[fpc-announce] Lazarus 0.9.30 released

[Mattias Gaertner]

The Lazarus team is glad to announce the 0.9.30 release. This release
is based on fpc 2.4.2.

This release is available for download at the SourceForge download page:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/lazarus/files/

Minimum requirements:
Windows:       98, 2k, Vista, 7, 32 or 64bit
FreeBSD/Linux: gtk 2.8 or qt4.5, 32 or 64bit
Mac OS X:      10.4, LCL only 32bit, non LCL apps can be 64bit


Highlights / Major changes:

LCL:
* Windows CE: support for clipboard and keypad devices
* GTK2 and GTK1 interfaces are now separated. 
  GTK1 is no longer maintained by the Lazarus team, 
  but patches are still welcome.
* fpGUI: the LCL interface to fpGUI now supports all components 
  on the standard page.
* QT: support for Haiku
* Layout and autosizing is now more consistent across widgetsets, 
  overhead was reduced, improved cross platform layouts and complex forms.
* Added gif reader
* TLazIntfImage - New function AlphaBlend, which can alpha blend
  an intfimage into another, using a separate intfimage as the
  alpha channel. 
* Unit chart and its component TBarChar are deprecated. 
  See the new package TAChartLazarusPkg.

IDE:
* Support for FPC resources: 
  You can now use {$R *.lfm} instead of {$i unit1.lrs}.
* The Delphi converter has improved a lot.
* Build modes, build macros and conditionals now allows 
  different sets of compiler options for projects and packages.
* Editor
    * Hiding (Folding) of comments in Pascal source.
    * Allow Multiple Source-Editor Windows
    * Allow several Views of the same Source
    * User-defined color-schemes.
    * Identifier-completion pop-up is now resizeable
* Project compiler options can now be saved as default for new projects.
* When opening a project only those forms are opened 
  that were open when project was closed.
* Various designer usability improvements:
    * arrow and tab keys switching between components
    * resize/move cancellation using ESC key
    * save/restore of the form window state in the project session
    * skip snapping when Alt key is pressed 
* When creating a new project the default unit output directory 
  is now lib/$(TargetCPU)-$(TargetOS). Target file name is project1. 
  This has no impact on old projects.
* IDE now preserves the line endings of source files (it uses
  the line ending of the first line, it does not preserve mixed 
  line endings).
* You can now quickly switch between several versions / branches of 
  packages by defining the preferred package file name for each dependency.
* You can now use the IDE directive %H- to hide individual hints,
  notes and warnings.
* The IDE can be made dockable. Install either the package 
  AnchorDockingDsgn or EasyDockMgrDsgn.
* The ToDo list was moved to a separate package: todolistlaz.lpk.
* Czech translation added 

Debugger / Editor
* Inserted/Deleted lines during a debug session are now tracked. 
  Breakpoints and Execution-line are adjusted.
* Step out command implementation (by Flavio)
* Show execution point command
* Single Instruction step (over/into)
* UI Improvements: Toolbars for Watches, Breakpoints, Disassembler
* Watches: Enabled display formats (mem-dump, Hex, Default, ..)
* Disassembler added navigation: jump to address / return to execution point
* Improved reaction speed: It is possible to continue stepping 
  without having to wait for all watches, locals, ... to be evaluated 

Components:
* The IDE got some options to become easier for students and pupils 
  and there is a new package EducationLaz adding options to hide
  complex parts of the IDE
* New AggPas (Anti Grain Geometry for Object Pascal) package, 
  now supporting FPImage and LCL. AggPas highlights: Subpixel rendering, 
  8-bit alpha channel, paths, platform independent rendering using
  pure pascal
* TAChart update, including: stacked and rotated series, 3 new types
  of series, axis transformations, interactive tools, 6 new demos and
  other improvements


And thousands of fixes and smaller changes. The detailed list of changes can be
found here:
http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Lazarus_0.9.30_release_notes


Mattias