New job, new office, new adventures

It’s been roughly 4 weeks since I posted a status report on Amibian.js. I normally keep people up-to-date on facebook (the “Amiga Disrupt” and also “Delphi Developer” groups). It’s been a very hectic month so I fully understand that people are asking. So let’s look at where the project is at and where we are on the time-line.

For those that might not know, I decided to leave Embarcadero a couple of months ago. I will be working out may before I move on. I wanted to write about that myself in a clean fashion, but sadly the news broke on Facebook prematurely.

Long story short, I have been very fortunate to work at Embarcadero. I am not leaving because there is anything wrong or something like that. I was hired as SC for the EMEA regions, which basically made me the support and presenter for most of europe, parts of asia and the middle east. It’s been a great adventure, but ultimately I had to admit that my passion is coding and community work. Sales is a very important part of any company, but it’s not really my cup of tea; my passion has always been research and development.

So, come first of June and I start in a new position at RemObjects. A company that has deep roots with Delphi and C++ builder users – and a company that continues to produce a wealth of high-quality, high-performance frameworks for Delphi and C++ builder. RemObjects also has a strong focus on modern languages, and have a strong portfolio of new and exciting compilers and languages to offer. The Oxygene compiler should be no stranger to Delphi developers, a powerful object-pascal dialect that can target a variety of platforms and chipsets.

Since compiler technology and run-time systems has been my main focus for well over a decade now, I feel RemObjects is a better match.

Quartex Components

Quartex Components has been an officially registered Norwegian company for a while now, so perhaps not news. What is news is that it’s now directly connected with the development of the Quartex Media Desktop (codename “Amibian.js”). While Amibian.js is an open source endeavour, there will be both free and commercial products running on top of that platform. I have written at length about Cloud Forge in the past, so I wont re-hash that again. But 2020 will see a paradigm shift in how teams and companies approach software development.

Company logo professionally milled and on its way to my new office

I will also, once there is more time, continue to sell and support software license components.

Quartex Media Desktop

The “Amibian.js” project is moving along nicely. The deadline is Q4 2019, but im hoping to wrap up the core functionality before that. So we are on track and kicking ass 🙂

More and more elaborate functionality is being implemented for the desktop

Here is an overview of work done this month:

• TSystemService application type has been created (node.js)
  • TApplication now holds IPC functions (inter process communication)
  • Running child processes + sending messages is now simplicity itself
  • Database drivers are 90% done. Delete() and DeleteTable() functionality needs to be implemented in a uniform way
• Authentication is now a separate service
  • Service database layer is finished (using SQLite3 driver by default)
  • Authentication protocol has been designed
  • Server protocol and JSON message envelopes are done
  • Presently working on the client interface
• LDEF bytecode assembler has been improved
  • Faster symbolic lookup
  • Smarter register recognition
  • Early support for stack-frames
  • Fixed bug in parser (comma-list parse)
• QTX framework has seen a lot of work
  • Large parts of the RTL sub-strata has been implemented
  • UTF16 codec implemented
  • QTX versions of common controls:
    • TQTXButton
    • TQTXLabel
    • TQTXToolbar
      • TQTXToolButton
      • TQTXToolSeparator
      • TQTXToolElement
    • TQTXPanel
    • TQTXCheckBox
    • .. and much, much more
• Desktop changes
  • Link Maker functionality has been added
  • Handshake process between desktop and child app now runs on a separate timer, ensuring better conformity and a more robust initialization
  • The Quartex Editor control has been optimized
    • All redraw calls are now synchronized
    • Canvas is created on demand, avoids flicker during initial redraw
    • Support for DEL key + behavior
    • Gutter is now rendered to an offscreen bitmap and blitted into the control’s canvas. The gutter is only fully rendered when cursor forces the view to change

I will continue to keep everyone up to date about the project. As you can understand, its a bit hectic right now so please be patient – it is turning into an EPIC environment!