Turbo Delphi IDE (Integrated Development Environment)
Like most other development tools, Delphi IDE comprises a number of sections - (dockable) panels.The default IDE desktop layout includes some of the most commonly used tools. You can use the View menu to display or hide certain tools. You can also customize and save the desktop layouts that work best for you. Here are the parts, areas of the IDE, as outlined by the screen shot:
Ok, most of the names mean nothing for the moment :)
- Menus and Toolbars
- Code Editor, Form Designer, Welcome Page
- Structure View
- Object Inspector
- Project Manager, Model View, Data Explorer
- Tool Palette
For example: take a look at section marked with 2. This largest part of the IDE is where you will be writing programming code("Code Editor"), designing your application windows /forms ("Form Designer"), open existing projects, read programming blogs, etc. ("Welcome page").
Delphi IDE is "work sensitive" - it will display different sections depending on your current work.
Delphi IDE Menus and Toolbars
The title bar of the IDE window contains the name of the current project (you'll see in some of the future chapters what exactly is a Delphi project). The menu bar includes a dozen drop-down menus - we'll explain many of the options in these menus later through this course.The toolbar provides a number of shortcuts to most frequently used operations and commands - such as running a project, or adding a new form to a project. To find out what particular button does, point your mouse "over" the button and wait for the tooltip. As you can see from the tooltip, for example, point to "Open Project", many toolbuttons have keyboard shortcuts ("Ctrl+F11").
While you have no projects opened in the IDE, the main part of the screen goes to the "Welcome page"...
