RLINK32: Error opening file "...\Data.DFM". Occurs the first time I build a project after opening Delphi

I get this error the first time I build/compile a particular project after opening Delphi (D6 Pro). Subsequent builds do not开发者_运维百科 give the error.

I have the same issue, it was fixed by replacing {$R *.dfm} directive in the problem unit (which was not found by Delphi during first compilation) by more specific clause {$R fMain.dfm}.

The error can be caused by an exception being raised in a design component on the form. If the component is running some initialisation code which raises an exception this error will be produced. This can be shown by adding

raise Exception.CreateFmt('Test', []);

into the code of the component. Note that in D6 Pro this does not produce 'Test' in the error message. The underlying exception message is not displayed.

This is probably caused by a control that raises an exception during its creation (when the form is loaded).

How I solved this (this case was specific for me, but a very similar solution may apply to you):

First I loaded the 'broken' unit into the IDE. It didn't caused an error until I pressed F12 to see the form. The error message raised by the IDE was not very helpful, but after changing the {$R *.dfm} to {$R MainForm.dfm}, the error message changed to something more specific. More exactly, in the error report, one line was of special interest:

{MyControls_XE.bpl} StrGrdBase.TBaseStrGrid.FixCursor (Line 569, "StrGrdBase.pas" + 9) + $8

I navigated to that line and I have seen that in some conditions I was trying to set focus on the second row, while the grid had only one row.

I also got the same error on Deplhi 2010, the problem was there was a component which has not been installed in IDE, when I changed the component to the one that exists it is worked as a charm.

I've found an additional reason for this behaviour: DFM files are rejected if a property is placed below any child objects owned by the main object. In other words, a TButton object should be defined below the last property of the TPanel object that the button is placed on. Tested with D2010, compiling with bcc32