Delphi Forms in Addin

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Delphi Forms in Addin
What is the best way to use Delphi forms in Addin 
Charles van den akker III




Posts: 4
 Joined: 2006-02-28
Hello...

I am using, i would think a rather complex way of using forms and am concerned that there are memory issues...

TAddinModule
...
uses DelphiFRM
...
Var
MyForm : TDelphiFRM;

...


Then on InitializeAddin

MyFormVar := TMyForm.Create(nil);

Is this the best way?
Posted 28 Feb, 2006 07:12:01 Top
Dmitry Kostochko


Add-in Express team


Posts: 2880
 Joined: 2004-04-05
Hi Charles,

I would recommend you using the following code. 


uses DelphiFRM;

procedure TAddInModule.adxCommandBar1Controls0Click(Sender: TObject);
begin
  MyFormVar := TMyForm.Create(nil);
  try
    MyFormVar.ShowModal;
  finally
    FreeAndNil(MyFormVar);
  end;
end
Posted 28 Feb, 2006 08:56:55 Top
Wim W.A. ten Brink


Workshop Alex


Posts: 30
 Joined: 2005-11-23
I agree with Dmitry, with a few notes:

procedure TAddInModule.adxCommandBar1Controls0Click(Sender: TObject);
var
MyForm : TMyForm;
begin
MyForm := TMyForm.Create(Self);
try
MyForm.ShowModal;
finally MyFormVar.Free;
end;
end;

With Delphi forms, I tend to remove the global form variables, especially when I create new forms of those forms by code. (They are only needed when you auto-create those forms from the project options, which you can't do with add-ins and other DLL's.)
And personally, I think it's a bit cleaner and more safe to use local variables for forms. Cleaner because it saves a few bytes in your global data segments. More safe because there's less risk of accidently altering the value of such variables with another value.

The second note is that I use Create(Self) instead of Create(nil) simply because the TAddInModule class is inherited from TComponent and knows how to free any child components (and a form is a component too) that are linked to it. Thus, even if the Finally doesn't free the form, the add-in still will free it when destroyed.

And a third note: in my add-in I use several forms that are non-modal. I create them on the OnInitialize event and free them on the OnFinalize event. While Outlook is running I just show and hide these forms as need be. This too is an effective way to handle Delphi forms.
With kind regards,
\/\//\ Workshop Alex
Posted 08 Mar, 2006 03:58:01 Top
Dmitry Kostochko


Add-in Express team


Posts: 2880
 Joined: 2004-04-05
Hi Wim,

Thank you for your comments.

Posted 09 Mar, 2006 07:34:21 Top
Roger Tobler




Posts: 1
 Joined: 2006-05-02
It work's fine for opening a form, but how do I close it without creating errors?

isn't it possible to do a form.hide or a form.close?

thanks
Posted 02 May, 2006 04:35:05 Top
Dmitry Kostochko


Add-in Express team


Posts: 2880
 Joined: 2004-04-05
Hi Roger,

Why not? You definitely can do a Form.Close, and you need to make some changes in the code from the post above to do a Form.Hide.

Posted 03 May, 2006 07:36:49 Top