The new 11.2 release of RAD Studio Alexandria, like the previous versions, again includes the C++Builder and Delphi with the same version number. The developers at Embarcadero have placed great value on improving work with the IDE. They have also further expanded support for the platforms used. Among other things, the iOS simulator now also offers support for ARM-based Mac PCs with M1 or M2 CPUs.
Better to work with the IDE
As in the previous minor release, the creators behind RAD Studio Alexandria are also focusing on improvements and enhancements to the IDE with this version.
Development environment improvements include support for Markdown documents and a VCL-based HTML preview. VCL (Visual Component Library) is a set of visual components for rapid development of Windows applications in Delphi and C++. It contains both visual and non-visual classes and helper classes intended to support programmers in developing Windows, web, database and console applications. According to the development team, all remaining dependencies on the Internet Explorer ActiveX control were removed.
Users can now open and edit Markdown (.md) files in RAD Studio and view a rendered rich text view of the file in the Preview tab. The markdown rendering should also support tables and other special tags. Similarly, HTML files are rendered as formatted HTML within the IDE with a new native VCL-based viewer. As with Markdown, developers cannot modify HTML in formatted preview, but they can edit both HTML and Markdown in the code editor. Also, in the Project Page Options dialog, they are now able to specify a Markdown file instead of an HTML file as the “Project Page” or Readme that appears automatically.
Enhancements to the platform and tools
RAD Studio 11.2 adds iOS simulator support for the Delphi language with the ability to generate iOS simulator binaries for macOS devices running on ARM-64 (M1 or M2 CPUs). Developers should now also be able to virtually test mobile apps programmed under Delphi on various Apple devices without special hardware.
While the programmers in version 11.1 of RAD Studio still had to rely on the Android API level 30, they can now use the level 31 required by Google Play from November 2022. Embarcadero has also updated the installer to offer the Eclipse Temurin JDK 11 required by the latest Android SDK tools.
Delphi’s Linux toolchain previously used GDB for debugging. In this release of RAD Studio, Embarcadero developers have now switched to LLDB, which they say has resulted in a major quality improvement in both features and Delphi language syntax support. They have also upgraded to version 12 of LLDB and adopted it for the iOS simulator along with the existing use of LLDB for the C++ Win64, Delphi macOS, iOS and Android 64 platforms.
A post on the company’s blog lists all the changes in the new version. If you need more detailed information, you can find it on Embarcadero’s DocWiki.
