[fpc-devel] delphi 2010/XE/XE2 - like rtti and "packages"

[Dimitri Smits]

Hi, 

A few times the latest weeks, I noticed on this list (and the Lazarus list(s)) a "need" for the Delphi rtti extra's and the Delphi meaning of packages (program/library/*package*/unit). 

I am willing to reboot what I started and give it another shot with rtti. 

Both are at least partly intertwined, so I might need some help of you all with a system more exotic than a Wintel machine ;-) 

First off: 
* Delphi's RTTI starts from package/unit/type tree that is registered on startup/loadup of a binary with the RTL. Be it executable or dynlib. => what units/objects/classes/... in the fpc compiler would I need to alter to allow the following additions on windows, but eventually all platforms: 
- a smartlinkable "section" per module (=executable/dynlib) for the package info 
(preferably, here the init/finit block may be expanded/replaced with a link to the unitblock) 
- a smartlinkable "section" per unit for the typeinfo for when used in a "package" module 
- a smartlinkable "section" per unit for the typeinfo for when used in a "program" or "library" module 

I know that I might/would need to alter some types in respective typinfo/sysutils to accomodate in the rtl, but I would first like to know how to generate them in the output. :-) 

optimally, one wouldn't need 2 different versions of the unit-typeinfo, but I was thinking that in package we take all the types, in one section. And in the other for program/library, we would allow smartlinking to take out subsections that are not needed. 

So, any help/redirection to documentation or units is greatly appreciated (as well for the "section" and what can be done with them). 

once I get a tree-hierarchy of module/package<->units<->typeinfos working, I intend to go on with the RTTI unit implementation and subsequent questions on that topic. 

kind regards, 
Dimitri Smits 
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