Delphi Programming

2007-07-07 ANONYMOUS: I added the "32-bit" to the operating system support statement because:

1) Delphi can't produce EM64T applications for XP/Vista/2003 64 bit. 2) Delphi can't produce IA-64 applications for Windows Server IA64 3) Delphi can't produce Windows Mobile applications.

Thereby there is no full support for all active Windows operating systems.

2007-07-07 RGROSSMAN: Reverted because a) change was anonymous, and b) it will produce 64bit apps by the time this comes out, and c) this is an executive summary, not spec sheet. Please don't ruin this project with quibbling. Until you have written and added a few hundred words, please consider yourself a non-participant.

Poor Delphi community - what became of you. If you think you're helping the Delphi community writing *lies* you're not helping it at all. a) Change was anonymous but stated the truth - feel free to deny it, but that's the truth anyway. Sorry, I am tired to register at every site. b) Delphi will produce 64 bit apps, if everything goes well, in no less than one year and half, end of 2008. Anyway, it won't produce IA-64 apps anyway - and there IA-64 MS operating systems. Better you keep informed about high-end applications and operating systems. c) If this site is used to spread useless info about Delphi, actually damaging it and not helping. If an executicve says "I've read it supports all MS OSes, please write our app to run Windows 2003 64 bit" and you can only reply "Sorry I can't, actually it does not support 64 bit OSes" you make the info provided here useless because they aren't reliable. d) When you will have written as much Delphi code as I did in the past twelve years maybe you consider yourself a real Delphi developer.


I added a section titled "Delphi versus...", as I suspect this will come up when pitching Delphi to a manager: he'll say but what about <technology I read about in some IT business mag>? Adding brief highlights of Delphi's strengths against other languages, IDEs, etc., will help handle such cases. But we can't claim that Delphi is better than everything in every way, because it's not. For example, the Delphi Pascal language is not better than the C# language. But you can argue that in at least some cases, Delphi's Windows-native executables are better than .NET executables.

If this section grows over the next little while, then great. If it gets no love, then someone can delete it in a week or few.

I also added a couple of paras to the features. Feel free to edit. Particularly I want the bit about the 30MB run-time to not sound like a jab at .NET, while still making the point that, hey, you don't have to carry around a damn 30MB run-time.

DougBurbidge 10:02, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

How do you make a decent-looking bullet-points list on this wiki? I made some but they look like crap.User:wpostma

Recommendations[]

  • For all versions of Windows should be, as the anonymous poster stated, clarified as 32 bit. Or 16 & 32? How many sales will be lost by making this a technically correct statement? The next paragraph mentions planned support for x86_64 64 bit.
  • I'd suggest "Interestingly, the underlying architecture " was changed to "The underlying architecture "; Managers reading this document are not likely hackers, and therefore not likely to be interested in technical aspects of the VCL.
  • RE; "it seems that many C programmers actually take pride in writing code that is hard to understand and maintain". Should definitely be removed. Using Delphi will not prevent obfuscation. This is a developer attitude issue, not particular to language features. This statement will not assist management decisions.
  • There should be clearer distinction between .NET and Win32 apps; it seems that the advantages of each are presented without clearly describing the difference between the two. The only place this is mentioned is under C#, VB.Net "Delphi can produce .NET applications as well as "native" Win32 applications, and Delphi source code can be written to be very portable between the two platforms." It would be worthwhile adding a section for this, at the very least a subsection of "Delphi features".

Also,

  • "RGROSSMAN" if you wish to sign your posts on this wiki when you are logged in, use "~~~~".
  • User:wpostma just use an asterisk (*).

Aligma 06:01, 12 July 2007 (UTC)


Under "fast learning curve" I've added a line about Pascal being a language that is actually taught to students.

Arthur Hoornweg 10:43, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

It should be qualified as "i386 32-bit", there have been 32-bits NT4's for MIPS and Sparc afaik. Btw, the roadmap section reads if it was ripped right off the borland site, all corporate speak and intentions. IMHO it should be replaced with the expections of the users (read wikia readers), not the corporate agenda's that are know to change at will. 88.159.74.100 20:17, 23 March 2008 (UTC)


I'm missing a crucial thing (or maybe it's just that it it has been described in far too many words): Delphi is one of the fastest development environments in the world thanks to its blazing fast compiler and its feature-rich and mature visual component library. In Delphi one can develop applications in a fraction of the time that would required in other languages/environments.

Arthur Hoornweg 10:52, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

The compiler is fast, yes, but the Delphi 200x IDE is definitely not the fastes around. 2007 is better than the versions before but still... But one thing is for certain: The turnaround time between coding, compiling, running/testing is faster than with most other IDEs.--80.139.34.235 11:54, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

As for Lazarus: I tried to install it on two different computers (Kubuntu Linux) and could not get it to work. It's always complaining about some free pascal sources when I try to add an event handler. Yes, I could spend some more time trying to find out what the problem is but currently I can't be bothered. Will check again in a few months. --Dummzeuch 11:10, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Couldn't get D2005 and D2006 to work on Vista. Will check again if a new version comes out. 88.159.74.100 20:17, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Some points:


  • 32-bit should be x86 32-bit on Win9x and WInNT. (and maybe 16-bit on Win16 if you count D1). Most notably WinCE (both x86 and ARM, both 32-bit) are NOT supported.
  • Some of the 64-bit comes out when it emerges are really sounding stale. Embarcadero postponed 64-bit again. Sigh. No 64-bit before 2nd half 2011, and maybe not even that, while links on this page from 2007 talk about "soon".
  • 64-bit has gone mainstream meanwhile, with many consumer laptops now having 64bit Windows

88.159.75.231 13:18, August 27, 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure if this article is meant to be unbiased, but it reads like a fan writing desperately about his ailing sport hero. The comparisons between languages, for example, is shockingly biased towards Delphi. Not only this, but none of the claims are actually backed up with any hard facts or references.

One shining example is, "..the fact that C# is advocated as 'easy to learn' is outright funny." Also, I fail to see how scripting languages being "slower than native code" would ever be a "general feature" of a said language.

Now, the above is only a tiny sampling of the article, and if they were the only offensive comments then I would happily overlook it. However, I am struggling to find a single unbiased sentence. But perhaps it is meant to be written in this fashion? In which case, why does this article exist in the first place, but more importantly why on earth is it misleadingly named "The Business Case For Delphi"?

Milesizzo 06:29, August 12, 2011 (UTC)

@Milesizzo: You are completely right. I never understood the purpose of this page either but on the other hand I could not be bothered to ask. I like Delphi and I am using it every day at work. I also think that there are quite a few reasons to prefer it to other programming environments but I rarely let myself get into discussions about this nowadays. It's just not worth it. But maybe I am a special case in so far that nobody tried to force me switching to anything else lately. The last time that happened was >5 years ago and I realized that I was on a dying project and just moved on. --Dummzeuch 10:06, August 13, 2011 (UTC)