PRESENTERS

Homer Jones sells insurance agency management software through his company Agency Business Systems. He has been adding features to his application, written in Delphi, for a long time and will show us his latest addition: sending SMS messages.

David Cornelius is a contract software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating client/server and mobile apps, e-commerce integrations for Retail Pro. He writes mostly in Delphi, some in .NET, and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts, LLC.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a contract software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating client/server, e-commerce integrations for Retail Pro, and hosting Windows applications in the cloud. He writes in Delphi, C#, and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts, LLC.

This first meeting will introduce the project and go over the database and server application. We will look at a powerful, open source framework for building web apps, called DMVC Framework. We’ll show how to establish REST protocols, serialize JSON data, and test and debug your API.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a contract software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating client/server and mobile apps, e-commerce integrations for Retail Pro, and hosting Windows applications in the cloud. He writes mostly in Delphi and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts, LLC.

We won’t have a specific presenter but could start off the discussion with how the year went for everyone, touch on some of the interesting news highlights in the tech industry, and go from there.

There are many Remote Desktop clients and other ways to access remote desktops through a browser. We will briefly explore options, then dive into the configuration details of Cybele Software’s offering.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating e-commerce integrations for Retail Pro, and enabling Windows applications to run in the cloud from any HTML5-enabled browser. He writes in Delphi, C#, and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts, LLC.

Additionally, there are hooks to enable your application to interact with the web browser to which it is painting and enhance the user experience in expected “web” ways.

Come tonight and see how easy it is to take your application to the web!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating e-commerce integrations for Retail Pro, and enabling Windows applications to run in the cloud from any HTML5-enabled browser. He writes in Delphi, Free Pascal, and C# and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts, LLC.

We’ll meet again in August.

Typically, when installing software, you need to look for them on the web, select a mirror to download from, go to your downloads folder, launch the installer, acknowledge licenses, then repeating for each program. Once you get setup to run Chocolatey scripts, you can run simple commands to automate this. For example, to install Chrome and Firefox browsers and the AdBlockPlus extension on each, simply run these four PowerShell commands:

• choco install googlechrome
• choco install firefox
• choco install adblockpluschrome
• choco install adblockplus-firefox

and in a few moments, your two favorite browsers will be ready to use. Of course, you could put these commands along with several others into a script, save it to USB drive or online storage, and re-run it any time you’re setting up a new environment.

How much time could you save next time you need to setup a new development machine if you could install all your favorite tools by running a script? Or what if you could run an update script once a week that would check for updates to all your software and update them for you?

THAT is the whole goal of Chocolatey–saving time. Lots of time!

Many of the packages in the Chocolatey public repository are open source, others require a license after installing such as Visual Studio Professional. Unfortunately, (at the time of this writing) there are no packages to install Delphi. However, there is a way to create your own Chocolatey packages to install your own licensed and locally stored software, automatically put in license keys, and automate the process.

That’s what we’ll see tonight–how to get your own licensed copy of Delphi ready for quick installs. Come tonight and watch a new virtual machine get setup, ready with browsers, tools, databases, and of course, Delphi, in ONE hour!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a contract software developer building applications for almost any platform, creating ecommerce integrations for Retail Pro, and enabling Windows applications to run in the cloud from any HTML5-enabled browser. He writes in Delphi, Free Pascal, C#, PowerShell, and uses several web technologies. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

PRESENTER

Ron Grove will again lead the discussion, based in large part on his deep knowledge of the subject having read the book the SOLID principles were based on before the acronym was coined.

• Liskov Substitution - objects in a program should be replaceable with instances of their subtypes without altering the correctness of that program,
• Interface Segregation - many client-specific interfaces are better than one general-purpose interface, and
• Dependency Inversion - one should depend upon abstractions, not concretions.

PRESENTER

This will be group discussion led by Ron Grove, based in large part on his deep knowledge of the subject having read the book the SOLID principles were based on before the acronym was coined.

PRESENTER

Ron Grove is a strong proponent of design patterns and transformed coding practices while he was at Retail Dimensions. He has been in the IT Services area for many years but is also a superb programmer with a strong interest in a broad spectrum of technologies including Delphi, .NET, and mobile.

Since it’s the first meeting of 2018 we will also focus on what we’re all doing with Delphi (if anything) and what kinds of discussions would be best to focus on this year. I don’t want to spend too much time talking about features that are hardly even marginally useful to any of us and focus on what is useful.

Additionally, you might just see a hover-craft as a side-line interest!

PRESENTER

Ron Grove has been in the IT Services area for many years but has become a superb programmer with a strong interest in a broad spectrum of technologies including Delphi, .NET, and mobile.

PRESENTER

Ron Grove has been in the IT Services area for many years but has become a superb programmer with a strong interest in a broad spectrum of technologies including Delphi, .NET, and mobile. His career has recently taken an interesting turn for the better. He will explain the IT, development, and other opportunities this is opening for him.

So what does this have to do with Delphi? Nothing necessarily. However, some of our members have shown how to connect and control small devices with a Delphi program. I’m not sure you’ll see any of that this month, but we will be digressing from our regular topic and having a little fun with hardware. One of the devices that will be shared has been described as “Music of the Grids.”

Sounds intriguing? You’ll have to be there to see what we have!

We will also have some audience participation to cover Firebird support through IBDAC and will touch on Oracle considerations. Anyone with experience in DevArt database connection products is welcome and encouraged to share your experience.

PRESENTERS

David Cornelius works as an Implementation Engineer for Black Knight Origination Technologies Division but keeps his hand in the development circles by working on Delphi and web applications whenever he can through his business, Cornelius Concepts.

Homer Jones and Ron Grove will add to the discussion by sharing their experiences with Firebird and Oracle.

Our second presentation will be a demo of the TeeChart components by Steema Software. You will see how to add charting to your application and see some demos that come with the product. David Cornelius will be talking about this component set.

PRODUCT GIVE-AWAY

Steema Software is promoting their products by once again giving away one developer license of TeeChart Pro to a randomly chosen attendee!

PRESENTERS

Homer Jones is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing office management software to the Insurance Industry. He has served as an MIS manager for General Motors Corporation, System Sales Manager for Control Data Corporation, and Programmer Analyst for ADP. Homer received his Ph.D. from Oregon State University and taught System Documentation at San Jose State University.

David Cornelius works as an Implementation Engineer for Black Knight Financial Systems but keeps his hand in the development circles by working on Delphi and web applications whenever he can through his business, Cornelius Concepts.

The discussion will cover two main areas:

• Predictability in Software Development: What does it mean, and how is it achieved?
• Using “Quality Gates” as a project scheduling and development process improvement tool.

The presentation will be low-tech and will include a round-table discussion.

An outline of the talk is available.

PRODUCT GIVE-AWAY

Steema Software is promoting their products this month and next by giving away one developer license of TeeChart Pro to a randomly chosen attendee!

PRESENTER

Our speaker this month is Jonathan Eaton, an ASQ certified software quality engineer. He spent about three years implementing and maintaining an FDA-compliant QM process for the software development of what the FDA would consider a “software component of a medical device”–in this case, a Delphi application, and later a website, that patients and clinicians could use to download and analyze patient data recorded by blood glucose meters and insulin pumps.

You won’t want to miss this meeting!

DOOR PRIZE!

Once again, DevArt, a database component and tools vendor for Delphi and .NET, is sponsoring our meeting! One lucky attendee, picked at random from those who submit their name and email, will be eligible for one free license of either SecureBridge or a Delphi Data Access Product from the DevArt Store!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has used SecureBridge to save many days of anguish in trying to understand and control internet security protocols and how the Indy components use them to provide SFTP capabilities in Delphi programs. He has been programming since the IBM PC came out and currently writes XML transformations for lending institutions as an employee of eLynx. Read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

• an Android application using Delphi and FireMonkey,
• a insurance management program incorporating compiled resources,
• a back-end integration using plug-in modules, REST APIs, and UniDAC accessing SQLite and MySQL.

The goal is to show, again, the variety of software that can be produced with Delphi. Hopefully, it will inspire questions and provide insight into topics that might be of interest for future meetings.

PRESENTERS

• The android application will be shown by Gene Juhos of Sysmatics, supporting small to mid-sized businesses with legacy software, database, reporting services.
• Embedded resources will be explained by Homer Jones of Agency Business Systems, selling insurance agency management software nation-wide.
• JSON and UniDAC will be shown by David Cornelius of Cornelius Concepts, a contract software developer.

DOOR PRIZE!

Once again, DevArt, a database component and tools vendor for Delphi and .NET, is sponsoring our meeting! One lucky attendee, picked at random from those who submit their name and email, will be eligible for one free Delphi Data Access Product from the DevArt Store! Additionally, all of the entrants will be eligible for a 20% discount on the purchase of a new product within two weeks of the meeting! There will be a very short presentation on UniDAC during the last of the code presentations.

A church requested a touch-screen enabled member photo display in their lobby. After some research and looking at options, it was decided the display would be built in HTML5 using jQuery libraries to provide picture zooming and layout control and so that it could work on multiple devices with varying screen sizes. The list of member names and picture filenames was maintained in two spreadsheets, one sorted by last name and one sorted by first name.

With these parameters, the challenge was laid. A Delphi program was written to extract the data in the spreadsheets to HTML using WebBroker and template files. In order to facilitate testing, a set of sample data needed to be generated. So DevArt’s dbForge Data Generator was used and then another Delphi program was created to generate spreadsheets for testing from the sample database.

The whole project was open sourced and is now on GitHub.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a software developer, currently implementing SaaS solutions for lending institutions at Black Knight Financial Services. He has used Delphi since Turbo Pascal 3 and dabbles in other technologies such as .NET, Raspberry Pi, Linux, and web programming. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

We will go over the basics, covering the most useful parts with the broadest appeal, especially concentrating on lists and all the cool things you can do with them. A discussion about the main reason Spring4D came into existence, Inversion of Control, and what Dependency Injection really means will also be addressed. Finally, you’ll learn why so many people use service location (hint: it’s easy!) and why it’s looked on as a bad practice (hint: it’s an ANTI-PATTERN!).

PRESENTER

Ron Grove introduced the Spring4D library to product development at Retail Dimensions several years ago. It quickly transformed several libraries used widely throughout the programming department. Ron has been in the IT Services area for many years but has become a superb programmer with a strong interest in a broad spectrum of technologies including Delphi, .NET, and mobile.

PRESENTER

Mike Shkolnik is a Project Manager in the Portland area and while he’s been “using Delphi since it was Turbo Pascal on a CP/M card in an Apple II,” he is completely self-taught and does not consider himself an expert. (In other words, he’s like many of us!)

For some, the updates were considered little more than paid bug fixes. For others, the updates piled up on the virtual shelf with little time to figure out new features before the next version was out. But many of you just closed your wallet and stayed with what you had, comfortable in a fairly stable environment and getting third-party components to add support that only appeared in much newer versions of Delphi.

With Delphi 10 Seattle just released, this might be a good time to look back at the whole XE line of upgrades and review the changes that have taken place. There have been NINE versions of Delphi in the last five years, which is a nightmare if you’re a component developer and a challenge to keep on top of if you’re busy running a business. For developers that do upgrade, I suspect they either skip several versions at a time or just stick with one that is fairly stable for what they need to do and let the others pile up.

Tonight, we’ll look through the following lists of “What’s New” and pull up the IDEs to take a look at the highlights of the new and enhanced features you may have missed. This will be an open discussion as it’s unlikely any one person could be familiar with every single new feature! (Case in point: The speaker has had very little time with FireMonkey and has no experience with FireDAC, so any attendees with knowledge in these areas are welcome to share their experience with the group.)

From the “docwiki.embarcadero.com” web site, here is the “What’s New” list for each version we’ll cover:

• Delphi XE
• Delphi XE2
• Delphi XE3
• Delphi XE4
• Delphi XE5
• Delphi XE6
• Delphi XE7
• Delphi XE8
• Delphi 10 Seattle

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a contract software developer building Windows applications, e-commerce integrations, Linux web modules, and sometimes a mobile app. He writes in Delphi, Free Pascal, Oxygene, C#, JavaScript, PHP, and more. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

To help generate some ideas, tools could cover (but are not limited to): source control, code compare, deployment management, script editors, macro libraries, search tips, programming aids, keyboard short-cuts, IDE plugins, or database analyzers.

We all should be able to learn something!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a contract programmer building Windows applications, Retail Pro plug-ins, Linux web services, and exploring cross-platform capabilities of Oxygene. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

This month, we’ll continue that exploration by branching away from the Windows desktop and take a look at how the same shared classes we used previously can also help us build ASP.NET web sites and Android apps.

CODE

The code for everything demonstrated during both parts of this presentation is on GitHub. Feel free to download make suggestions or improvements.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a contract programmer building Windows applications, Retail Pro plug-ins, and exploring new features of Oxygene. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

Tonight, we’ll look at an advanced language that really does build applications for every major platform today: Oxygene.

Oxygene is an Object Pascal-based language from RemObjects Software that works inside Visual Studio to build a wide variety of types of applications. From console-based utilities to .NET Windows Forms applications to ASP.NET web sites to mobile apps on Windows, iOS, and Android, you can use one IDE and one modern programming language to support them all! (And if you don’t like Pascal, they also offer C# and Swift compilers!)

This will be part one of a two-part session and may extend into a third if there is enough interest for some of the advanced concepts. We’ll start with the idea of a Shared Project in Oxygene and show how your platform-agnostic classes can be shared among all your projects without creating DLLs or copying your code.

Then we’ll show the built-in support for unit testing and move quickly into a simple console application. Next, we’ll build a familiar .NET Windows application using WPF. If there’s time, we’ll show the Windows Phone app as well which has many similarities to the WPF application since they both use XAML.

Our next session will cover ASP.NET and Android and possibly iOS (depending on the resources available–a Mac is required for building an iOS app).

PRESENTER

David Cornelius keeps very busy in his day job adding features and fixing bugs in large Windows applications written in Delphi. In off hours, he can often be found exploring new features of Oxygene or fiddling with a Raspberry Pi. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

With Hydra you can have this today! This is not a free product, but one purchase price (from RemObjects Software) gives you support for Delphi 7-XE6 and Visual Studio 2008 and up plus starts a one-year subscription of updates and support.

In tonight’s meeting, you will learn how to take an existing Delphi application and add Hydra support, first to incorporate a Delphi plug-in, then to load a .NET plug-in. You’ll also see the same concepts applied to an existing .NET application to give you the flexibility to start with either platform. Both visual and non-visual plugins will be demonstrated.

The development tools used will be Delphi 2010 and Oxygene (inside Visual Studio 2013).

CODE

The code for the main demo from this presentation is on GitHub. Feel free to download and play with it as you would like.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius keeps threatening to leave the area–and the chance of that happening are increasing. But when he’s available, he’s still very much a part of this group. While his day job doesn’t involve .NET at all, he has a keen interest in the technology. He has been developing software since the mid-80’s and currently works on Delphi and JavaScript applications for WideOrbit. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts.

In the absence of a specific topic, we may continue or follow-up on last month’s discussion about more frequent upgrades to Delphi and the uproar over the price. Or we may talk about branching and merging source files with subversion. But most likely, we’ll just chat as good friends that enjoy software development.

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3.

Well, once again, David has accepted a job in another state, this time in Washington. It’s more likely this time that his move is imminent and will be permanent. Thus, coordination of these meetings will necessarily fall to those who remain and are interested in seeing it continue.

Discussion of what it takes to run this group and who may be interested in taking over the simple management of the meeting room and topics presented will be the focus of this month’s meeting.

But time marches on and there are new language features, new technologies to support, and enhancements^^ in the IDE. _(^^Some people don’t consider the changes to the IDE to be enhancements, but that’s a discussion for a different forum.)_ With new VCL controls, Unicode strings, anonymous methods and generics, more RTTI available, keyboard templates, Error Insight, Live Bindings, and support for touch screens with gestures, there are many reasons to upgrade.

We’ll touch on as many of these areas as we have time for and as the attendees are interested in using either Delphi 2010 or Delphi XE5. Come join us and see for yourself what you may be missing if you’re on an older version of Delphi. Perhaps you have an unwrapped box on the shelf (figuratively–I know software doesn’t come in a box anymore) and this will prompt you to start using it. Or maybe you’ll discover some of the new controls will enable you to ditch unsupported 3rd-party components which are holding you back.

At the end of the meeting, we’ll take a vote to see which version of Delphi is the best!

One idea is to explore some of the new VCL enhancements as noted in David I’s blog. Does anyone have experience using Delphi’s Live Bindings? I’d like to see how that compares with some of the XAML/WPF stuff I’ve been dealing with.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

Doug Ausmus will show us his version of a “Hello World” which involves calling an external DLL to talk through a USB port to electronic circuit boards and watching LEDs blink.

Gene Juhos will show us what all we get when we start a new Android app from one of the several built-in mobile app templates.

PRESENTERS

Doug Ausmus started playing with electronics when he was 4 using an “Electric Build-it Set” which he earned by selling, with his brother, 12 boxes of “All Occasion” greeting cards door to door from an ad in a comic book. Programming with assembly language started in the mini computer days on a DEC PDP 11 and with microcomputers in the Intel 4004 days and later other vendors and chips as they came on the scene. He has never been without electronics and programming since and made it his business as well as one of his hobbies.

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3. Before that he used the Pascal language on the Apple Lisa. He started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, and CADOL. Currently, his business, Sysmatics, converts proprietary character based business applications to Delphi for several customers.

In September, we took a look at a simple application and how it was written using several different programming environments. We started with what we’re all familiar with, Delphi for Win32, moved to C# for WinForms which had a different language and IDE, but used similar window controls, then kept the language the same and built the app in C# using WPF, and finally used Oxygene, a Visual Studio plug-in compiler with the Pascal syntax. We also looked at a web version of the application using JavaScript.

This time, we’re going to continue where we left off, in a Windows desktop application using .NET and WPF in Oxygene, but using some more advanced techniques to make it look better. There’s a second reason for revisiting this–learning about layouts in XAML. This becomes important when we move to mobile platforms and need to handle a wide variety of device sizes.

Once we’ve rearranged the layout, we’ll look at how the XAML changes to support WinRT using Oxygene for WinRT, followed by a Windows Phone version.

The learning curve is very steep on these different platforms and there are significant differences just within the Microsoft platforms, so this time we’ll concentrate in this area. Next month, we’ll see a demonstration of Delphi XE5 and how it handles these devices but further exploration using Oxygene for Java and Oxygene for iOS must wait until next year.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

The evening event has been CANCELLED! Instead, you are invited to Ruth’s Chris Steak House in Portland at noon. Because there were two events on this date and far many more people registered with Embarcadero for the noon event than the evening event, Embarcadero has eliminated the evening one. There will not be any meeting at the Fanno Creek Brew Pub in December.

At this technical and interactive session, attendees will:

• See Android and iOS true native apps built from a single code base
• See multi-device, true native development tools in action
• Talk with development experts on how you can make the move to mobile today

Follow this link to learn more and register for this mid-day Android and iOS Meet and Eat event. Lunch will be provided.

Since programming languages were invented, people have tried to use one code base to get an application to run on multiple platforms. Whether it meant building custom compilers or interpreters for each platform (BASIC, C, JavaScript, Python), or writing an API layer for each device that talks to a generic module (Java, .NET), the goal has been to reduce the time it takes to develop a product while having it work for as wide a market as possible.

So why then, would someone want to write one application in as many different programming languages and environments as possible? For exploration and learning, of course!

It’s easy to find tutorials with examples of “Hello World!” in every language. The program we’ll be looking at tonight is a little more involved, enough to actually be useful and learn something. It’s a one-form application with some buttons, a ListBox, and some string manipulations, just enough to make it interesting, but not too much so we can’t get through it in an evening. (A more involved application is slated for early next year.)

The first environment we’ll explore will be Delphi, of course. This will introduce the project’s concepts and give a base of expectation for the succeeding examples. The application was originally conceived in Delphi 1, but has been upgraded and a few language enhancements made so it now uses Delphi 2010.

Then we’ll move into Visual Studio using C#. There we will explore two varieties, one using WinForms (the first GUI available in .NET, but now deprecated), and one using WPF (Windows Presentation Frameworks, the current recommended way to build .NET apps). Both of these variants were created in Express 2012 for Desktop version of Visual Studio.

Next we’ll use Oxygene, a Pascal compiler inside Visual Studio, using WPF and compare with both the C# version and the original Delphi versions.

Finally, we’ll explore a web version of this program written in HTML5/JavaScript.

Look for mobile devices (Windows, Android, and iOS) to be supporting this same application in November!

PRESENTERS

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and is a software development manager at Retail Dimensions. You can read more about him at Cornelius Concepts. David will present the Delphi, C#, and Oxygene versions of the application.

Chris Newcombe, finances his lifestyle of gaming and outdoor pursuits by leveraging his knowledge of Delphi, C#, HTML, and PHP. A longtime ODUG member and Borland/Embarcadero enthusiast, he actually bought HTML5 Builder when it came out. He is currently studying to be the next local JavaScript guru and will be explaining how we don’t need expensive resource-intensive compilers anymore–just a text editor and a browser with JavaScript enabled!

Sounds like fun? There are several of us Delphi developers that are interested in this technology and one of our members has offered to share his passion for electronics, give us a hands-on demo, help us get started playing with this technology, and teach us a little of what you can do with it.

You can read more about it at MAKE Magazine or on Wikipedia.

PRESENTER

Doug Ausmus started playing with electronics when he was 4 using an “Electric Build-it Set” which he earned by selling, with his brother, 12 boxes of “All Occasion” greeting cards door to door from an ad in a comic book. Programming with assembly language started in the mini computer days on a DEC PDP 11 and with microcomputers in the Intel 4004 days and later other vendors and chips as they came on the scene. He has never been without electronics and programming since and made it his business as well as one of his hobbies.

But they can’t all be that good. Some tools are merely open source plug-ins to a larger framework. Some tools have serious limitations they don’t believe should be show-stoppers. And some tools are still in beta testing, possibly nowhere near ready for professionals to use.

Where does Delphi fit in all this? Do we have to leave the Pascal language to embrace this new world of multi-platform proliferation? Or is Embarcadero really going to come through on it’s promise to write-once, compile for almost anything? Is FireMonkey the answer to keep us paying homage to the gods of Delphi?

Tonight’s meeting will be a discussion of the industry trends for development tools, the pros and cons, the positive and negative opinions of any who wish to gather. Hopefully, we’ll draw out those who have ventured to new territory and learn from their experiences.

There will be no one presenter and possibly no clear technology of choice at the end of the evening. But may we all leave with a broader picture of the direction development tools are taking–and some things to consider when it’s time for our own personal decision-making.

Ron Grove will present a basic history of AnyDAC and provide an overview of key product features. Afterwards he will field more specific questions folks may have and encourage discussion about what this may or may not mean for those in attendance.

References:

• FireDAC product page
• U.S. FireDAC Purchase page

Ron Grove has done a couple short tutorial videos for AnyDAC online. They are hosted on YouTube, but may also be found on his own site at RonGrove.com. The video “First Steps to use AnyDAC” was also linked to in the official AnyDAC help files as a brief introduction, though the presenter expects Embarcadero to use their own videos going forward.

PRESENTER

Ron Grove has been in the IT Services area for many years but has become an superb Delphi programmer with a strong interest in a broad spectrum of development technologies including .NET and mobile. He currently works at Retail Dimensions.

Fortunately, the Windows controls on the Delphi tool palette are simply wrappers around Windows objects and the API to control them is easily accessible.

This is nothing new. Since Delphi 1, developers have been able to explicitly dictate every aspect of a control’s look and feel if they are willing to dig down just under the surface by setting a property or two and hooking into an event.

Tonight, we’ll show a real-world application that manipulates a StringGrid to combine cells, color them, and fill them with data. We’ll touch on a few other controls as well and explore the technology a bit to help you break through the mysterious barrier of the Canvas and how you can Paint on it!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and is a software development manager at Retail Dimensions. You can read more about him and his programming interests on his web site, Cornelius Concepts.

PRESENTER

Our main presenter, Chris Newcombe, finances his lifestyle of gaming and outdoor pursuits by leveraging his knowledge of Delphi, C#, HTML, and PHP. A longtime ODUG member and Borland/Embarcadero enthusiast, he actually bought HTML5 Builder when it came out. Sadly he has not yet bought a decent phone so he can fully explore mobile applications - but we’re nagging him about that :-)

Get ready to develop apps for Windows 8. Learn how to give your existing VCL and FireMonkey apps a new Windows 8 look and functionality. See what’s new in FM2, the next generation FireMonkey application platform. And get a first look at the newest member of the RAD Studio family – HTML5 Builder!

• Create Delphi, C++Builder and Prism applications with Windows 8 styling and functionality
• Convert existing VCL and FireMonkey forms to Windows 8 look and behavior with one click
• Add new multimedia functionality to your FireMonkey apps
• Use the new Visual LiveBindings designer to make connections quickly and visually
• Create HTML5 web apps and mobile apps for Android, iOS and more with new HTML5 Builder
• Build Windows 8 apps with WinRT using Prism XE3 in RAD Studio
• Embed InterBase XE3, the low cost zero-admin high performance database, into your Windows 8 applications
• …and much more!

We will cover attributes in depth, show examples of their use and provide some units of code you can take home and use in your projects.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and is a software development manager at Retail Dimensions. You can read more about him and his programming interests on his web site, Cornelius Concepts.

PRESENTER

Ron Grove has been in the IT Services area for many years but has become an excellent Delphi programmer with a strong interest in mobile technologies. He currently works at Retail Dimensions.

Tonight’s presentation will be by a company that has been using Crystal Reports since Delphi 3. Crystal 8.5, no longer supported, was the last version that let you install a free runtime for every user. It was also the last version that had a VCL SDK. Newer versions of Crystal require either a report server or full installation of Crystal Reports on each workstation. This can get expensive. And the Crystal user interface for entering parameters is really clunky.

So a better and cheaper alternative was sought. This led to the discovery of DataLink Viewer and Visual Cut from Millet Software. Gene Juhos from Sysmatics would like to demo how he uses these products.

ADDITIONAL DISCUSSION

There is increasing interest in developing cross-support agreements between ODUG members to provide backup programmer assurance for clients worried about their software being developed by a single person. We will explore various methods this can be accomplished after the main presentation.

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3. Before that he used the Pascal language on the Apple Lisa. He started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, and CADOL. Currently, his business, Sysmatics, converts proprietary character based business applications to Delphi for several customers.

We’ll have a laptop with Delphi 2010 and a USB drive if you want to bring screen shots or code snippets to display. Otherwise, it will just be a fun time of sharing.

At this month’s meeting, we’ll show how to turn it on, how to use it, and how it can enhance developer productivity, especially if you are sharing libraries or have several units to which you are constantly referring to for reviewing a type or method. There are very few articles on this subject, so come take advantage of the presenter’s research and be more productive right away!

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and is a software development manager at Retail Dimensions. You can read more about him and his programming interests on his web site, Cornelius Concepts.

Some of the things we’ll likely cover include GExperts, editor macros, templates, debugging and logging, build events, mapped or redirected drives and paths, WinInternals tools, dealing with UAC and 64-bit issues, and automated builds.

Make a list of your favorite ways to shorten your development time and bring them to share with the others. If you have a knowledgebase of tricks, or a favorite programming construct, or even if you have a question for the group on how to do something better or faster, let’s hear about it!

Everyone should be able to take home some ideas to improve their programming day!

Sometimes meetings like this bring out very interesting topics!

The term “business application” was stretched a bit when Embarcadero came to town during the XE2 tour and explained how FireMonkey is the new way to write business applications. You won’t see data rotating on a cube or have to sit through yet another photo album example that attempts to wow the audience by zooming in on a picture. Instead, this demo will show how you can make your existing business applications more intuitive by tapping into the natural human tendency to want to manipulate what is seen on the screen with a finger–and how that differs from using a mouse.

Suggestions from the audience will be solicited throughout the meeting to make the application even better. Source code to the application will be made available after the meeting.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slide
• Analysis of Gesture Design (PDF)
• Touch Gesture Reference Cards (PDF)
• Touch Gesture Reference Guide (PDF)

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and is a software development manager at Retail Dimensions. You can read more about him and his programming interests on his web site, Cornelius Concepts.

With RAD Studio XE2, you will be able to create 64-bit Delphi applications to take advantage of the latest hardware, access more memory, and push the performance envelope. You will be able to deploy your applications to Windows and Mac and more. And with FireMonkey™, the GPU-powered next-generation application platform, you’ll be able to create visually stunning HD and 3D business applications that are more immersive and interactive than anything on the market.

Come see what all the excitement is about at this free RAD Studio XE2 World Tour event and see how easy you can:

• Create GPU-powered FireMonkey applications that will keep your customers engaged
• Build 64-bit Delphi applications to take advantage of the latest hardware
• Create a single application and target both Windows and OS X
• Extend your multi-tier DataSnap applications with new mobile and cloud connectivity in RAD Cloud
• Connect any visual element to any type of data using LiveBindings™
• Modernize the look and feel of your Windows applications with VCL styles
• Create mobile-optimized web applications and standalone apps for iOS and Android devices using RadPHP
• …and much more!

All event attendees will receive:

• Special discounts on RAD Studio XE2, Delphi® XE2, C++Builder® XE2, RadPHP XE2 and Embarcadero Prism XE2
• Entry in a drawing for a free copy of RAD Studio XE2 Professional

Refreshments will be served at this event.

Click here to register!

We will also look at using the web services wizard to read in WSDL from a SOAP based web service. This is nice because we can see how it hides all the complexities of XML from us. Delphi Pro will be used, but we can discuss what DataSnap is capable of doing as well. We’ll also discuss JSON because in many places it is starting to replace XML where the complexities of XML are not necessary.

If there is time we will create JSON from the web broker server and read it in using a Delphi client. The push towards simplification of the data we transfer on the web right now is strong so we need to understand each of these technologies as well as how they have influenced each other.

PRESENTER

Ron Grove has been in the IT Services area for many years but picked up Delphi along the way to maintain some in-house programs. He recently joined Retail Dimensions, Inc. as a Delphi developer and brings a strong interest in mobile services to the team.

One member, David Cornelius, has been a long-time user and proponent of CodeSite and will share his expertise with the group. Even though this product has been out for a while, he still get requests once in a while on how to use CodeSite effectively. And since an “express” version of the product now ships with RAD Studio, more people are using this tool.

Some of the features that will be discussed include:

• Displaying a variety of data types
• Using colors to quickly locate key debug lines
• Differences between the full and express versions
• How to export information in records
• Saving debug output to a file
• Multi-threaded debugging
• How to use CodeSite with Visual Studio
• Using templates to quickly add debugging to your code

Download:

• PowerPoint Slide

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

PRESENTERS

The discussion leaders are long-time members of this group, Homer Jones and Dan Lowe. There are likely others that have experience with this or other help authoring products and we welcome their comments.

The emphasis this month will be using Firebird with examples and member experiences shared.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

Our main presenter is Alfonso Presa. Alfonso was born in Cuba and received a Bachelors degree in Computer Science at ISPJAE (Tech University of Havana). He also pursued a Masters in Telecommunications, but had to leave the area. He was in Venezuela for 9 years developing software for Pharmacies, Drugstores, Clinics, and Insurance. He is now in the United States, but works remotely for the health care company, which now has more than 450 customers and a solid reputation in the local market.

He has used Delphi 6 and Firebird versions 1.5 - 2.5. He will share programming techniques and ways to develop mid-sized applications using Firebird and show that even being a free database engine, Firebird can compete with almost all features of larger products such as SQL Server and Oracle. In fact, Firebird is faster and easier to deploy in small environments (less than 40 workstations).

Join us as we explore this incredible open source product to learn how you can provide robust database solutions to your customers.

RAD Studio 2010 helps you go further and get there faster with more than 120 new and enhanced features that help you finish projects faster and reach more users. New and enhanced features include:

• New and enhanced tools for coding, debugging and compiling in the IDE:
  • IDE Insight for easy access to features, settings and components
  • Code formatter
  • Debugger data visualizers
  • Multi-thread debugging
  • Background compilation
  • C++ Class Explorer
• Rapidly build touch-based GUI, tablet, touchpad and kiosk applications
  • 30+ included gestures and create your own
  • Works on Windows 2000, XP, Vista and Windows 7
  • Easily touch enable existing apps
  • On screen touch keyboard
• Make the connection with more data and more application architectures
  • Firebird database connectivity
  • Updated drivers for Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle and MySQL
  • DataSnap callbacks, filtering, HTTP, REST and JSON support

Come to this exciting event and learn more about the latest product offerings from Embarcadero Technologies

PRESENTER

Embarcadero Technologies was recently in Portland for the Delphi 2009 launch and is focusing on groups that have not been visited in a while. David Cornelius attended the Sacramento Delphi User Group in December, saw the presentation, and requested a copy of the materials for the Oregon group which he will share at this meeting. The same information, the same demo programs, the same slide show will be presented as was seen at that meeting.

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and works full time as a programmer in Beaverton at Retail Dimensions. On the side, he runs Cornelius Concepts building Windows applications.

There is no prepared topic as there will likely be reflections over the past years and discussions of future trends. However, continuing the theme of our March meeting, another project, a very different one (involving GUIDs, Unicode, and reporting), has had its own “Conversion Story” and several lessons learned from that experience could be shared as interest dictates.

So what’s the future hold for this group? The web site will remain for quite some time and if there is a special topic or presenter that is available and interest is high and (most importantly) one or two people are willing to organize and announce it, then there can certainly be as many more gatherings of Delphi developers as warranted.

As always, this has been a community-centered group, formed by enthusiasts over a new language and carried forward into the professional world dealing with real projects and real clients. The group never died because no one wanted it to. The software still meets a need, can solve current problems, and produces steady income for many people.

But more than that, the group has fostered the creation of friendships. And friendships don’t have to die away just because a computer group isn’t meeting regularly anymore.

We’ll keep the Yahoo! Group for continued communication and discussion as long as it makes sense. And I hope we strive to keep in contact, no matter what we do or where we end up.

Cheers! David Cornelius Coordinator, Oregon Delphi User Group

It is a story of corruption in high places, and the daunting task of doing away with the evildoers – at least those responsible for the unrest. To the casual observer, everything seemed normal, but down deep, where access to the critical information took place, events unfolded with far reaching implications. Some said that corruption was just a fact of life. Others blamed it on the Evil Empire. And others even said nothing could be done because the people using the network couldn’t be convinced to do the right thing. Everything they said was true.

One day, 15 years ago, an unsuspecting person trusted what the Evil Empire said about Access to data. Little did he know that his decision would lead to more and more corruption. A product was released using Access as the front-end and the back-end. The market was ripe, and sales went nuts, but then the corruption started. First the front-end couldn’t be trusted, and that soon spread to the back-end. It quickly rose to the point where the service calls were so frequent that our hero was unable to program fixes. What he soon learned was that he couldn’t fix it. He had to re-invent it.

Even though sales were still rolling in, a painful decision had to be made. All sales were halted until a new front end could be created. There simply wasn’t enough time to recreate a new front-end and back-end. Once again, the Evil Empire entered the picture. They said, “Here. Take Visual Basic. It will end the corruption.” What they said made sense. VB wasn’t a database, so it wasn’t as corruptible. What they didn’t say was that it was too slow to do the job. That’s when the real hero of the story came in … Delphi 3.

The front-end became a Delphi 3 program, but the back-end remained with the Evil-Empire. Delphi was so fast and stable that back-end corruption was rare, but it did happen. Various strategies were implemented to minimize corruption, or at least provide ways to restore. They were good enough to keep the product viable for 15 years. During that time there was a switch to Delphi 5, but data access was still BDE-like, using DAO. The 3rd party DAO components were difficult to upgrade to anything beyond Delphi 5. The Evil Empire said; “Here. Use ADO. It will let you upgrade.” What they didn’t say was that it was too slow to do the job, once again.

Over the last 15 years, features have been added to the program that couldn’t tolerate data loss caused by corrupt Access databases. One feature’s solution was to create dBase tables via Topaz. They simply don’t corrupt. Another feature’s solution was a small DBISAM database, which does corrupt, but not like Access. We’ll go into those during the meeting.

Today, the 15 year-old product looks pretty out of date. It was developed prior to wide screen monitors, and the components for D5 don’t do as well with themes as, say those in Delphi 2007. And, of course, there’s the reliance on a very corruptible database. All of that is being addressed in the latest version of the program, which we will cover in the meeting. More specifically:

• We can discuss migration from Access, Topaz, & DBISAM to Firebird 2.X. This will include IBDAC Data Access components and why we chose them instead of IBObjects. We will also touch on IB Express as a Firebird Admin tool. We can also discuss the development of a Data Pump to move data from the three original databases into Firebird.
• We can discuss report creation using Report Builder 11. This will include standard report printing as well as the creation of reports that allow interactive data entry by the end user, like filling out a paper form.
• We can discuss Developer Express components replacement of Woll2Woll, Raize, and TMS components, and resolution and screen aspect ratio independence via MDI versus SDI.
• We can discuss a backup program for the Firebird database, that will create a local backup file, or FTP the backup file to a remote site of your choice.
• We can also discuss JediVCS as a version control system that can use several different databases, including DBISAM, MySQL, Firebird and others. It also extends the Delphi IDE so that projects can be checked in or out from within Delphi as easy as opening a project from disk files.
• We can also discuss anything else related to Delphi or programming in general.

Download the PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing office management software to the Insurance Industry. He has served as an MIS manager for General Motors Corporation, System Sales Manager for Control Data Corporation, and Programmer Analyst for ADP. Homer received his Ph.D. from Oregon State University and taught System Documentation at San Jose State University.

RAD Studio 2010 helps you go further and get there faster with more than 120 new and enhanced features that help you finish projects faster and reach more users. New and enhanced features include:

• New and enhanced tools for coding, debugging and compiling in the IDE:

• IDE Insight for easy access to features, settings and components

• Code formatter

• Debugger data visualizers

• Multi-thread debugging

• Background compilation

• C++ Class Explorer

• Rapidly build touch-based GUI, tablet, touchpad and kiosk applications

• 30+ included gestures and create your own

• Works on Windows 2000, XP, Vista and Windows 7

• Easily touch enable existing apps

• On screen touch keyboard

• Make the connection with more data and more application architectures

• Firebird database connectivity

• Updated drivers for Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle and MySQL

• DataSnap callbacks, filtering, HTTP, REST and JSON support

Come to this exciting event and learn more about the latest product offerings from Embarcadero Technologies

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

Embarcadero Technologies was recently in Portland for the Delphi 2009 launch and is focusing on groups that have not been visited in a while. David Cornelius attended the Sacramento Delphi User Group in December, saw the presentation, and requested a copy of the materials for the Oregon group which he will share at this meeting. The same information, the same demo programs, the same slide show will be presented as was seen at that meeting.

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and works full time as a programmer in Beaverton at Retail Dimensions. On the side, he runs Cornelius Concepts building Windows applications.

File Extractor Pro is a data carving tool. It allows the user to carve deleted files from a logical partition in either NTFS or FAT12/16 and FAT32. A standalone image file in both raw bit stream format (think DD file) and compressed sgzip with 64k size clusters. Create and manage custom file signatures while leveraging the power of modern processors by using multiple threads of execution.

Cell Phone Analyzer (CPA) is also a data interpreter, but is designed specifically to decode cell phone flash files. Cell Phone Analyzer pulls both active and deleted data from GSM enabled cell phones and provides the end user with several choices of report outputs. HTML, RTF and Text. CPA also provides a virtual explorer for Motorola phones, allowing the user to see both active and deleted file names and data.

SIM Analyzer Pro is a GSM SIM card application. It uses a third party ActiveX control to communicate with PC/SC compliant smart card readers. Data is pulled from the SIM card and stored in an encrypted container that also uses an injected MD5 key for verification. SIM Analyzer Pro can also create, what we call a Safety SIM which I will explain, that keeps the phone off the network while the end user navigates the phone - keeping the call detail logs in tact and blocking incoming and outgoing network traffic.

PRESENTER

Steve Payne has been using Delphi 7 Enterprise for the last eight years. He’s created three commercial applications, all related to data recovery and interpretation.

Delphi has provided him with the ability to use a high-level syntax language that is easy to program and understand, while at the same time, is backed by a robust compiler that competes with C++ output both in size and performance.

DLLs can be very useful in many situations and once you learn a few tricks, are really quite simple. We will talk about how to structure your application to use DLLs to make updating installed applications much simpler to manage and keeps customers working happily.

If there is time, we’ll take a peek at some new DLL tricks in Delphi 2010!

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos has been working with Delphi since version 3. Before that he used the Pascal language on the Apple Lisa. He started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, and CADOL. Currently, his business, Sysmatics, converts proprietary character based business applications to Delphi for several customers.

First, I found an old OpenGL program that displays fireworks and thought it would be fun to look at the code and watch splashes of color explode–especially since some major fireworks displays in the area were canceled this year due to budget constraints.

I’ll also dig out some of Marco Cantu’s Fun With Delphi presentations from CodeGear seminars and see if we can learn something while laughing at his silly programs. You might be surprised how much you can learn from the TNothing component!

NOTE: Our regular meeting location at Legacy Emanuel Hospital is no longer available! We will be meeting one time at the Lucky Lab Public House in Multnomah Village (7675 SW Capitol Hwy).

The upstairs room we’re hoping to meet in has a $100 reservation fee, so it can’t be used as our regular meeting place. However, it’s not currently reserved and since Monday nights are usually slow, they might let us up there. There is parking across the street next to the “Parks and Recreation” building.

Part of this meeting will be a continued discussion from the email list on the location of future meetings.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius is a full-time Delphi developer and has been programming since the 1980s.

There are a lot of new features and language enhancements in the last three versions of Delphi that may seem like magic to those who do not know about them. And there are some features that have been in Delphi for a long time that some don’t realize are there.

On May 18, 2009, the mysteries of the unknown and the secrets of the masters will be shown in real applications. These tips will enhance productivity, prevent errors, and aid in coding. (Caution: There may be a temporary drop in air pressure as everyone gasps in amazement!)

Here is a preview of some of the topics to be covered:

• Hot Keys
• Live Templates
• Component Templates
• Unit Testing
• Theme Support
• Handy Functions
• Component Injection
• New Components
• And more!

We will move fast, but there will be references to several CodeRage sessions made by well-known speakers over the last few years. These sessions have been downloaded and will be available to copy to your memory stick (AKA jump drive) after the meeting.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and works full time as a programmer in Beaverton at Retail Dimensions. On the side, he runs Cornelius Concepts, building Windows applications and hosting web sites.

There will be discounts on Delphi 2009, C++Builder 2009, or RAD Studio 2009. And one lucky winner will walk away with a free copy of RAD Studio 2009 Pro!

Mark your calendar for Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Download:

• RAD Studio 2009 Feature Matrix
• Reasons to Migrate from Delphi 7 to Delphi 2009

Anders (aohlsson@embarcadero.com) is also looking for groups or companies that would like to meet privately, before the evening presentation. He is interested in meeting and speaking with development groups, discussing their project needs, and answering any questions about the company. Follow up with Anders directly if you are interested in one of these.

NOTE: We will meet in the Lorenzen Center Auditorium

PRESENTER

Anders Ohlsson from CodeGear

So for our November meeting tomorrow night, I would like to open up the floor to discussion on Delphi news and developments and invite you to share your opinions on where the programming tools are heading. Has anyone upgraded to Delphi 2009? Is anyone doing Unicode development? Is anyone doing Delphi.Net development? Have you heard what its replacement is?

If instead we want to get into some code, I’ll have my laptop and a projector there with Delphi 2006 for Win32. I also have Visual Studio 2005 with RemObject’s Chrome Pascal compiler plug-in, the initial version of Oxygene.

In any case, we’ll have a great time. Remember, we’re now meeting in the (east) classroom of Medical Office Building, still at Legacy Emanuel Hospital. Hope to see you there!

There will be a brief introduction to web services, what they are, and who might be using them. Then we’ll get into the code by creating three web services in Delphi 2006, each increasing in complexity, and each with a VCL client to use them. The differences between an ISAPI DLL and a CGI stand-alone executable will be explained, the Web App Debugger that comes with Delphi will be demonstrated, and some samples of actual web service data from a real life ecommerce project will be shown.

Sound like too much for two hours? With Delphi, web services are a snap! And the steps are surprisingly similar from Delphi 6 to Delphi 2007. But there are some tips you’ll want to know….

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been developing software since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and works full time as a programmer in Beaverton at Retail Dimensions. On the side, he runs Cornelius Concepts, building Windows applications and hosting web sites.

PRESENTER

Gene Juhos of Sysmatics started his programming career writing code for an IBM 3741. He’s written useful code in COBOL, FORTRAN, C, C++, Assembler, CADOL and lately mostly Delphi. He took his first Delphi training class in 1996 using Delphi 3. Currently, Sysmatics supports a mix of customers on UNIX, Novell, and Microsoft networks. They convert old green screen applications to Delphi.

Studying these two topics together could branch in various directions, depending on questions and preferences from the audience. We may even continue the discussion at our March meeting if need be or dive into more detailed areas of study.

I invite you to join us and bring your experiences of incorporating libraries and testing methodologies into your programming projects.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and works full time as a Delphi programmer in Portland.

This month’s format will be a little different. There will be an introduction by David Cornelius, focus on examples with Chris Newcombe, then the audience is encouraged to share their “worst bug ever” and how they overcame it. Some tips and tricks for preventing bugs will be explored, and finally, a couple of Delphi libraries that can help hunt down the ones that slip through.

Please come, listen and share as we strive for better software development practices.

PRESENTER

Chris Newcombe is an independent programmer with over 20 years experience in coding.

• Utilities written in Delphi
• How to call a web service
• CodeGear’s RAD Studio 2007
  • What is Blackfish SQL?
• Others?

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, is a contract programmer through CorneliusConcepts.com, and supports a web hosting company, Sohlius, with a friend.

With Live Templates you can:

• fix typos automatically;
• insert large code snippets with a couple of keystrokes;
• remind yourself of obtuse parameter options;
• greatly speed up coding.

Live Templates is not limited to programming in Pascal. Any file edited through Delphi’s IDE can take advantage of this feature. In fact, each Live Template specifies what language it should be used for. There are several pre-built templates and we will look at them.

The presentation will introduce Live Templates, how to view and change the templates that come with Delphi, how to expand on them, how to create your own powerful templates in a few easy steps, and even how to change the default template-editing template!

If you bring a USB drive, you can take home all of the templates used during the presentation and be up to speed immediately!

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

You will be provided with a CodeGear update, as well as presentations and demonstations showcasing the new products.

As if the opportunity to check out our newest, coolest toys wasn’t enough, we will also give all attendees a special product discount, and enter your name in a raffle for products and even an 80GB iPod!

PRESENTER

David Intersimone from CodeGear, and Michael Li from InfoCan Management

The topic this month is just a loose discussion around Borland/CodeGear and speculation about how they’ll do this year. Delphi 2007 for Win32 was announced on Friday and has several really nice features and improvements. It’s supposedly faster than Delphi 7, has much better and faster help, is a non-breaking update (no need to purchase upgrades from your 2006 3rd-party controls), supports Vista glass frames (among other features), and includes a major update to dbExpress.

There’s been a flurry of blogs about it and I think the company is doing a pretty good job of evangelizing and pumping up excitement about it. My favorite article so far is: this one. You can find blog links, news, and lots of information on the CodeGear web site.

As always, I’ll have my laptop with BDS 2006 along with some 3rd-party components and tools if anyone tires of talking and wants to get into the code.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

If you have been following any Delphi blogs recently, you undoubtedly have seen some from Nick Hodges. Nick is the Delphi Product Manager at Borland/DevCo and has been very busy increasing awareness of and promoting the Turbo Delphi and Borland Developer Studio IDE. He recently posed a question about why so many people were still using old versions of Delphi and not upgrading. As you might imagine, he got a flood of responses. He followed that with another entry, this time his reasons why you SHOULD upgrade. In fact, his blog entry is the title of this month’s presentation. You can download the PowerPoint slide and Delphi 2006 feature matrix at the bottom of this page.

Not all features are are important to every programmer. But his list actually motivated me to get out my copy of BDS 2006 and play around with it some more (I’ve spent a lot of time with D2005, so it wasn’t a big jump). I’ll have a demo of ECO, show some live templates and the new refactorings, briefly show the two products included, and cover as many of the additional cool little things as we have time for.

If you have used BDS 2006 or downloaded Turbo Delphi, please come and share with us your experience. I would love to hear everyone’s favorite new feature.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides
• Feature Matrix (PDF)

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

To get you started on a good discussion, here are some web sites for reference you can browse beforehand:

• Read independent evaluations: CMS Watch
• Explore and test: Open Source CMS
• Compare and discuss: CMS Matrix

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

This month’s presentation will start off with a brief PowerPoint overview of Java. The difference between Application, Applet, and Servlet/JSP will be explained (with a heavier focus on the web server platform). Eclipse and Tomcat will be used for development, and you will see how those pieces fit together and how to set up a web project.

Following that, a Black Jack application will be demonstrated. It uses the MVC (model view controller) pattern; each piece will be explained along with how they interact.

PRESENTER

Rod Johnson works at ODS Health Plans and has written a number of Delphi client server applications using the ADS database. For the past six months or so, he has been working in the web applications area maintaining existing Java web apps.

• Setting up PHP, Apache, MySQL on Windows (WAMP)
• Configuration of PHP.INI (Development vs Production)
• How to control your web application with .htaccess
• Security issues

We’ll also see some sample web pages generated with PHP and try to address any other topics the group wants to talk about.

PRESENTER

The Presentation will be given by Ken Cobun, a long-time ODUG member. Ken started using Turbo Pascal in 1986 and moved on to Dephi up to version 6. He’s been using PHP since 2002 in LAMP and WAMP environments.

PRESENTER

Chris Newcombe is an independent programmer with over 20 years experience in coding. Like many other members of ODUG, he is exploring new programming environments to cope with a declining number of Delphi projects.

David Cornelius has been maintaining his own scripts since he started programming in the 80s on DOS PCs. He’ll show you where the right list of Delphi compiler options is in the help file (they aren’t all listed in all places) and how to use macros to make your scripts much shorter.

But the bulk of the evening will cover InnoSetup. With as much power as any build setup tool and with plenty of documentation, it is hard to believe this tool is free–yet it keeps getting even better! Use pre-processing, macros, wizards, a syntax-highlighted editor, online help, and an active newsgroup to build your software installations. David will show how one InnoSetup script is used to build full and upgrade setups for two varieties of his main Delphi application. This combined with powerful batch files allows true single-click launch of his complete build setup process, includng uploading of the finished executables to his web site.

Try it out ahead of time by downloading InnoSetup from www.jrsoftware.org and bring your questions!

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

Don’t forget we’d like to give away a free license of FinalBuilder 4 Professional worth $499 as a door prize.

PRESENTER

Ed Dressel

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group, works for Retail Dimensions, and runs a contract software development business (CorneliusConcepts.com) and a web hosting company (Sohlius) with a friend in his “spare” time.

There will be give-aways, including a copy of Delphi 2006. You won’t want to miss it!

PRESENTER

Anders Ohlsson from Borland Software Corporation (borland.com)

Advantage TDataSet Descendant VCL for .NET, the BDP.NET provider and the native Advantage NET Data Provider. Advantage Database is one of the few database solutions that provide complete support for Delphi 2005.

Advantage Version 8.0 is currently in Beta. The new version includes replication, on-line backup, scripting, transaction savepoints, and a newly re-designed Advantage Data Architect.

Remember, the local server (peer-to-peer) is FREE and there is a low-priced, easy-to-use web server license. In addition, we’ll talk about our integration with iAnyWhere, a Sybase subsidiary.

For more information, see the web site: advantagedatabase.com. For their KnowledgeBase, FAQ’s, & NewsGroups, see: devzone.advantagedatabase.com/as/advantage_solutions.dll.

PRESENTER

Phil Ruebel from Extended Systems, Inc.

We will discuss how to make this group more beneficial to the members and what kind of topics are going to serve this commnuity best over the next year or two. Please bring your ideas and join in our discussion. Please also be prepared to share how you might be able to participate in the coming months–the more people we get, the less of a burden it is on any one person–and the more variety of topics and experience you have to choose from for meetings.

Pizza will be available and drinks can be purchased in the nearby cafeteria.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius from Cornelius Concepts

Chrome is the next Generation Object Pascal language for the .NET and Mono Platforms. It combines the elegance of Pascal with the power and flexibility of the Common Language Runtime. By borrowing some elements from languages such as C#, Java and Eiffel and by adding its own language innovations, Chrome greatly boosts the developer’s productivity by allowing to write less and better code.

The RemObjects Framework is the combination of three products (the RemObjects SDK, Data Abstract and Hydra) aimed at the development of distributed systems that are cross-platform, database-independent and service oriented. During the course of the presentation various elements of these products will be shown and the attendees will gain a complete understanding of what makes this solution one of the leading 3rd party alternatives for the Delphi and .NET markets.

PRESENTER

Alessandro Federici from RemObjects

You know you’ve always wanted to be writing games instead of… whatever you’re getting paid for at the moment. Tonight we’ll look at doing graphics in Delphi. The talk will focus on using DirectX for Windows to create 3D graphics and the efforts of the JEDI team to make DirectX more accesable to Delphi programmers. We’ll also touch on input (keyboard, joystick, etc.) and perhaps sound.

As for writing Doom 7… well, you have to start somewhere!

PRESENTER

Chris Newcombe works as a computer consultant, and has been using Borland’s Pascal products since Turbo Pascal 3. He currently uses Delphi 7 and 2005. Alas, most of his projects are less fun to work on than games.

Also, he will be willing to show the code behind a new project he’s been working on lately, Project Timer. This small database application uses dbExpress and dbGo to connect to Microsoft SQL Server and helps him keep track of time spent on projects for various clients. There are already many such programs, but none that are free, connect to a database across the internet, provide a variety of reports (not yet implemented), export to XML and QuickBooks (not yet implemented), and are open source! He has quite a ways to go yet (including removing a proprietary grid component), but is already using it every day.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and runs a contract software development business in Portland. Visit his web site at Cornelius Concepts for more information.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and runs a contract software development business in Portland. Visit his web site at CorneliusConcepts.com for more information.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides
• Delphi project

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for over 15 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is the current coordinator of the Oregon Delphi Users Group and cofounder of Sohlius, Inc. managing the development of a large web-based project.

Winning awards year after year, it is often touted as the best BDE replacement for Delphi. But even if you aren’t looking to move up to something more stable and easier to deploy than Paradox or Access, it’s reliability, speed, small footprint, SQL language, and royalty-free distribution license and many other features are reasons enough to choose it over other products.

DBISAM’s libraries can be compiled right in to your application’s .EXE. It comes with in-memory table support that replicates identical functionality of its file-based counterparts. Applications can share data files on a network or attach to a DBISAM server for LAN or Internet connectivity using strong encryption. And if you have unique needs or just want to see how it works underneath, the full source code to the database engine and supported utilities is available. All this while looking and acting virtually like the standard TTable and TQuery components you’re already familiar with.

Come see a demonstration of DBISAM in a real-world application, get to know its feature set better, and possibly be the lucky winner of one of tonight’s door prizes!

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and runs a contract software development business in Portland. Visit his web site at CorneliusConcepts.com for more information.

We’ll also look at OdugWebMgr, a nearly-complete program which will be used to manage the data for the ODUG web site. You’ll see how easy it is to create a cross-platform, CLX application with dbExpress.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for 16 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and writes software and builds web sites using Delphi, Kylix, PHP, Firebird, and MySQL. Visit his web site at CorneliusConcepts.com.

Here’s a very brief taste of what we’ll be looking at:

• ECO (Enterprise Core Objects)
• WinForms
• WebForms (ASP.NET)
• BDP for .NET (Borland Data Providers)
• VCL for .NET
• IDE features
• Compiler/language feature

There will be a special discounted offer at these meetings. You do not want to miss out on the substantial savings! The discount is 25% off on Delphi 8 Architect and Enterprise and 15% off on Delphi 8 Professional. Both new and upgrade pricing. More details at the meetings.

Raffle! We will also raffle off at least one copy of Delphi 8 Enterprise at each meeting.

PRESENTER

Anders Ohlsson from Borland Software Corporation (borland.com)

What’s in it for you? Just by showing up you’ll learn how to:

• Reduce the security risks to the data in your apps
• Manage and integrate data across or beyond your enterprise
• Deliver timely access to corporate information

Don’t know Pervasive? You should.

Pervasive.SQL provides support for the Delphi community through the Pervasive Direct Access Components (PDAC), a plug-in replacement for the Borland Database Engine.

PDAC delivers the reliability and quality of Pervasive.SQL under the covers, combined with high-speed access to the rich database interface provided in Delphi without forcing you to learn an entirely new interface.

Get the scoop on Pervasive’s latest data security products and find out how Pervasive delivers complete, secure data management and integration solutions for developers like you:

• Pervasive Backup Agent - Ensures clean and consistent backups.
• Pervasive AuditMaster - improving accountability by tracing all data activities back to named users.
• Pervasive DataExchange Real-Time Backup Edition - improving availability by reducing data loss or downtime due to server crashes or site disasters.
• Pervasive.SQL V8 - improving integrity by eliminating operating system and network data vulnerabilities.

Want to know more about how Pervasive delivers value to Borland developers? Check out our special web site section devoted to you at www.pervasive.com/borland

PRESENTER

Chip Izard and Jim Beecher from Pervasive (www.pervasive.com)

• Indentation and spacing
• Good naming conventions
• Writing robust code
• And why everyone needs version control!

Some example code, both personally written and commercially sold, will be shown–and you’ll get to help decide how well it was written! A free tool for quickly formatting poorly-written code will be shown and a few IDE tricks for speeding up development while preserving readable style will be revealed. Also, a list of web sites for further reading will be provided.

Version control systems will be discussed and you will see that even if you’re a single developer, everyone can benefit from using one.

Most importantly, YOU will have a part in sharing your experiences, both good and bad. Come join in the discussion and learn from your colleagues.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for 16 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and writes software and builds web sites using Delphi, Kylix, PHP, Firebird, DBISAM, and MySQL. CorneliusConcepts.com.

PRESENTER

Founding principal of Phase II, a computer based consulting service, Mr. Leo Frishberg (leofrish@acm.org) has been an avid programmer since Algol 68. As a User Experience Architect, Frishberg concerns himself with how to make products more engaging, seductive and pleasant for the targeted user audience. Relying heavily on rapid prototyping, discount usability and iterative development approaches, Frishberg is an evangelist for engaging the user as early and often as possible in the product development cycle. Currently, he is the Program Chair for CHIFOO, Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon, a local special interest group of the ACM.

InnoSetup is a powerful setup creation tool for Windows that rivals many commercial installers. With scripting, pre-processing, command-line parameters, support for all versions of Windows, registry and .INI file support, DCOM and MDAC installation, and single-exe creation, there’s almost no task too big.

GExperts has been presented at ODUG before, but it’s good to review the myriad of features available in this Delphi IDE plug-in. From the simple ASCII chart, to a PE Explorer, to a Code Librarian, to the multi-line component palette, we’ll be pressed for time to cover it all. Not everything can be covered in detail, but you will have a good overall introduction to the set of powerful features available.

David will show how using these two products in conjunction has enabled him to automate a build process using one installation script and set of source code that produces two similar, but critically different applications, thus reducing errors and increasing productivity.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and runs a software development business. Visit his web site at CorneliusConcepts.com for more information.

I’ll bring my laptop with Delpi 6 Professional, Firebird, DBISAM, Access, and several third-party components including the TurboPower libraries, Rave Reports, Raize Controls 3, InfoPower 3000, Indy, CodeSite, WPTools, and some custom components I’ve developed.

We can talk about databases, object-oriented programming, security, the market, the weather, or whatever else may come up. Who knows, it could be one of the more interesting meetings!

Hope to see you there.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software development tools since the mid-80’s. He is the coordinator of the Oregon Delphi User Group and runs a contract programming business from his home in Beaverton. Visit his web site at CorneliusConcepts.com for more information.

Some specific items that will be presented include:

• DiamondBack (the next release of Delphi)
• hear about the new IDE and compiler features
• see Diamondback in action
• Is Kylix dead?
• The Borland Roadmap and SDO

PRESENTER

Phyllis Helton is the Information Services Manager, Analyst, Designer and Lead Developer for The JESUS Film Project where she has been programming for the past 10 years. Phyllis works from home, 1,000 miles away from the other three members of the development team. She is a self-taught developer, starting her programming in Paradox 4.0 for DOS, then moving to PL/SQL for Oracle, then finally to Delphi, which she has been using for the past 4 years.

The list of incredibly cool stuff in this feature packed release just goes on and on.

You don’t want to miss this chance to see it all, and be able to win a copy, as well as getting a show special. That’s right, a special price for just you - and that’s not all. You’ll get other cool stuff too - how does a T-shirt sound?

What are you waiting for? Get your calendar out and pencil this date in, or punch it into your cell phone or PDA now!

PRESENTER

Anders Ohlsson from Borland Software Corporation

RemObjects’ concept of Smart Services (services accessible at the same time using different message formats and/or network protocols) are designed to take remoting into the future by providing all of the benefits of exisiting Web Services, but eliminating their drawbacks, which include the notoriously slow and inefficient communication via SOAP, the complex setup issues involved with DCOM, etc. Smart Services provide the easy way to implement fast, efficient and standard-compliant communication–both on clients and servers.

Visit their web site for more information: RemObjects.com

There will be one lucky winner of a copy of RemObjects and a web site made available to attendees of the presentation for a discounted price on the product!

PRESENTER

Ed Dressel is Senior Software Engineer for The Annuity People, Inc., which develops point-of-sale software for retirement analysis products. (Customers include companies such as Nationwide Insurance, MetLife and Security benefit). Prior work included developing software for real-time plant-wide data acquisition in the manufacturing industry, as well as various contractual projects.

Ed is a member of Developer’s Express’ DX-Squad and Digital-Metaphors’ Team-DM (both peer-to-peer newsgroup support team). He has worked with Delphi since Turbo Pascal version 3 and speaks frequently at ODUG meeting.

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for over 15 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is currently employed at Oregon Health & Science University developing software for researchers using Delphi and Firebird. In his spare time, he develops more software through his contracting business, Cornelius Concepts, using Delphi and DBISAM.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for over 15 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is currently employed at Oregon Health & Science University developing software for researchers using Delphi and Firebird. In his spare time, he develops more software through his contracting business, Cornelius Concepts, using Delphi and DBISAM.

Not all the libraries available can be adequately covered in one night. Therefore, we will look at the following code packages (descriptions taken from SourceForge.NET where these code libraries can be obtained):

Abbrevia is a compression toolkit for Borland Delphi, C++Builder, & Kylix. It supports PKZIP 4, Microsoft CAB, TAR, & gzip formats & the creation of self-extracting archives. It includes visual components that simplify the manipulation of ZIP files.

Essentials contains 13 native VCL controls for Borland Delphi & C++Builder. The controls include drop-down calendars & calculators, roll-up dialogs, 3-D labels, tiled backgrounds, scrolling messages, menu buttons, and more.

LockBox is a cross- platform toolkit for data encryption. It contains routines & components for use with Borland Delphi, C++Builder, & Kylix. It provides support for Blowfish, RSA, MD5, SHA-1, DES, triple- DES, Rijndael, & digital signing of messages.

OnGuard is a library to create demo versions of your Borland Delphi & C++Builder applications. Create demo versions that are time-limited, feature- limited, limited to a certain number of uses, or limited to a certain # of concurrent network users.

Orpheus is an award- winning UI toolkit for Borland Delphi & C++Builder. It contains over 120 components covering everything from data entry to calendars and clocks. Other noteworthy components include an Object Inspector, LookOut bar, & report views.

ShellShock provides a set of components that let you customize applications with the functionality available in the Windows Shell & Windows Explorer, all without writing code. The components are written in native VCL for Borland Delphi & C++Builder.

SysTools is a library of utility routines & classes for Borland Delphi, C++Builder, & environments that support COM. It includes 1-D & 2-D bar codes, sorting, money routines, logging, high-precision math, a run-time math expression analyzer, & much more.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for over 15 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is currently employed at Oregon Health & Science University developing software for researchers using Delphi and Firebird. In his spare time, he develops more software through his contracting business, Cornelius Concepts, using Delphi and DBISAM.

The Advantage Database Server is a scalable, high performance client/server RDBMS for networked, stand-alone, Internet and mobile database applications. The Advantage Database Server supports many development environments including Borland Delphi and C++ Builder. Advantage Database provides native connections for most developments environments, facilitating easy integration with new and existing applications.

Homer Jones, Assistant Coordinator for ODUG, will show benchmark results between Advantage, DBISAM, and MS Access. He also plans to show the database conversion utilities from Access to Advantage and DBISAM.

There will be door prizes for attendees including one copy of a 5-user license of Advantage Database ($615 retail).

PRESENTER

Chris Franz is the Advantage Database Engineering Consultant at Extended Systems, responsible for assisting customers with selection and integration of Extended Systems mobile and data management solutions into their business applications. His expertise is focused on assisting developers in designing, coding and deploying database applications using Extended Systems tools and various development languages.

Chris came to Extended Systems from the Army National Guard where he provided consulting and training to soldiers. Chris has spent the last 8 years providing training to various audiences on a variety of technical topics. Chris has a wide range of experience in the technology industry including Network Management, Programming and Database Administration. Chris is a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer and a Certified Technical Trainer.

Chuck Vertrees is the Advantage Database Product Manager at Extended Systems, responsible for developing and managing strategic relationships with commercial software companies that integrate Extended Systems mobile and data management solutions.

Chuck has been with Extended Systems for 4 years and has been employed in the IT industry for 10 years. He holds a BBA from Boise State University and a MBA from Northwest Nazarene University.

COMPANY BACKGROUND

To be the global leader in providing data management software to the mobile enterprise and to developers of commercial software applications.

Founded in 1984, Extended Systems is a global technology company whose legacy of innovation and commitment to engineering excellence are reflected in advanced and widely adopted software solutions designed to meet the evolving needs of a data-intensive world. Headquartered in Boise, Idaho, Extended Systems has offices and subsidiaries throughout the United States

We all know we should design our software before we start coding, but how many of us actually do? MDA is all about design (using UML), and using the design to drive the programming. Two-way tools help you keep the design and the code in synch (addressing what I think is the biggest problem to date with using design tools).

ALM takes MDA to the next step, beyond simply design and coding to the entire application lifecycle, starting with requirements all the way through deployment. Borland is trying to position itself as the leading tools vendor across the application lifecycle, and across multiple platforms.

The presentation will be loosely structured, showing off various bits of the C#Builder product, according to what the audience most wants to see.

PRESENTER

Ray Lischner is the author of C++ in a Nutshell, Delphi in a Nutshell, and other books. He speaks regularly at the Borland Conference and to user groups across the country.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been a developer for 15 years working mostly on the DOS and Windows platforms using Borland’s Pascal compilers. He is currently writing client-server applications using MS SQL Server, InterBase, and DBISAM. See his web site, CorneliusConcepts.com, for more information.

Much development has occured since Firebird rose from the ashes of the Open sourcing of Interbase. In this presentation some of the topics we’ll explore and demonstrate include:

• A brief history of Firebird/InterBase
• A review of Firebird’s Features
• What’s new since the open sourcing of InterBase
• What’s new in the forthcoming release of Firebird 1.5
• What’s on tap for the future

PRESENTER

Rob Schuff is Informatics Core Director at the Oregon Health & Science University General Clinical Research Center. He received his education from Portland State University and holds Bachelors and Masters degrees in Mathematics with a concentration in Statistics. He is a self-taught application designer and programmer who began using Delphi in July of 1995 (Delphi 1) after using Paradox for Windows. Rob leads a project development team of four individuals providing design, direction, and oversight on several small to medium applications for the General Clinical Research Center at OHSU. And lastly….he is enjoying an additional new full-time job called “fatherhood”!

This presentation shows some of the ways that Delphi development tools and CodeWright editing features complement each other. It first shows how CodeWright works with Delphi through environment synchronization, project creation, command line configuration and file support. It then describes some of the features that make CodeWright a useful tool for Delphi programmers.

PRESENTERS

Jim Stevens and Tina Kvavle are well-versed in CodeWright, having worked in the CodeWright Product Group for 4 and 5 years, respectively. Jim has 20 years of Software Development, Technical Consulting, Technical Support Management and Product Management experience, having worked for Merant and Security Pacific Bank before joining Borland (formerly Premia/Starbase). Tina has 8 years of technical and marketing communications experience, previously working for U.S. Bank.

We will start off in Delphi 6 Pro tonight and move to Kylix 2 Enterprise at a future meeting (possibly January). We’ll use a web template and put in some custom tags. These tags will be replaced with database elements on the fly when the web page is requested. The database backend will be Firebird on our development site, but we’ll use backwards-compatible SQL to make sure we can port to InterBase painlessly, since the ODUG web site resides on Borland’s servers. (If you have an HTML template you think would work well for this site, please bring it!)

You’ll get to see Firebird in action using IBObjects, and WebBroker, the foundation underlying Borland’s WebSnap technology. Several basic pieces of the web site and database will be laid out, but you will get to help design as we choose a layout and decide what to put where.

(Yes, Kylix 3 has been out for a while now, but the concepts will hold for newer versions and in fact will help you understand the newer WebSnap technology more readily.)

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for over 15 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is the current coordinator of the Oregon Delphi Users Group and cofounder of Sohlius, Inc. managing the development of a large web-based project.

The presentation will discuss the ImageEn components, and how Homer used them in ABS Document Manager. ABS Document Manager is an add-on option to a larger client tracking, and office automation application. The unique feature of ABS Document Manager is that images are stored in a DBISAM database rather than as discrete files. This enables images to be linked to client records as the detail record of a master / detail relationship. This too, is unique because the master record is in Microsoft Access rather than DBISAM.

Main points of discussion will be: The ImageEn components, ABS Document Manager, database and application design criteria, implementation methodology, and useful tips and tricks.

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing office management software to the Insurance Industry. He has served as an MIS manager for General Motors Corporation, System Sales Manager for Control Data Corporation, and Programmer Analyst for ADP. Homer received his Ph.D. from Oregon State University and taught System Documentation at San Jose State University.

The presentation will begin with a simple object and test application. The object will be examined and discussed. At this point, the unit containing the object will be discarded, and will be recreated live using ModelMaker. After the break, the difference engine, documentation support, and customizable features will be discussed.

PRESENTER

Steve Griffiths cut his teeth on dBase II for CP/M (but is not as old as dirt), programmed in C, C++ to support an electronics environment, and has been using Delphi from Delphi 1. He is currently employed by CorVel Corporation.

PRESENTER

Kevin Stanton is an independent consultant doing business as RDB Solutions and has been working with Delphi since version 1.0 dealing with client/server databases and comes from the Paradox and IBM Mid-Range worlds.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides

PRESENTER

Ed Dressel is Senior Software Engineer for The Annuity People, Inc., which develops point-of-sale software for retirement products. (Customers include companies such as Nationwide Insurance, MetLife and Security benefit). Prior work included developing software for real-time plant-wide data acquisitionin the manufacturing industry, as well as various contractual projects.

Ed is a member of Developer’s Express’ DX-Squad and Digital-Metaphors’ Team-DM (both peer-to-peer newsgroup support team). He has worked with Delphi since Turbo Pascal version 3.

PRESENTER

Ray Konopka is the founder of Raize Software, Inc., and the chief architect for CodeSite and Raize Components. Ray is also the author of the highly acclaimed Developing Custom Delphi Components books and the popular Delphi by Design column, which appeared in Visual Developer Magazine. Ray specializes in user interface design and Delphi component development, and is a frequent speaker at developer conferences around the world.

PRESENTERS

This will be a Panel Presentation

Ray’s session at BorCon was to a very large, attentive audience and he presented the topic well. While David cannot hope to draw the same size crowd as the world-renown speaker, he feels it is a very important topic and hopes to get the same important key points across. It should be stressed that this is not specific to Delphi.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been using Borland’s software tools for over 15 years, using mostly the Object Pascal language. He is currently employed at Oregon Health & Science University developing software for researchers using Delphi and InterBase.

PRESENTER

Fred Edberg is a Delphi developer living and working in the Portland area. He is a former “Windows Developer” with a subsidiary of ODS Health Plans where he maintained and enhanced a client/server application which processed A/R, billing, claims, etc. and developed an Imaging application as well. Earlier, he worked for the US Army as a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Specialist and Geographer where he developed a GIS for the planning and management of natural resources at a military installation.

Fred earned a BSc and MSc in the Geosciences specializing in digital mapping technologies. He completed his thesis research with the development and comparison of statistical classification algorithms for satellite image data.

His interests lie in data analysis, statistics and image processing - especially when using Delphi - and has been known to play Spanish tunes on the classical guitar.

PRESENTER

Shawn Lehr is a Delphi developer for CorVel Corporation and, over the course of the last five years, has used Delphi 1, 3, 4, and 5. He does not consider himself a Delphi expert but is a huge fan of this unique programming tool and is excited about passing on this subtlely useful information to other Delphi developers.

PRESENTER

Founding principal of Phase II, a computer based consulting service, Mr. Leo Frishberg (leofrish@acm.org) has been an avid programmer since Algol 68. As a User Experience Architect, Frishberg concerns himself with how to make products more engaging, seductive and pleasant for the targeted user audience. Relying heavily on rapid prototyping, discount usability and iterative development approaches, Frishberg is an evangelist for engaging the user as early and often as possible in the product development cycle. Currently, he is the Program Chair for CHIFOO, Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon, a local special interest group of the ACM.

As a professional developer experienced with many of these components Ed will give us a brief of what Dionysus means and why this is something totally new in the Delphi Market

Visit the Project Dionysus web site.

PRESENTER

Ed Dressel is Senior Software Engineer for The Annuity People, Inc., which develops point-of-sale software for retirement analysis products. (Customers include companies such as Nationwide Insurance, MetLife and Security benefit). Prior work included developing software for real-time plant-wide data acquisition in the manufacturing industry, as well as various contractual projects.

Ed is a member of Developer’s Express’ DX-Squad and Digital-Metaphors’ Team-DM (both peer-to-peer newsgroup support team). He has worked with Delphi since Turbo Pascal version 3.

Ed will give a thorough demo of what ExpressWeb brings to Web development over and above the 3 different technologies already in Delphi.

ExpressWeb Framework is a product of Developer Express Inc.

DOOR-PRIZE! There will be a drawing for a free copy of ExpressWeb Framework (bring a business card to drop in the hat). Must be present to win.

PRESENTER

Ed Dressel is Senior Software Engineer for The Annuity People, Inc., which develops point-of-sale software for retirement products. (Customers include companies such as Nationwide Insurance, MetLife and Security benefit). Prior work included developing software for real-time plant-wide data acquisition in the manufacturing industry, as well as various contractual projects.

Ed is a member of Developer’s Express’ DX-Squad and Digital-Metaphors’ Team-DM (both peer-to-peer newsgroup support team). He has worked with Delphi since Turbo Pascal version 3.

ReportBuilder is a product of Digital Metaphors.

PRESENTER

Ed Dressel, ReportBuilder expert and long time member of TeamDM, will show how ReportBuilder Server Edition brings RAD to the world of N-Tier reporting enabling Delphi developers to quickly and easily deploy state of the art information publishing solutions to support remote clients and web browsers.

• Delphi7 Migration Path to .NET
• Cover COM .NET Interop.
• Language additions to support .NET
• Overview of ASP.NET
• Overview of Windows Forms
• Overview of .NET Web Services
• RAD Web Development using IntraWeb and Web-Snap
• Web Services Support in Delphi7
• Overview of DataSnap and dbExpress
• dbExpress connectivity components
• Data management with ClientDataSets and SimpleDataSets
• Overview of ModelMaker (UML Modeling Tool)
• Cover various diagrams/patterns
• Refactoring Delphi code
• Cross Platform Development using CLX
• Visual Reporting with Rave Visual report designer (End User functionality)
• Model Driven Architecture (MDA) development with Bold for Delphi

A copy of Delphi 7 Architect will be given away along with some other prizes!

PRESENTER

Anders Ohlsson from Borland Software Corporation

Borland aims to change all that!

This month, Borland is making a tour of user groups in the Northwest. They will be talking about Kylix in depth, their code name for the Delphi and C++Builder developer tools for Linux. Come join us to see demos, ask questions, and get a head start on preparing for cross-platform development!

For more information on Kylix (and simply for some good reading!) see Homer Jones’ article in this month’s Computer Bits magazine, entitled Cross-Platform Development." Also, be sure and visit Borland’s web site on Kylix!

PRESENTER

Sr. Manager of Developer Relations, has been with Borland for 5 years. He is one of the main Delphi gurus at Borland and is the man behind CodeCentral on the Borland web site. He will present the main topic.

In October, we learned about RaveReports from Chad Hower of Nevrona Designs. Recently released, this is the vastly reworked version of ReportPrinter Pro 3. We will see some of the demos and get a first-impression look at the product.

If time allows and interest is there, we’ll also take a peek at how to get around some of the pitfalls of using QuickReport, the free reporting tool that comes with Delphi.

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing office management software to the Insurance Industry. He has served as an MIS manager for General Motors Corporation, System Sales Manager for Control Data Corporation, and Programmer Analyst for ADP. Homer received his Ph.D. from Oregon State University and taught System Documentation at San Jose State University.

Homer will give the ReportBuilder demonstration and talk about QuickReports.

DAVID CORNELIUS has worked with the Pascal language for 15 years and is happy to see it embracing the Linux platform. David has worked as a programmer, network administrator, tech support person, web master, salesman, installer, PC repairman, project manager, and systems analyst (sometimes all on the same job!). He is currently employed at Interactive Northwest, Inc. as a Software Engineer doing Windows, web, and sometimes Unix development. He also does some contract programming in Delphi on the side through Cornelius Concepts.

David will be lead through the Rave Reports demo.

• Using non-visual and visual inheritance
• Custom Form properties and events (available in the object inspector)
• Using the open Tools API to create form experts
• Using Patterns.

If time allows, we will demonstrate the effect of these techniques in an actual application designed for a busy medical research facility.

Many of the techniques presented draw from the wisdom and expertise of Ray Lischner (Hidden Paths of Delphi 3) and white papers from Xavier Pacheco, former Delphi Engineer, now of Xapware Technologies.

Download:

• PowerPoint Slides
• Five Delphi Projects

PRESENTER

Rob Schuff is Informatics Core Director at the Oregon Health & Science University General Clinical Research Center. He received his education from Portland State University and holds Bachelors and Masters degrees in Mathematics with a concentration in Statistics. He is a self-taught application designer and programmer who began using Delphi in July of 1995 (Delphi 1) after using Paradox for Windows.

In Rob’s current position at OHSU he provides direction and oversight on several small to medium applications, hardware, and general long-term direction for the General Clinical Research Center’s Informatics Core.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been a developer for 15 years working mostly on the DOS and Windows platforms. He is currently employed at Interactive Northwest, Inc. as a Software Engineer doing Windows (and sometimes Unix) development.

PRESENTER

Jeff Sohler has considerable experience with Oracle and has worked with Delphi off and on since it’s inception. Presently, he is employed with Interactive Northwest, headquartered in Tualatin.They develop Telephony, IVR (Interactive Voice Response) and Speech Recognition solutions on both Windows and Unix platforms (hopefully Linux soon!). Jeff has experience in these environments, but his present title is “Windows Development Project Manager”. He’s not a full-time “administrator”… because of the company’s small size, he spends lots of time “down in the trenches” slinging code, writing SQL and designing solutions with the rest of the team.

He’ll also show the general outline of his system and the objects used. This is very extensive with about 50 forms and 50 tables. All of these are tied together with the users always having the same look and feel no matter where they are in the system.

PRESENTER

Ed is an independent developer who writes systems for mental health professionals using Delphi and InterBase 6.0. He also works for Providence Health Plans as a systems developer doing MS SQL and Delphi development.

The first application, named Bambi, is basically complete except for annual maintenance and can be seen at www.Bio-Optics.com. Bambi is used for evaluating the health of the cornea and diagnosing eye disease. Bambi captures video images of a monolayer of cells of the cornea of the eye from special corneal microscopes, enhances the image if desired, and allows morphometric parameters (number of cells/mm2, variation of cell sizes, etc.) of the image to be determined. These parameters are used to evaluate the health of the cornea prior to corneal transplantation, eye surgery, or the treatment for corneal disease. Turbo Pascal 1.0 enabled the birth of Bambi while Delphi 4.0 has allowed the mature Bambi to do be able to do fully automated cell analysis.

The second application is currently being developed as a possible method for the evaluation of images in a potential new treatment to cure diabetes. This method involves working with microscope images of red objects of various sizes on a background of variable color containing various other colored objects that are not of interest. The number, sizes, and shapes of the red objects of interest for any image is to be determined and the statistical parameters of these red objects from many associated images needs to be calculated and displayed in a spread sheet.

PRESENTER

Ron graduated from Reed College in physics, got his Ph.D. in physics from Rice University, then spent several years in Boston as Research Professor of Ophthalmology and Director of Ophthalmic Biomedical Engineering at Boston University School of Medicine. While there doing eye research, he founded Bio-Optics, Inc. to manufacture and sell an instrument he invented that obtains images of the cornea. He moved the company to Portland about four years ago after giving up his academic position in Boston.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been a developer for 15 years working mostly on the DOS and Windows platforms using Borland’s Pascal compilers. He is currently consulting through ATSI Group.

David will explain how enhancing Delphi 5’s IDE, or Integrated Development Environment, has helped him increase productivity. Two plug-ins, GExperts and CodeRush>, will show the incredible power of this RAD environment and expand your idea of productivity.

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been a developer for 15 years working mostly on the DOS and Windows platforms using Borland’s Pascal compilers. He is currently consulting through ATSI Group.

PRESENTER

John Kaster from Borland Software, Inc. (borland.com)

Advantage Database Server Advantage Database Server is a scalable, high performance client/server DBMS for networked, standalone, Internet and mobile database applications. The Advantage Database Server supports the NetWare, Windows NT/2000, and Windows 95/98 operating systems.

• Native SQL on both the remote and local server
• Fully scalable-write once, deploy anywhere
• Provides industry-leading filter optimization for Advantage applications
• Royalty-free distribution for local and shared environments
• Eliminates cost of ongoing administration-no database administrator required
• Fast and easy to install using existing network file system and hardware
• Protects database applications against network failure and user error through a centralized storage management system

XTNDConnect RPM XTNDConnect RPM (Remote Procedure Middleware) is an extendable, embedded, n-tier server that makes distributed application development easy. XTNDConnect RPM provides a suite of programming tools designed specifically for Delphi for the fastest middle-tier development possible. Middle-tier architecture can provide many benefits over traditional two-tier database applications, such as centralized business rules, centralized code maintenance and database abstraction.

• Provides real-time access to enterprise server processes for mobile and Windows applications
• Supports Palm Computing, Windows, and Windows CE Windows CE 2.11 - 3.0/PocketPC devices
• Lightweight, easy-to-use thin-client architecture
• Secure, reliable connections; Session SafeGuard and Guaranteed Delivery
• State or stateless connection models
• Native, ODBC, or ADO access to any database server

PRESENTER

Chuck Vertrees from Extended Systems, Inc.

ASTA has been in development since 1997 after Delphi Chief Architect Chuck Jazdzewski visited the Boise Delphi User Group and told us about the new open TDataSet model in Delphi 3 along with the new borland sockets. Within 2 weeks we had AstaClientDataSets streaming across the Internet.

It took us 7 months then to develop ASTA 1.0 which was released in July of 1998 after a large beta. ASTA 2 was released in October 1999 adding server side components like the TAstaProvider and TAstaBusinessObjectsManager. ASTA 2.1 was released in February 2000, ASTA 2.5 was released in December 2000 and ASTA 2.6 was released in June 2001 and reviewed by the Delphi Informant Magazine which later declared ASTA a runner up winner in the Best Database Connectivity Award for the year 2000 and 2001.

ASTA 2.6 is a mature product with a very large feature set with a help file that is almost 1 meg in size, almost 100 tutorials and support for 25 different Delphi 3rd Party Database Components that can be used on ASTA servers. ASTA has users in over 75 countries world wide with thousands of ASTA application deployed world wide running over LANS, WANS and the Internet. ASTA has continued to be an N Tier innovator with new features like ASTA Middleware Triggers and Default Values and Provider Broadcasts and continuing with true cross platform support for Palm, WinCE, Linux PDA and Java Clients.

ASTA Design Goals

• Allow Database Developers to use their existing skills to develop N tier Applications so that existing applications could be quickly ported to ASTA using Client Side SQL
• Allow Experienced N Tier developers to use their N Tier Skills in extending ASTA servers using advanced N Tier features
• Build very scalable and easy to deploy servers and handle all Threading Issues internally so that Developers could concentrate on building applications
• Allow Thin Client Applications that could be deployed with NO DLL’s and build in the ability to have client exe’s update themselves when new versions were registered on the server
• Require only SQL Select statements so that all insert, update and delete SQL could be generated by ASTA components
• Build an easy to use Messaging Layer so that Database Application Developers that had NO tcp/ip experience could easily stream any kind of data across the internet
• Abstract the server side so that any Delphi 3rd Party Component could be easily plugged into an ASTA Server

PRESENTERS

Steve Garland from ASTA Technology Group (astatech.com) and ODUG Member, Rob Schuff.

The presentation topics will be:

• Application development using DBISAM (it’s almost too easy).
• Creating database tables using the DBISAM System Utility (beats database desk top). Part of this will include a little database design theory so you can get the best performance from DBISAM (or other database applications for that matter).
• BDE Database Transfer Utility - convert any database with a BDE Alias to DBISAM (it’s so easy it feels like cheating).
• Migrating a DBISAM Desktop application to Client/Server.
• Client/Server Administration
• Comparisons between DBISAM and MS Access (and others RDBMS if prep time permits). This will include Performance, Data Integrity, Ease of data maintenance, and restructuring data via code.

PRESENTER

HOMER JONES is currently the President of Agency Business Systems, Incorporated, a Portland-based company providing office management software to the Insurance Industry. He has served as an MIS manager for General Motors Corporation, System Sales Manager for Control Data Corporation, and Programmer Analyst for ADP. Homer received his Ph.D. from Oregon State University and taught System Documentation at San Jose State University.

We’ll cover such things as

• Window and palette arrangement
• Keyboard hot-keys
• IDE plug-ins
• Programming styles for enhanced readability
• Uses for the Tag property
• Typed-constant tricks

PRESENTER

David Cornelius has been a developer for 15 years working mostly on the DOS and Windows platforms using Borland’s Pascal compilers. He is currently writing client-server applications using MS SQL Server, InterBase, and DBISAM. See his web site, CorneliusConcepts.com, for more information.

PRESENTER

Rob Schuff is a local software engineer with over 3 years of Delphi experience. His current position involves all maintainance and enhancements to multiple Midas applications.

Rave Reports allows you to transform your database into useful information and gives you the freedom to present it to your users over the web in the format they desire. Additionally, one of our lucky members will receive a FREE Rave 4.0 license!

PRESENTER

We are delighted to have as our special, out-of-town guest, Chad Hower, Vice President of Engineering for Nevrona Designs. Chad was a featured speaker at the 11th Annual Borland Conference this summer in San Diego and his presentation on Internet, Sockets, and TCP/IP Programming and Development was so popular that a second presentation had to be scheduled.

Chad Hower’s programming career started in 1981 at Pennsylvania State University. He has since mastered more languages than a United Nations translator and is an expert in multiple operating systems, databases, and protocols. Chad’s professional excellence and contributions won him the Technical Assistance Recognition Award (C++ Builder) from Inprise /Borland. He also writes for Delphi Magazine and VB Online in his spare time.

Nevrona Designs is a company rooted in the future, who creates unique possibilities for their customers. Nevrona is committed to providing solutions to those on the cutting edge of technology.

The meetings are free and open to the public. We meet almost every month as topics and interest and schedules demand. For a long time, we met on the third Monday of most months but are now meeting on the third Wednesday of every month. Our meeting location has changed a few times, but we have landed a good place on the south side of the Portland metro area that promises to be our new permanent location. We also sometimes meet online if we have a remote speaker or if we want to host the topic for a wider audience. However, always check the location in the email announcement or on the web site for each meeting to find out what is happening each month.

Feel free to join the low-volume mailing list to be notified of meetings and participate in occasional developer discussions. We look forward to meeting new people and sharing programming experiences!

Email List

To be notified about when and where our meetings will be and to participate in the low-volume discussions that occasionally arise, please join our email list hosted at groups.io. It’s totally free and you never get any solicitations to pay for anything nor do you need to watch any ads. Just follow the link below to the Groups.io site then click the “Apply for Membership” button:

History

When Borland came out with Delphi 1 in 1995, a new world opened up to Pascal programmers–Windows programming was now easily within their reach. Sure, there had been Borland Pascal 8 for Windows, but not too many people wanted to tackle the OWL (Object Windows Library) with all its C-like complexity and steep learning curve. With Delphi, many of the necessary details of Windows programming were hidden in “wrappers” or components that could be simply chosen from a palette and dropped on a form.

Soon, books and magazines started teaching Delphi programming and in Portland, Oregon, like many areas around the country (indeed, around the world!), developers wanted to get together and talk about this new programming environment, to strengthen their skills, learn new techniques, and build professional relationships. So, sometime near the end of 1995, a few of these people got together and started meeting on a monthly basis in Legacy Emanuel Hospital’s Lorenzen Center Auditorium. There was no one really “in charge” at first, just a group getting together and talking about Delphi.

But the meeting room definitely had a stage and we wanted someone up front! Soon Greg Postlewait stepped forward to lead. Greg’s professionalism and ability to bring good topics and speakers to the meetings, grew attendance rapidly. We setup an email list at eGroups–which was merged into Yahoo! Groups and is now on Groups.io. Since we were able to get the meeting room for no charge and the mailing list was free, we have never charged for admission or annual dues. After four years, Greg moved out of the area and handed the reins over to David Cornelius, who is the group’s coordinator to this day.

The group almost closed down in 2010 when David took an out-of-state job and made plans to move. But a year later, after working remotely and traveling a lot, he decided to stay in the Portland area. No one else had come forward to take over, so he resumed the leadership role.

At some point along the way, a web site had been established, but since there was no budget, it moved a couple of times depending on who would host it for free. In late 2000, David Cornelius arranged with John Kaster of Borland to host the group’s web site on Borland’s “Homepages” server. After several years, the server started showing its age and with the separation of the Developer Tools Group from Borland into Embarcadero’s CodeGear division, it didn’t even really fit there any more. So in early 2009, the domain name odug.org was established and a new web site was built. It is currently hosted by Cornelius Concepts, LLC and has gone through a few revisions, including WebBroker-generated HTML, Drupal, and now (as of January 2024), built with Hugo (the Markdown content and Pascal-like theme for the site are publicly available on Github and published using Github Actions).