Update 1 for RAD Studio XE2 is available

Today,  just less than a month of releasing the original XE2 product, Embarcadero published the first update of a series of frequent updates for RAD Studio XE2 (including Delphi XE2 and C++ Builder XE2). Update 1 contains 120 bug fixes in FireMonkey, VCL Styles, compiler, and IDE. This update is mandatory for installing the future updates. Here is the official announcement: Update 1 for Delphi XE2, C++Builder XE2 and RAD Studio XE2 . Make sure to read Release Notes for Update 1 before installing it, because Update 1 requires a full uninstall of original XE2 installation and is not a simple upgrade. You can also see a list of all bug fixes in this update here: Delphi XE2 and C++Builder XE2 Update 1 Bug Fix List .

As I checked the bugs list, at least one bug regarding BiDi support (QC # 97965) is fixed in VCL Styles. No other BiDi related bugs are fixed in this update. Embarcadero staff mentioned in Embarcadero newsgroups that the company is planning to release monthly updates for XE2 product, so we should wait to see if any of the BiDi related bugs will be fixed in the coming updates or not.

Delphi 64 is coming

Eventually Embarcadero released a sneak preview of Delphi 64-bits compiler. Four days ago, there was an April 1 fake story about this, but now it is all real:

http://www.embarcadero.com/products/delphi/64-bit

According to their latest published Delphi roadmap by Embarcadero, they had planned a beta version of the 64bits compiler to be released in the first half of 2011. Currently there is only a sneak preview video available, but you can fill a form to receive more information, or participate in its beta testing program. Seems this time Embarcadero are stick to their published roadmap, unlike what we saw for Delphi XE release.

Embarcadero and Iran Embargo

Are you an Iranian Delphi (or C++ Builder, or JBuilder) developer? Have you noticed that while you are in Iran, some pages of Embarcadero website do not load?

You might have thought it is your ISP, or maybe Iranian filtering system, or maybe your browser, which are causing the problem, because other visitors are using the website with no such problems, and nobody has reported such problems. Well, if you thought that way, you are wrong!

It was some months (or maybe a year) ago that I noticed I cannot log into Embarcadero forums (web interface for their newsgroups). It was telling me that my username\password was not valid! I retried my username\password several times, and even tried to make it to email me my password, but no success! Eventually I decided to create a new username, and tell them about my problem in the forum, but when I was creating the new account, I noticed that Iran is not in Countries list, and I have to choose another country if I want to create an account in their website. It was there that I found out they deleted my previous forum ID without any notification just because Iran was chosen as my country!

Days passed and April 2010 came, I noticed that some Iranian Delphi developers were reporting problems about accessing EDN (Embarcadero Developers Network). EDN provides some articles, news reports, and white papers about Embarcadero products for software developers. I thought it must have been some ISP problems, but since I wasn’t sure, I created a topic in Embarcadero forums, and asked if EDN is down. Some users mentioned they have no problem accessing it in Europe, and later on, my topic got deleted from their forum, and I received an email from one of Embarcadero employees that this is due to their respected company’s policies in complying with US embargo, and I should keep it as a confidential note!

Now it’s been some days (maybe 1 or 2 weeks) that I found out accessing weblogs belonging to Delphi team members on Embarcadero website, and also documents wiki website (online version of Delphi documentation) is not possible from Iran. Read the rest of this entry »