In the case of RAM usage, I had to reduce the amount of RAM dedicated to the GPU from 128Mb to 64MB. Indeed, I hit both issues even with the Model B’s 512Mb RAM. Common problems encountered seem to be caused by running out of memory, or card storage space during the build process. Whilst researching this I have found that others have already attempted this with varying degrees of success.
Free Pascal additionally requires the GNU build tools and fortunately these are already installed in Raspbian, so I only had to add Subversion before I could attempt to use my usual build process on the Pi with a few of the options tweaked for ARM output: sudo apt-get install subversion So I started again with a fresh Raspbian SD card, but this time, I only installed FPC from the repository. This process requires a seed compiler, which in this case, can easily be supplied from the default repository. On my main Kubuntu system, I habitually build Free Pascal and Lazarus from source, using Subversion to obtain the latest changes. However, as with Debian, the versions of the available packages are a little behind the current releases. From the command-line though, ‘fpc’ will invoke the compiler and ‘lazarus’ the GTK2 based IDE. The only snag from a visibility point of view is that there is no automatic integration of Lazarus into the LXDE menu.
The good news is that the standard Debian packaging commands worked a treat: sudo apt-get update After spending a little while getting to grips with Raspbian, I was able to progress to the business of testing Free Pascal. I have one of the new Raspberry Pi Model B’s that has 512Mb of RAM and I have been using it with the current Raspbian image ( ). Free Pascal and Lazarus packages are available on Debian, so I wanted to see if they had successfully transferred to Raspbian in a usable form. The official operating system for the Pi is called Raspbian which, as it’s name suggests, is a derivative of Debian Linux.
As a Pascal advocate, I would love to see a modern Pascal compiler made widely available on a platform like this. The Pi is a minimal, low cost, ARM based computer, designed primarily for educational uses.
I have been investigating the use of Free Pascal and Lazarus on the Raspberry Pi.