13.3 Using string tables.

String tables can be used to store and retrieve large collections of strings in your application.

A string table looks as follows:

STRINGTABLE { 1, "hello World !"
              2, "hello world again !"
              3, "last hello world !" }

You can compile this (we assume the file is called tests.rc) as follows:

windres -i tests.rc -o tests.res

And this is the way to retrieve the strings from your program:

program tests;

{$mode objfpc}

Uses Windows;

{$R *.res}

  Function LoadResourceString (Index : longint): Shortstring;
  begin
    SetLength(Result,LoadString(FindResource(0,Nil,RT_STRING),
                                Index,
                                @Result[1],
                                SizeOf(Result))
             )
  end;

Var
    I: longint;

begin
  For i:=1 to 3 do
    Writeln(LoadResourceString(I));
end.

The call to FindResource searches for the stringtable in the compiled-in resources. The LoadString function then reads the string with index i out of the table, and puts it in a buffer, which can then be used. Both calls are in the windows unit.