Delphi - Compiler Directives multi lines effects selected IDE error line

Question

I'm wondering why if the compiler directives was typed on multi lines will effects the selected IDE error line.

For example:

{$SETPEFlAGS IMAGE_FILE_DEBUG_STRIPPED or
 IMAGE_FILE_LINE_NUMS_STRIPPED or
 IMAGE_FILE_LOCAL_SYMS_STRIPPED or
 IMAGE_FILE_RELOCS_STRIPPED}

.....

procedure Foo();
begin
  WriteLn('1');
  WWriteLn('2');
  WriteLn('3');
  WriteLn('4');
  WriteLn('5');
end; 

IDE Error

[dcc32 Error] Crypter.dpr(29): E2003 Undeclared identifier: 'WWriteLn'

Inside the source code the selected line is WriteLn('5'); not WWriteLn('2');

But if the compiler directives was typed on this way (one line) :

{$SETPEFlAGS IMAGE_FILE_DEBUG_STRIPPED or IMAGE_FILE_LINE_NUMS_STRIPPED or IMAGE_FILE_LOCAL_SYMS_STRIPPED or IMAGE_FILE_RELOCS_STRIPPED}

Will fix the issue!.

Answer 1

If things are as you say, then this is a defect in the IDE. Report the issue as a bug to Quality Portal.

It's easy to work around the issue. Simply don't use multi-line directives. In this case you can extract the flag into a separate constant and refer to it in the directive.

const
  PEFlags = IMAGE_FILE_DEBUG_STRIPPED or
    IMAGE_FILE_LINE_NUMS_STRIPPED or
    IMAGE_FILE_LOCAL_SYMS_STRIPPED or
    IMAGE_FILE_RELOCS_STRIPPED;

{$SETPEFlAGS PEFlags}

---

The reason I hesitate in the first paragraph is that what you describe would also occur if the linefeeds were incorrect. If your linefeeds are not CR+LF then the IDE gets confused about line numbers. So, it's worth checking that your linefeeds are CR+LF. You could simply re-type the code and the linefeeds will be correct. Typically you get mixed up linefeeds when you paste from another source.