Author: Jonas Bilinkevicius

In D6, what's the best or usual way to stream an object to text so that it shows up 
just as it does when you copy an object to the clipboard or when you display a form 
as text?

Answer:

This example shows how to use the built-in VCL component streaming support to 
convert any component into a string and convert that string back into a component.
1   
2   function ComponentToString(Component: TComponent): string;
3   var
4     BinStream: TMemoryStream;
5     StrStream: TStringStream;
6     s: string;
7   begin
8     BinStream := TMemoryStream.Create;
9     try
10      StrStream := TStringStream.Create(s);
11      try
12        BinStream.WriteComponent(Component);
13        BinStream.Seek(0, soFromBeginning);
14        ObjectBinaryToText(BinStream, StrStream);
15        StrStream.Seek(0, soFromBeginning);
16        Result := StrStream.DataString;
17      finally
18        StrStream.Free;
19      end;
20    finally
21      BinStream.Free
22    end;
23  end;
24  
25  function StringToComponent(Value: string): TComponent;
26  var
27    StrStream: TStringStream;
28    BinStream: TMemoryStream;
29  begin
30    StrStream := TStringStream.Create(Value);
31    try
32      BinStream := TMemoryStream.Create;
33      try
34        ObjectTextToBinary(StrStream, BinStream);
35        BinStream.Seek(0, soFromBeginning);
36        Result := BinStream.ReadComponent(nil);
37      finally
38        BinStream.Free;
39      end;
40    finally
41      StrStream.Free;
42    end;
43  end;