use web browser component or not?
lazarus / 38-Networking and Web Programming

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krolikbest · 2021-04-09 19:09

I am developing a project whose task is to read information from
sensors. The application works on Raspberry Pi and should be made in
two falvours:
1. works without screen/monitor, then one of the application threads
is a simple httpserver whose task is to present the read data in the
remote browser. There is (well, will be soon) also some admin panel
that allows  remote control of the application
2. works with touch screen, then i would like to use form and some web
browser component in order to avoid building a regular form with
buttons, grids, edits etc.  In the web browser element I could display
exactly the same pages as in soulution 1.
So, in the second solution I have perhaps such options:
- thtmlViewer
- fpCef3
- don't use any visual form; just start default browser in RPi with
URI on startup.
It seems to me that last fits my needs but would like to ask if is it
worth to use htmlViewer or fpCef3 or maybe is there something better
regarding web browser component?

Regards,

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devEric69 · 2021-04-09 19:54

Hello,

If the web interface doesn't have to be too complicated (for example,
if it doesn't have to handle a CRUD data-grid), then I would launch
the browser registered and installed by default in the RasbPi (simple
HTML pages creation with Lazarus, in fact). THtmlViewer supports HTML
framesets: I've heard that it's "old-fashioned", but I like them. I
don't know neither fpCef3, nor other browser solutions written in
Lazarus like those.

Afterwards, if things get more complicated, it's possible to use:
- fpWeb (allows to emulate Php with Lazarus: web server side code)
- Pas2JS (allows to emulate Javascript with Lazarus: web client side
code)

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egsuh · 2021-04-10 01:15

Use general browsers. OpenURL will do everything. Htmlviewer does not
support HTML5 fully.

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salvadordf · 2021-04-24 12:53

You can use CEF4Delphi with Lazarus in a Raspberry Pi to embed a
Chromium based browser to your application.

See this post :
https://forum.lazarus.freepascal.org/index.php/topic,41272.msg389838.h
tml#msg389838

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trev · 2021-04-24 23:52

I always launch the user's preferred/default web browser with
OpenURL() unless there's a good reason not to do so. It's more user-
centric.