Author: Tomas Rutkauskas

I am trying to work out how to store approximately 1000 lines of text (3 columns, 
30 chars each) inside an application. I do not want to have any .INI entries and 
would prefer not to use an external file.

Answer:

You can start with one and embed it into a resource. Let's assume you have the data 
in a normal textfile. Make a resource script file (filedata.rc) with a line like

FILEDATA RCDATA filedata.txt

Add this RC file to your Delphi 5 project group. This automatically gets you a $R 
line for it in the project DPR file and the resource is compiled for you when you 
build the project. Now, how to get at the data at runtime? Each line is a fixed 
length of 90 characters. So the file could be represented as an array of records of 
this type:

1   type
2     TFileData = packed record
3       col1, col2, col3: array[1..30] of Char;
4       crlf: array[1..2] of Char;
5     end;
6     PFileData = ^TFileData;
7   
8   Let's use a class to regulate access to the data. I assume you only need to read 
9   it, so there is no need to copy it from the resource.
10  
11  type
12    TDatahandler = class
13    private
14      FData: TList;
15      FResHandle: THandle;
16      function GetRecord(index: Integer): TFileData;
17      procedure GetRecordCount: Integer;
18      procedure InitDatalist;
19    public
20      constructor Create;
21      destructor Destroy; override;
22      property Records[index: Integer]: TFileData read GetRecord;
23      property Recordcount: Integer read GetRecordcount;
24    end;
25  
26  implementation
27  
28  constructor TDatahandler.Create;
29  begin
30    inherited;
31    FData := TList.Create;
32    InitDatalist;
33  end;
34  
35  destructor TDatahandler.Destroy;
36  begin
37    Fdata.Free;
38    if FResHandle <> 0 then
39    begin
40      UnlockResource(FResHandle);
41      FreeResource(FResHandle);
42    end;
43    inherited;
44  end;
45  
46  function TDatahandler.GetRecord(index: Integer): TFileData;
47  begin
48    Result := PFileData(FData[i])^;
49  end;
50  
51  procedure TDatahandler.GetRecordCount: Integer;
52  begin
53    Result := FData.Count;
54  end;
55  
56  procedure TDatahandler.InitDatalist;
57  var
58    dHandle: THandle;
59    pData: PFileData;
60    numRecords, i: Integer;
61  begin
62    pData := nil;
63    dHandle := FindResource(hInstance, '
64    if dHandle <> 0 then
65    begin
66      numRecord := SizeofResource(hInstance, dHandle) div Sizeof(TFiledata);
67      FResHandle := LoadResource(hInstance, dHandle);
68      if FResHandle <> 0 then
69      begin
70        pData := LockResource(dHandle);
71        if pData <> nil then
72        begin
73          FData.Capacity := NumRecords;
74          for i := 1 to Numrecords do
75          begin
76            FData.Add(pData);
77            Inc(pData);
78          end;
79        end
80        else
81          raise Exception.Create('Lock failed');
82      end
83      else
84        raise Exception.Create('Load failed');
85    end
86    else
87      raise Exception.Create('Resource not found');
88  end;


You can add a method to sort the FData list, for example, or a filter method that would populate another TList with pointer to records that match a set of criteria.