Is there any sort of timeline for when encryption will be implemented in the current Delphi version? I have a project that has a requirement for it, and I really really really do not want to recode to .net if possible. Thanks.
I can't really be sure right now. The code for encrypting is working (both xls and xlsx) and it is tested because it comes form the code for FlexCel .net, but I need to implement a lot of crypto functions (like SHA1, etc) which aren't in delphi and we can't rely on third part encryption utils either. All that code is isolated into an "encryption factory", so what we need to do is code that. One quicker solution could be to provide some encryption factory using some third party, maybe lockbox, I don't know. But in order to install this you would have to install the crypto lib first, and I don't want to add dependencies.
The other idea I had this week could be to use the MS Crypto API, it would work in windows only (not osx), but it might be the best solution at this moment. But I haven't got time to explore it yet since we are very very busy right now finishing the rendring engine for an imminent 5.5 release. I plan we will be able to ship 5.5 next week, and after that encryption is next in line. But I can't really give an estimate of how long it would take, even when it should't be more than a couple of weeks if things go smooth. If it is ok to you, I can give you an update 2 weeks from now, when things should be more clear.
Regards,
Adrian.
Thanks greatly for the response. I'm definately looking forward to 5.5, and I think I can hang on another month or 2 if it means avoiding moving even part of the work to .net. In my case a Win only solution would work, but I certainly understand that you would rather perfect a cross platform solution instead of making the half step.