When I write a component I like to add an "About" property that displays an info dialog box diplaying the component version number and a brief description. In Delphi 5 I achieved this by using a Property Editor and Registering it within the component. Converting to Delphi 6 gave me a problem. Firstly the unit "dsgnintf" is no longer part of Delphi and secondly the supplied replacments "DesignIntf" and "DesignEditors" compile to a non-distributable EXE file. ("proxies.dcu" is part of the design-time non-distributable package).

What now ?

Surfing the web came up with solutions of creating BOTH run-time and design-time units. Whilst this is fine for a serious or complicated property editor, I did not wish to go these lengths for a simple about property.

The solution I have now adopted does the trick for me and is implemented as follows ..

Declare a property of boolean.
Display the info dialog box when set to true. (set to false after display)

This allows double clicking the false/true value (or selecting true) at design time, and if needed can be set at run-time by

MyComponent.About := true;

Stripped down skeleton example ....

interface
uses Dialogs;

type
  TLogFile = class(TComponent)
  private
    { Private declarations }
    ...
    FAbout : boolean;
    ...
    ...
    procedure SetAbout(Value : boolean);
    ...
  protected
    { Protected declarations }
    ...
  public
    { Public declarations }
    ...  
  published
    { Published declarations }
    ...
    property About : boolean read FAbout write SetAbout;
    ...
  end;


implementation


procedure TLogFile.SetAbout(Value : boolean);
const CrLf = #13#10;
var msg : string;
begin
  if Value then begin
    // Display your dialog message here
    msg := 'TLogFile v1.2' + CrLf  + CrLf  +
           'ASCII Log File Component.' + CrLf  +
           'Logs to EXEPATH/.log' + CrLf  +
           'Automatically Truncates and moves to Archive' + CrLf  +
           'Log File (Extention .olg) after MaxLogSize.' + CrLf  +
           '(32 bit version - DELPHI VI)' + CrLf  + CrLf  +
           'Copyright © 2002 Mike Heydon';
    MessageDlg(msg, mtInformation, [mbOK], 0);
  end;

  FAbout := false;
end;