freepascal.compiler/api

1. What is this?
----------------

This is the first public release of our system independent routine collection
for Pascal. This package includes routines in four major areas:

- file handling (FileCtrl, FileSys)
- keyboard handling (Keyboard)
- mouse handling (Mouse)
- full-screen video handling (Video)

2. Where to find documentation?
-------------------------------

Documentation is not available yet. However it is planned. If you need help
feel free to ask on our public mailing lists.

There are two mailing lists, one for users. To subscribe send a message to
[email protected] containing one single line:

subscribe fpk-pascal

The other mailing list is for developers. To subscribe to this list, send a
message to [email protected], containing:

subscribe fpc-devel

3. FTP sites
-------------

This unit collection is available at the following FTP site:

ftp://ftp.uni-freiburg.de/pub/pc/msdos/fpk-pascal/develop/


4. Installation
---------------

* With FPK:
compile the unit with FPK-Pascal using your favourite switches.

ppc386 buildapi.pas

will do the trick. After this, copy the resulting .ppu and .o files to
your ppc lib directory. By default this is

/usr/lib/ppc//linuxunits

under Linux. Under DOS units are in \PP\LIB\

* With BP
compile the unit with Borland Pascal using the command:

bpc /cd buildapi.pas for real target
bpc /cp buildapi.pas for DPMI target
bpc /cw buildapi.pas for Windows target

you may want to rename filectrl.pp to filectrl.pas if you want BP to
be able to access your source file more easily. Copy the resulting
.TPU, .TPP, .TPW files to your \BP\UNITS directory. (or to a directory
you created for add-on units, make sure that this directory is listed
in the Unit directories dialog)

* With Virtual Pascal/2
* With Speed Pascal/2
similar to the above ones, but since I don't have OS/2 installed right
now, I don't know.

5. Copyright
------------

This library is under the terms and conditions of the LGPL. See the enclosed
file COPYING.LIB for details. The library is not available as a shared lib (yet)
so it may cause licensing problems if you want to use it in a commercial project.
This will change as soon as the lib becomes available as a shared library.

6. Troubleshooting
------------------

Due to the bugs in the FPK compiler you may run into problems while compiling
the API. For example when I try to compile a unit which lists SysCalls in the
uses clause (in the implementation) part, the compiler always wants to compile
SysCalls (even if I have it in the lib directory.) copying the units to your
working directory helps. (you'll also need errno.inc and sysnr.inc)