Re: [Podofo-users] I have question to helloworldexample program, when I run it.

[Craig R. <cr...@po...>]

This the LAST email I will reply to that was sent directly to me. Please
reply only by the email list. I will ignore any further email from you
that you do not send via the podofo-users mailing list.

has...@ho... wrote:

>    So......do you mean that I've built the PoDoFo successfully?

Given that you did not report any errors in the build process, and you
have produced a DLL, then it does seem like PoDoFo was built successfully.

>    Fellow your meaning,the error showed just now is a compatible
> question between different versions of PoDoFo, isn't it?

That is correct.

>    You mean that the example cpp is no use under my current
> situation,right?

The example program would need a few changes to compile with PoDoFo
pre-0.5.0 . That does not mean that it is of no use (it still shows you
roughly how PoDoFo is used), just that it's not exactly right for PoDoFo
pre-0.5.0 and will not actually compile. Perhaps you might learn
something from updating it to work with PoDoFo pre-0.5.0 using the
information that Dom provided in his reply.

When I get time I will try to update the example and include it in the
podofo subversion tree. I can't do that right now, though.

>    Then,what can I do when I start my way to play with PoDoFo0.5.0? On
> which class or function should I put my eye? ( In fact I wanna know how
> to finish a Helloworld. )

As both Dom and I have said, you should read the test programs and the
tools shipped with PoDoFo to get an idea of how to use it. The PoDoFo
documentation will also be useful.

Unfortunately the on-line documentation is only for 0.4.0 (because 0.5.0
is not released yet) and it is not easy to generate the documentation on
Windows. You might be better off just reading the comments in the header
files, since those are used to create the HTML documentation.

>    Can user download newest document of the PoDoFo0.5.0 or must user
> online check?

I assume you are asking about a user of your program. If so, a user of
your program does not need to install PoDoFo at all. You must ship the
PoDoFo DLL with your program (if using the DLL version) or statically
link PoDoFo into your program. Except for a note in your license or
documentation, the user does not even need to know your program uses
PoDoFo at all, since you've already provided the DLL file required for
runtime use. Remember the example directory layout I sent you earlier?
That's how it looks, though if you've built PoDoFo as a DLL you must
include the podofo dll as well as the DLLs it depends on.

Have a look at some of the other programs on your computer. Some of them
will have DLL files like iconv.dll, zlib.dll, libjpeg.dll, etc in the
same directory as the program executable. The program uses these DLLs
like your program will use PoDoFo. You can use the excellent Dependency
Walker tool to examine what DLLs a program uses and where it finds them.

I extremely strongly suggest that you go and read some general
information about Windows programming, using libraries and DLLs, and
packaging programs for Windows. None of the things I've explained is
specific to PoDoFo, and I honestly just don't have time to write
detailed tutorials for you in all the basics of writing and distributing
programs on Windows. Especially if I have to repeat and re-phrase the
information several times. It's not your fault - after all, English
isn't your first language so technical conversations in English will be
difficult - and you're new to all this stuff. However, that doesn't
change the fact that it takes me a while to write, time I could be
spending on my job, my uni work, or working on improving PoDoFo. I'm
happy to answer specific questions, even if they're not exactly related
to PoDoFo, but I can not afford to explain everything about using and
distributing libraries on Windows.

There are lots of good books on basic Windows programming, and a lot of
tutorials on the web too. This MSDN section might also be useful, though
some of the information may be a bit too advanced for your current needs
and of course much of it refers to MSVC++ not MinGW:

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/1ez7dh12(VS.80).aspx

[I certainly won  feel inclined to help much more if you won't even
reply via the podofo-users email list so everybody can benefit from the
conversation. Especially when I've asked you to do this several times.]

--
Craig Ringer