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Units Conversion with Delphi's Data Aware Components

Mark Derricutt — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 10:36:00 GMT

Whilst tidying up for the move this weekend I came across a CD-ROM containing some old screen shots of one of the projects I was working on at $employer using Borland Delphi.

The original (paradox for DOS) applications at $employer had an extensive units conversion system which allowed you to view pretty much any column in the database in any combination of measurement imaginable. Translating this to work in the Delphi environment was quite fun, and Delphi made it surprisingly easy.

If I recall correctly, the core components in I came up with were the TUnitQuery and TUnitTable components - descending from the normal TQuery and TTable components the system overrode the getText/setText methods of each TField so that the conversion's were fed automatically to any data-aware component.

In addition to these two, a TUnitPopupMenu and TDBUnitPopupMenu was created which simply reported/set a specific type of unit with the data-aware version automatically sourcing/updating its details to the linked TUnitQuery/TUnitTable (with all relevant fields automatically updating throughout the display instantly). Several property inspectors were made available to extend the IDE's designer with unit aware configuration settings, with each choice being persisted to the users registry.

I quite enjoyed writing funky component libraries like this, especially the property inspector's, it was amazing to see how easily one could enhance their IDE with specific in-house value-add functionality. I guess this is what drives me to keep writing plugins for IntelliJ IDEA these days, and as much as I miss mucking around with visual components like these, I don't really miss the pascal (or the win32 api) that much...

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Homeless in AU

Mark Derricutt — Mon, 21 Jun 1999 11:59:00 GMT

Ok, time for a rant, possibly a lengthy one, I aint written for a day or two have I?

Well, whats been happening.... When we last tuned in to the adventures of the Mark in the land of the Australian Intellect we learnt he wasn't suitable for the job at PowerCor (oh how I saw that coming when I left) and had been asked to move out of the motel...

Anyway, thursdays morning I wandered down to the PB office, first things first... whats happening with the mote? "We've been overruled..." Val says, "...you're moving back in." What?? Yes, for some reason I was to move back into the hotel for the night, maybe two and something was being sorted with one of the company apartments. Sounds fine to me...

So off I go to see Ron... "We have a problem with PowerCor...." I start, "we need to talk..." I continue. Oh, turns out Ron's late for a meeting, then off to NZ for some meeting. I quickly explain the situation and he's like "well, we cant afford to put you up in the motel if you're not working" so I told him I could probably stay with some friends I know here (if I begged) and said I was gonna see if I could make a little holiday of being here.

Anyways, off he goes I'm still unsure of whats happening, so I setup the laptop and do a little delphi, I ask Val if theres a phone I could use to connect to the internet "no" I get, mmm, darn it. I ring NZ and speak to Errol (hi) and explain whats going down, then take to town for a shopping and exploration trip.

Friday - not much happening today, slept in a bit, did a little bit of delphi work, nothing major, quite a boring day :) Saturday - ahhhh the weekend, walked around town a bit more, finding more shops to stop at and stuff, all fun fun, I've been sampling a few different cafe's and such around the motel, all really cool, great food, and they all play jazz, some with live bands which is excellent.

Got a taxi out to prahran to see the band's Sanity's Cage and Cyclone Tracy play at "The Cat House" which was a cool pub, met some cool people and had a awesome night listening to some cool metal, I recorded the show and it came out blimmin awesome, although a slight mishap meant I didn't get Cylone Tracy's show recorded (the mike came out and I think I put it back in the wrong hole :( Got home around 3:30 - 4ish and slept till about 3, I didnt really do much on Sunday night, I tried looking for a church within walking distance from the motel but didn't spot any :(

Well, now we come to today, Monday, the day of reckonning, the day of judgement, the day of "has anyone got a knife?"... I'm sitting in the PB office down on Queen Street, Ron just walked in and the conversation basically "you're still here? you didn't go back on Friday then?" "Are you still in the motel?.... that'll cost you a bit". He was adamant that he made it clear the company couldn't afford to pay the motel if I wasn't working etc. etc. and that I was supposed to move out, which in a vague-rushed-im-late-for-a-meeting kinda way I guess he did, it's a pity no one else at PB knew what I was going on cause all I knew when I came back on Thursday to confirm what I was happening was that the motel was booked till july 31st, and my flight was july 2nd.....

So, I guess what this means is that I go back to the motel, check out, and find somewhere to stay... Malcolm's (Christian Music Product's - CD Supplier to the Gods) wife said I could stay with them in Camberwell if I needed to, and Mark said I could crash at his place if I needed to as well. So I have options... I just love Ron's quote "I dont mean to sound mean, but there's a flight today..." heh, and here I was thinking some time away from Auckland would be a good change, I think I'm in more need for a stress free break NOW than I was before.... oh, and I have no window where I am at the moment as well! :(

I think I'll go wander up to Metal Mayhem and pick up those Nightwish CDs he got in, and for those internatinal orders/trades for people on TOEF, I'll send them as soon as I get back to NZ :P Hmm, I hope my pay goes in soon, my accounts look VERY empty of cash.... Spot ya people....

Addendum... I'm back at the motel, about to start packing things up and tell the staff i'm checking out. Spoke to Malcolm on the phone and it's all sweet to stay with him till Friday. I might even do some work in the shop in exchange for some CDs (his idea) so not sure what's going to happen. Hell, at this rate, I might even just see if I could get a ticket for tonight and just come home, at least it would be an end to this whole event.

Sigh and mopes Mark

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Mark Derricutt — Thu, 17 Jun 1999 11:59:00 GMT

Wed 16, 10:40 - Well I just got a phone call from PB to say that I'm to move -out- of the hotel tomorrow morning, and I'll be moving into one of the apartments the company has, I'll also be sharing with someone else from PB, personally I think that sucks, I'm not quite sure where the apartment is, but I sure as hell bet that it'll be further away than a block from the cool jazz club I found last night. Sigh, if I'm sharing with someone I probably won't be able to spend alot of time on the net either, which sucks... Wed 16, 14:12 - Just been wandering around the city, whilst I didn't get lost, I didn't realise just how far up from the office I had walked... so it took a while to get back to the office. Anyway, I found Walkman World and looked at the sharp mini-disc player, very nice, very temping, one thing I learnt was that Brittish passports are open-bag, which means I could buy the mini-disc player/recorder and take it away with me then and there, which is cool. I also found a cool cd store, quite commercial and had a BIG upstairs section devoted to techno and stuff, but I did find Blind Guardians "Nightfall in Middle Earth" and "The Moon Revisited" in the "hard rock" section... But then, as thou it called to me, I was walking down the road and from the other side of the street I was it... A Hammerfall poster, I knew I had to go inside... turns out to a cd store dedicated to metal, powerprog and everything I like... I couldn't resist and picked up a few goodies, he's also getting the Nightwish CDs in next week again (about 5-6 copies of each) so if anyone wants one... he does mail-order via the net!!! He also invited me to a powerprog show this saturday, so assuming I can find the venue I'll be seeing "Sanity's Cage". But now... I'm back at the office, writing these notes, preparing to go back into the through of trying to figure what I'm supposed to do... I hate this - my brains dead and I cant get my mind around this problem... I'm thinking too much like a programmer at the moment :( Wed 16, 15:48 - I'm just trying to get myself connected to the network here, just had one of the guys fill out a "network connection request" form which has now just been taken down to the help-desk department and will apparantly take about 2-3 days before I can connect. I think I'll be getting a @powercor.com.au email address so if I do I'll have to get all my mail forwarded there, maybe. All I want to do is check my chalice mail :-) I said it would probably just be easier to get an analogue phone line setup at my desk so I could use my modem, but that seems just as hard... wow... I think, just maybe that PBNZ's IT is better than someone else for a change :) Thu 17, 8:42am - Hello people, I was gonna post this last night but didn't around to it, well, things don't seem to be working out quite as planned, I was partially expecting this problem and it seems to be coming true... The problem? I don't know enough excel/access to understand the logic of how to do what the client wants. Whilst on the surface it seems a simple task, it looks to be a combination between a spreadsheet and a database, and my mind just won't accept it unfortunately. I discussed this with Vikrim yesterday and we basically agreed that because of that, and because of the 2-3 week deadline for actually getting this done, it would be best performed by someone who has more experiance in doing projects that combine excell/access. 'tis just one of the things that happen, no one knew what this project was before I left NZ so no one knew if I was suitable for it, ahhh well these things happen...only downer is now I have to go to the PB offices here in Melbourne and tell this news to Ron Millard... So what does this mean for my stay in Aus? Well it could be cut short, I'm going to see if I could still stay here for a week or two and work on my NZ code which I brought with me, whilst I'm in Australia I may as make the most of it, esp. if I also have some holiday time available :)) I was down from email all yesterday because the flat was offline, I knew I should have power-cycled the gateway before I left... anyway, alls running in happy lala land again, although I must say that MS Outlook REALLY sucks as an IMAP client, very slow and bloated and hopeless at what it does... I installed PC-Pine and now I'm away laffing, full speed email without the bloat, and it even does everything I want it to do :) (ok so I have to be ONLINE to get my mail but thats ok)... It's almost 9am so I should really go finnish my breakfast, have a shower, then make my way down to the PB Offices... what makes all this even worse is that Vikrim (the guy from PowerCor Australia) has gone away for the next two days on business, oh well.... Australia rocks non-the-less, I think I like Melbourne already, wouldn't actually mind living here (from what little ive seen so far anyway)... A friend suggested I check out the job pages over here which I might do, just to see what work's available and stuff, always good to keep my options open I say...

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Australian Crawl

Mark Derricutt — Tue, 15 Jun 1999 11:59:00 GMT

Tues, 6:37am - Just got on the plane, I have a window seat, hooray.... Pity that window is a door, so I have a huge feaken annying 2ft wide door infront of me which doesn't give me much leg room at all.

Tues, 9:38am - I expect we'll possibly start our descent soon, hope the batteries last, I should have checked their charge before leaving Auckland :-) Well I'm sitting here listening to The Flower Kings, of the best bands I've discovered recently, mmm, well the caption just said something over the intercom system, but just like brittish railway, I couldn't understand a darn thing he was saying.

I've slept a bit on the flight, just minor dozing on and off with rather strange and warped dreams which I can't recall anymore, I hate that.

I've taken a photo of the door directly infront of me, why? To show the cracks in it, makes me feel REAL secure it does (not to mention that thuds and squarks it's been making when ever a bit of turbulance kicks in... The photo should be found on my photopoint.com photo site sometime soon (once I download the pic from my camera and upload it.

Hmm, battery low light flashing, gotta go :-) Bye bye, love ya.

Tues, 4:32pm - Well, an interesting day to say the least, the flight was well and getting off the plane and customs was no hassle, apart from a small luggage mixup which meant it took ages for our luggage to get off the plane...

Picked up a taxi to take me to the airport, he didn't seem to know where the motel was and asked me for directions - which I couldn't give, other than "er, its in the city". Anyway, after a while he digs out his map, should I be worried that a taxi driver doing the airport circuit DOESN'T know where hotels are??? Not really, what I -should- be worried about is taxi drivers that read maps on the freeway and crash into Preludes... Yes you got heard that right, my taxi driver crashed smashing up the backend of a rather nice looking Prelude...

Anyway, 30 minutes later we're on the road again and finally turn up at the hotel, after a quick shower and email check I walk down the road to the PB Power offices were I meet a few people, and get taking over to the PowerCor Australia building (just over the road a bit) and we stuck into talking about what it is I'll be doing, -finally- I know what it is they want of me, and I hope I can deliver :P

After 3-4 hours I now have a few whiteboard print-outs of the notes we took today and I have to write up a document on how I think we should handle the problem at hand, initial thoughts... it looks bigger than what it really is, but I think it could end up even bigger, which could be a problem.

The hotel suite is nice, its a small 1 bedroom/1 lounge unit with a tiny wee dinky kitchen, and a shower/toilet hanging off the bedroom area, all looking flash (photos will be on the net later).

I'm rather miffed, I just missed the Mortification concert by 2 days, which would have been awesome to catch, but The Offspring are playing in the next few weeks so I hope to see that.

Well, I'm starting to get a little hungry so I might go over the road to the restaurant and find some dinner, then think about this thing called work.

Muhahahaha just saw a TV add for "One Net" ISP and it's like "why should I choose One Net?" "Cause we connect by the phone" was one answer, makes it sound like an uncommong thing :P It's also wasn't flat rate :( GO IHUG :PPP

Anyways, I should go, this rant is getting tooooo long :P

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Off to Aussie...

Mark Derricutt — Mon, 14 Jun 1999 11:59:00 GMT

Well by you'll all know I'm off to the land of decrepid criminals kicked out of the mother land of England... Anyway, seeya people (this is an automated email going to numerous people from various social groups (so stop that fighting you lot in the corner!))

Well, the flight leaves around 6am tomorrow morning and I'm scheduled to return some time on July 2nd, which is a Friday, so I'm thinking I'll change the flight to a late sunday flight so I get the weekend to relax :)

Anyway, it's all a little worrying that I -still- don't actually know what it is I'm going to be doing for the next few weeks, numerous people have tried to tell me, but what they say doesn't really make much sense so who knows.

Well, I guess this is bye bye for a while, and I intend to keep these news postings up every now and then, or whenever I get bored and find myself at a loose end with a net connection somewhere (ahh the joy's of a fully automated and functional web-site)....

So this is good bye from me, and hello from him, and please.... don't forget to feed the fish in the corner!

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