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Is Linux Ready For Delphi? -- Delphi R&D Answers
Chrismo writes: "Danny Thorpe, Sr. R&D Engineer at Borland, has written a great article addressing "some of the commonly expressed fears, misconceptions, and even misplaced euphoria" heard from the Delphi community since the announcement of their move to support Linux with their development tools."
When do those pascal-based languages finally die? I hate pascal since they wanted us to learn it at school... :) Long live c/c++! btw, isn't the battle between kde and gnome enough? do we need a third environment?
Great! Having Delphi for Linux will introduce more folks who program/use Delphi to produce apps for Linux. More talented folks entering the Linux camp! Anything that creates more apps for Linux should be welcome news. Hopefully, the R&D division will get it right. Sounds promising, anyway.
"First things first, but not necessarily in that order."
- Doctor Who
Similarly, it is up to the maturity of a company that will be the primary deciding factor of whether it will sink or swim when the new wave of Linux desktops, browsers and, yes, users, strike. Time is running short for compaines like Delphi.
Want to work at Transmeta? Hedgefund.net? Priceline?
Can your IM do this?
I say way to go Borland/Inpris/Corel/...
Actually, I think that a rad tool for Linux is great. And Borlands got the background to be really benificial to the GNU/Linux Community. Easily portability between GNU/Linux+X and Windows means that more commercial software companies will port their software to Linux.
Even if those of us that support the open source model don't use it. The more RAD development tools we have, the better the community will be.
I program mainly in C/C++, but for a quick and dirty program, I still switch back to Pascal.
I'm sure I'll get flamed for this, but that's my $0.02
'nuff said
On Win32 Delphi uses COM to a great extent. How will that translate to Linux? Will they port COM to Linux? Will they jump to Corba? Will they play nice with Gnome/KDE?
Thanks.
I'm still working on a clever footer.
> Interesting. If this is "good news" you're admitting gcc sucks and the Open Source model produces a product so inferior that people would gladly pay money for something else.
If what you are saying is that "people would gladly pay money for anything else" then no. if what you are saying is "people would gladly pay money for something really good" then yes. And that doesn't imply that gcc must suck.
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
Don't step.
As a shareholder of Inprise/Borland (INPR), I know you're incorrect when you say:
You mean products like Delphi, which is made by Borland (now owned by Correl, a merge resulting in renaming them Inprise).
Borland was renamed Delphi by it's last CEO, a total idiot who didn't understand excellence and though paying millions to rebrand a quality brand was a good investment. Then the software side was named back to Borland (e.g. borland.com) when he got handed his platinum parachute. Finally, Corel came along and did a buy out, which should be finalized one of these days.
I'm no great fan of Delphi, but a lot of people like it, so one looks forward to Delphi ports over to Linux from Delphi/Win. C++ Builder is what we use here, and we're thrilled by the port to Linux - this news doubled the number of people where I work who wanted to code for Linux.
Will in Seattle
For those of you complaining of lack of "News for Nerds" and "Stuff that matters." you have no farther to look than here.
Is the large amount of overhead. But allegedly, Microsoft is looking to buy out Corel/Borland. George Dunham, Microsoft spokesman, states that buying out Borland/Corel will continue to fulfill MS's new strategy.
The story is here
Is that Delphi being available for Linux might actually spur the sales of their Windows product quite a bit.
At this point, more savvy IT departments are aware of Linux, but the common perception is that "it's not ready yet" (or is it "we're not ready yet"?). But, even out on the horizon, the existence of alternative environments has to cast some doubt on the typical Windows Standard Environment policy in place at most shops.
So, when a large internal RAD project comes down the pipe, even if 100% of the clients are currently Windows systems, Delphi may look like a better choice than Visual Basic simply because Borland is willing to consider popular non-Windows platforms. It at least gives you long term options -- in 2002, you'd hate to be the person to tell the CIO that Linux on the desktop is impossible because your department has just completed two million dollars of VB development -- a much worse problem than some poorly converted DOC files.
I'd expect there will be quite a few "We get along fine with gcc and vi, thank you." posts, but keep in mind this move isn't really about you. It's about the people on the S curve the author talked about (who probably care as much about you as you care about them), and my guess that in the short term, it's really about providing a more attractive product to their Windows customers.
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
I am VB programmer... despite the bad publicity the language gets, I was born and raised on GW-Basic, and then moved to VB way back in the old Win16 days. Now, I'm doing more and more (non-programming) work in Linux, but I can't start developing for it because I am too lazy to learn C++ when I can do a bloody good job in VB.
I think that it's great that Delphi(Object Pascal) is being ported to Linux -- how about an open-source version of a basic language so folks like me can start developing? With an open source Object Basic tool I would start porting my programs like crazy -- as would a million other VB programmers.
Before dismissing me completely, just consider that not everyone has to be a "programmer" to generate a lot of decent results in an Object Basic type langauge.
-rt-
** Evil Canadians are taking over the world. Learn about the conspiracy
That's not true. Some people who advocate Linux do so because it is free software, and would only advocate free software, and consider non-free software to be coercive and immoral. Danny Thorpe clearly disagrees with this view (as do most Linux users, probably) but that doesn't mean that its proponents are hypocrites.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
As a long-time Linux user, and a recent religious convert to the ways of Delphi (having, wrongly, abandoned my old faithful Turbo Pascal skills when Windows 3.0 came along in favor of C/C++, which was a *HUGE* mistake because I'd written about 3 million lines of Turbo Pascal code during the late 80's/early 90's), I am totally ready for Linux Delphi.
Delphi rocks, as a RAD tool. There really isn't much out there for Windows that can compare - Delphi *ACTUALLY* made Windows programming fun again - specifically the extremely well-designed VCL.
Prior to Delphi, Windows suffered the same fundamental problem that Linux currently does, at least for me anyway, which is that there are a large number of API's, and multiple different ways of doing things, from a developer standpoint.
The Delphi VCL changed all of that for me as a developer who cares about getting things done fast, as rock solid as possible - it encapsulates a lot of the dreck that is the Windows GUI API, and makes it productive.
Now, I'm not saying that Linux is the same - certainly, the GNOME/KDE efforts are very well designed projects, but there is still a last-step of organization that is required to make RAD a reality for those GUI environments, and I sincerely hope that Delphi can bring that into the Linux mix. Either way, Linux will still be a great platform to deploy apps on, and I use it every day regardless - its just that the Delphi way of doing RAD is going to make for a *huge* shift in developer focus away from such mundane things as library dependence, text-based GUI design, towards rapid application development.
And, since Linux needs apps, rapid app development can only be a good thing.
When I can use Delphi to build apps on Linux, I will ditch whatever last vestiges of control Microsofts operating systems have over my current development environment/requirements, and happily be a full-time Linux developer. Right now, I'm *forced* to use Windows as a client software deployment platform, because Delphi makes Windows programming so damned fast...
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Your troll/question was clearly answered in the article. Its all about choice. Linux is about choice. The freedom to do it your way. The freedom to choose your tools, your GUI or no GUI, etc. Scroll down to:
"Why would anyone pay money for development tools for a "free software" OS like Linux?"
On first blush, the notion of taking a commercial product like Delphi to the so-called "free software" Linux platform sounds crazy. Why would anyone pay money for Linux development tools when Linux ships with a free C compiler built-in?
Answer: Quality, Features, Support, and most of all: Choice. Linux is about choice. Any Linux advocate who says Delphi is not welcome in the Linux space is a hypocrite.
(emphasis mine.)
This is a must read for all Linux zealots. I tried to say something along these lines in a post to yesterdays Delphi article, but I did not put the same thought and effort into it as this guy did.
This article is important for Linux freaks to read because this is how the rest of the world outside of the community looks at Linux. They community has trouble understanding that the world doesn't care about open/closed, MS/RH, or any other opposed forces. If you want Linux to be big, this article shows the path to it being a huge success with the other 99.9997% of the world.
- I like pudding.
Would you agree with this? IMHO, Linux is very innovative - how else could you account for its success? GNOME, KDE, Enlightenment, Apache + JServ, etc. Even the Open Source concept (while not directly accreditable to Linux), is different from traditional closed source idealogy.
NT = No Text
$foo=~s/Linux/Windows/
Success is not a measure of innovation by any means. There are certainly some innovative things about linux, and the community behind it. But to call Linux on the whole "innovative" is going a bit far. "Cool", "useful", "Good", and "Robust" are better adjectives.
Delphi for Linux will be good for business, because it gives business more choice. One of our major products is software applications written in Delphi, which means our customers have to use Windows NT. Once we have Delphi available for Linux, we'll be able to port these applications to Linux, and our customers would have a choice of Windows NT or Linux.
Borland/Inprise say in the article that they would be hitching a ride on the Linux growth curve to make some money. What they haven't mentioned is the effect of a Delphi for Linux release on that growth curve. Having a product of the good reputation of Delphi released for Linux will mean that more businesses will be able to choose Linux where Windows NT was the only choice before. This will help Linux take market share from Windows NT. This effect is what will help Delphi for Linux become a major player in the market of Linux software development, and as a result, the Borland/Inprise management will be rewarded for their decision.
--
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
(I program in Delphi, and I've been following Kylix pretty closely)
On Win32, Delphi supports COM to a great extent, put it is not overly dependant on it - apart from MIDAS (more later on MIDAS)
Borland have publicly stated that Delphi will not support COM on Linux. Delphi will continue to support Interfaces which (under Win32) are reasonably closely tied to COM (at least everything that supports IUnknown is).
Delphi supports CORBA on Win32 already, so yes, it will under Linux, too.
It will "play nice" with GNOME/KDE, but I believe that it is going to use Qt for its native toolkit. (That is from assorted developer briefings I've come across)
MIDAS is Borland's three-tiered data access technology. I'm programming with it at the moment (in Delphi), and it's pretty nice. It does depend on COM under Delphi, though - but there is a Java implementation, and you can run it over sockets, so I guess a Linux version won't be too hard.
I look forward to seeing what they are going to use for the actual DB access under Linux. Delphi comes with something called the BDE, which supports access to lots of databases - kind of like ODBC, but Borland has stated that developement of that has stopped. Delphi 5 (the latest version) introduced a number of Non-BDE data access components (which have previously been supplied only by third parties).
And there are other ways to account for Linux' success other than innovation. Linux has given a relatively powerful and stable environment to the low end user, and despite what the FSF may say, many users are more attracted to the "free beer" than the "free speech". In my case, I think that the "free speech" is cool and brings a lot to the table, but I originally became a Linux user because I could get it for free without violating any license agreements or IP laws.
One could make the case that open source development is innovative, but let's be very honest. OS did a lot before Linus came up with this project. And someday, there will be a new darling of the open source world.
Lots of things succeed without being innovative. In fact, many times, you don't want to be on the "bleeding edge", but able to take advantage of new developments when they do in fact pan out. Doing something well is often better than doing it first.
"You can never have too many elephants on your team."
I've used VB too, think rather highly of it, and would be using it right now if it was free (beer and speech) and worked on unix and macs.
As it's not, I've been learning Python. It's about as close as you are going to get to Basic. Go out and jump on it. I also recommend wxPython, a graphics system for it.
-Jeff
Absolutely no disrespect for Insight's efforts with Delphi.
One can get an awful lot done using PERL and GTK+-bindings. This combined with UI-designer programs like Glade is pretty powerful. After some practice I can fire up a working prototype of an application in about an hour. Perl and friends is already installed on most recent Linux systems.
There needs to be a place besides slashdot for this stuff. It's funny, but the furthest off topic I've seen yet on /.. Dude, you need to put your creative energy to work someplace. You're wasting it trolling here. Someone needs to start a slash style creative writing page. That could actually be pretty cool.
Thats your assignment for tomorrow class...
P.S. It's hard to pick your favorite episode, isn't it?
- I like pudding.
A lot of people have said that this was a really 'articulate' article.. I thought it was pretty condescending. It filled me with a definite sense of 'well, duh.' I think Danny does an outstanding job of stating the blatantly obvious - which makes me really, really wonder why so many people are impressed with that pseudo-rant.
;)
Are we really so used to poor grammar and hot grits that we'll take that kind of shit from a career money-hacker and like it?
I hope not. Linux might need applications, but I hesitate to agree that Yet Another "Rapid Application" tool is the proper panacea to engender them. I'd rather have 'lots of educated programmers.'
Mebbe I'm wrong.
--
blue
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
Anything that makes it easier to port software across platforms has to be a good thing. One of the greatest things that Windows has going for it, is its appeal to GUI programmers to build stuff for it. If we can convince the GUI programmers that they can also write for Linux, we will get more user-friendly widgets.
The Open Source software movement seems to build really great tools for the people that programmed them; however it's appeal to the less Linux literate has much to be desired. Borland (and other GUI programmers) has done a lot of research in its users. IMO something that Linux really needs.
Thanks.
No sooner do I make the transition from Windows to Linux then my favourite development tool follows me. There is a god after all.
Seriously, Delphi is a great product and will really speed the development of applications for Linux. Think of the simplicity of Visual Basic with the power and flexibility of C++ and you are somewhere close.
But the real advantage is the great environment that Delphi provides for GUI design work. Linux applications often seem to lack polish in the user interface. I am sure that this is in part due to developers not wanting to spend loads of time tweaking convoluted front-end code.
This is why Linux needs a good visual IDE. It's extremely difficult and time consuming to design a decent user interface without one.
In Delphi, you can build, compile and test a GUI for your application without even touching the keyboard. You rarely need to consult any documentation because most features are just a click away. All the chores of programming are basically handled for you, although you can still dive down into the nitty gritty if you feel the need. It's a nicely designed environment that helps you out with all the tedious tasks but doesn't restrict you in any way.
Basically, the sooner I can start coding with Delphi/Kylix on Linux, the better.
Personally I hated a bit the way he put the things. Not because I cannot stand what he calls a "critical point of view" but because his ideas, apparently correct, hid something that I don't like.
Wouldn't it be cool if the VCL core packages were distributed with the OS? No it wouldn't. This only means that we would be somewhat forced to use the VCL for any application we have. And unless it's released under GPL I wouldn't agree with this. Why do you think Microsoft didn't agree to include those packages on its own OS ? Because it would have ment to give Borland the control over a part of their OS. Of course, they weren't that stupid. Should we be instead ?
As a possible solution : unless they release the packages under GPL (or some license that would not allow them to control the OS) they should stick with the installation kit solution
Another question : what are they going to do about the non-ANSI extensions in the BCB compiler (__property and so on) ? I agree they are actually extremely useful, but they are not ANSI. If we are going to use them, at least let's standardize them.
Third question : what about Qt - on which is based KDE ? Will the VCL based on that ? Will it try to replace it ? In what conditions ?
Ok. I asked a bunch of questions that may seem that I see this article and the whole Delphi story aas an evil thing. I don't. I worked for a couple of years with BCB/Delphi and I consider them the best RAD tools available now. Still, I wouldn't like Borland to become something it always wanted to be : some sort of Microsoft. Not because I have something with them - it's just the idea of monopoly that I don't consider viable.
We're hearing about Delphi a lot, but everyone here is clamoring BIG TIME for C++ Builder. They're all crazy for it. I heard a while back that it was up and running on Linux... When will we get big news about that?
I'm all for Delphi, but we have a project that we're working on in MSVC6 that we will have to port to Linux sometime this year, and porting to to Borland is an interim decision that would, in theory, make the Linux port much easier (if the compiler is upwards of 95% compatible between Linux and Win32).
ZOMG I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS ON MACINTOSH VERSUS WINDOWS, VI VERSUS EMACS, AND HOW YOU'RE NOT A DORK
come on people, South Park is funny! This dude didn't deserve that
... the GUI tools for Linux are as easy to use as they are for Delphi/Win.
If Delphi/Linux requires a shift of paradigm in the way the GUI stuff works/integrates with code, I won't mind that so much - as long as I get the same sort of environment.
Porting most of my apps from Windows to Linux would be *good*, but it wouldn't disappoint me if I wasn't able to do this as a result of some design decision Borland/Inprise had to make in order to make Delphi/Linux work well, such as a difference in the way the various GUI toolkit/libs work compared to Win32 API's...
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
There is a place for this stuff...The Onion.
Oh my god!!! What the hell is that icon?? Why does he have a cell phone and a brief case?!
*sigh* If only Tom would write like this guy. There may be some snippets of the article that I don't agree with, but I must commend him on the tone of his article. He didn't pander, nor did he attack. He actually has generated a decent debate.
When Tom Christiansen speaks the end result is usually a pissing contest. Tom's virtriolic diatribes are amusing at times, but I suspect that most people ignore him. As a matter of fact, I haven't seen many posts by Tom in quite some time. I wonder if even he is tired of flaming and responding to flames.
VCL ships with the source code. So does Qt. Neither is "free as in speech."
If you're gonna copy from The Onion word for word, you could at least have the decency to give them credit.
Check out DRM-free movies at http://www.bside.com
A big point to remember here is that Borland has had a long and rich history of bad business management. The reason the company still exists today within that 10% growth curve Danny was talking about is that their development tools are extrordinary! They far exceed the MS tools as far as ease of use and grasp of good technology. I've never heard of a developer using Borland tools going to Visual Basic or somesuch because they liked it better. You notice that Danny is Senior R&D, this means you weren't getting a mouthfull or "synergy" in that article, and reguardless of how the business is carried out, eventually you will end up with a fantastic, multi-language, GUI, X application developing, enterprise grade package that will allow all those people born to computers after the command line to produce quality applications for Linux... in droves of thousands! The number one complaint I hear about Linux is, "It doesn't have all of the applications I need." Here and now, Borland and Corel are going to solve that. I say, Welcome back Borland! -Effendi
-Effendi
This is a good thing though. Firstly, I've got a thing for Wirthian languages and Borland has been keeping the flame going for quite a while. I hope they continue to do so. Pascal is wonderful.
Second, competition is good. VisualAge for Java and Delphi fill an important void in the application development market. No matter how badass a hacker you are, there are a ton of people who spend a ton of money not to be. We need to continue to embrace those people. There are movements to build similar products out of Python and then there is squeak and a good solid Delphi will spur development and provide a ready and working solution for RAD.
Lastly, and perhaps one of the more important reasons is that Delphi has been deployed. There are businesses with substantial amounts of Delphi code in production and they are tied to Windows until there is a Delphi somewhere else. This enables them to move to Linux. Along the same lines, we need to rumble and get IBM to revive "Bart" and port it to Linux. If we can soften the blow of porting your custom apps then we make Linux that much more desirable, particularly in corporate America where it is already infiltrating as a web, print and file server.
This is my signature. There are many signatures like it but this one is mine..
But, Slashdot being as civilized as it is, I'll of course do some explaining as to what motivates this outburst.
This is not directed at all programmers who feel their craft can only be practiced with tools like C/C++, it's directed at those who are too elitist to see that sometimes programmers overlook simple tasks that can easily be performed by laymen with laymen tools.
News and bla for computer musicians: http://lomechanik.net/
I like what I've seen of Xbasic from the page you've given there... it seems like a wonderful program (I'm going to dl it when I get to Linux box at home).
It's not object oriented (so far as I could tell) but it is open source and free (as in beer) and basic-based. I can at least use it for some applications. Thanks a ton, man.
-rt-
** Evil Canadians are taking over the world. Learn about the conspiracy
In the article, the guy mention that Microsoft wouldn't let Borland/Inprise package the Delphi VCLs into Windows itself, but he also says that Linux isn't Windows.
Is this speculation on his part? Does he realize that the Linux community will most likely not simply say "no, thanks" but instead firebomb their headquarters if they even think of integrating something that seems so close to Visual Basic?
Esperandi
This is a bit of a rant addressed to the small (but vocal) sect of Linux users that whine and scream and cry whenever a company announces a product that is not free (in all senses of the word.)
In two words: GROW UP.
Companies exist for a number of purposes; chief among them are to offer products and services to customers willing to purchase them. To do this requires that talented people be employed to develop and maintain those products and services. How can the company stick around, to continue to provide those products, as well as offer new ones? Sticking around requires a keen sense of the market, to continue to innovate and lead the pack in ways your competition isn't doing. And sticking around also requires that you continue to make money so you can pay those talented developers.
This is exactly what Borland is doing; they are among the few (but growing number) of companies that have the foresight to know that Linux is going to be a huge market, and soon. They are simply providing a product that many developers (myself included) are clamoring for: RAD tools.
Borland's RAD tools are among the easiest to use and most productive I have had experience with. Delphi and BCB give you all the benefits of a powerful language, without all the hassle and trouble of a "traditional" solution laden with mindless, cumbersome details.
It's really quite simple, folks. If you like the idea of developing a fully-functional, complete product in a couple weeks, without having to care about all the silly details that make your life miserable, then you'll love Borland's RAD tools. Afterall, isn't that why we all love Perl? It makes easy things easy, and hard things possible. However, if you'd rather spend all your time under the hood and get to know the application intimately, you're probably already quite comfortable with your current options.
What gets me is that amount of bickering and ugly fighting that rears its head every time a company offers a new product for the Linux market that isn't free. Why try and discourage companies from offering products that many of us would like, just because it doesn't satisfy your personal (albeit warped) agenda? Why not vote with your dollars, and simply not purchase the product that you don't want, rather that making a big scene every time it happens?
It's time many of the kiddies in this community grew up and got a clue. Linux IS all about choice, and you too have the freedom of choice to develop without whatever you'd like. There are many of us who want and/or need the benefits a RAD tool can provide. Why rain on everyone's parade?
I'm looking forward to the event (and it will be an _EVENT_ ) where Sybase looks at their market share and decides that there should be a Unix version of PowerBuilder.
Mine can't be the only workplace where everyone bitches about Windows but only two or three of the dozens of developers actually develop in a Unix environment. Most of this is because "the tools aren't there" or the "users won't like it" or "we've got too much invested in this product".
Think of it... Jbuilder, Delphi, PowerBuilder, something like Visual C++ all on Unix. All leveraging the investments in skill, time, and code. Sounds pretty good.
An excellent, excellent piece. This is one of those articles that cuts through the all the rah-rah nonsense and puts forth a truthful view of Linux and the community surrounding it. I've never understood why anything less than "We're the best! Bill Gates is gonna go down!" isn't tolerated, but it certainly should be.
Perhaps his best point is why it's important for Linux advocates to learn their history. The peculiar dichotomy is that Linux is viewed as the up and coming technology for the techno-savy generation, but in actuality:
1. Linux is really just a whole lot like UNIX, which people in their fifties were programming 20+ years ago.
2. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the entire UNIX bulkiness and clunkiness were on their way out. UNIX was on all the "What's out for the nineties" lists. And there was a reason for that: hacks like Xwindows and csh just felt so backward at the time, especially next to an Amiga or Macintosh.
I'm not anti-Linux. I run RedHat 5.2 at home, and I read Slashdot daily. But I'm honest about Linux, and I also use Windows (and a Mac). Getting sucked into the "Linux will rock your world!" mentality is a bad thing. Linux is better than some things, worse than others. You have to be truthful about that or you'll turn into a raving loon.
Delphi for Linux is a bad thing in that it will bring hosts of "developers" (as opposed to programmers) to the platform. I see a trend here, RedHat is trying to make Linux as easy to use as Windows and Delphi will try to make Linux as easy to develop to as Windows. "Developers" tend to rely more on the ability of their "development environments" than on their own ability, leading to excessive automation, leading to bloated applications and to an increase in your daily number of core dumps.
It's the same everywhere: more features and less buttons. More ease of use and more impossibility of understanding. I mean, my answering machine has lots of features I don't use because I don't like to memorize all of the "shift modes" of its 3 buttons.
One button for every feature! Every feature in its button!
I'm pretty sure that, one way or another, my Microsoft serfdom (W'95 factory installation) came with VBnxx.dll -- But it certainly did not come with the VCL stuff. However, when I installed BCB, both sets of apps still worked. So, technically(tm), there is no good reason why there could not be multiple packages on a machine -- and hence competition. There's nothing to stop someone (or at least somemultitude) taking Glade and GCC and writing a RAD, fully opensource. I think a VCL-style encapsulation library is a perfectly natural extension to the current collection of programming libraries.
I sympathise in your concern that someday overwhelming market share would someday enable Borland (or a competitor) to throw its weight around with the OS distributors, makers, etc., but ultimately, they could try to do the same thing without OS inclusion -- which is, after all, just a conveniance. The OpenSource/Linux model largely exists in reaction to attempts like this, and I have confidence that it will prove resiliant to anysuch attempts. Opensource will gaurantee continued competition from free programs which will prevent any such coup d'état from taking place.
________________________
He who fights and runs away,
what will these trolls think of next?
He's talking about distributing "packages" which are similar to DLLs. They allow the Delphi developer to not have to link in the VCL code which produces a very tiny executable. If VCL packages aren't present, then the executable has to link that code in making it larger.
These packages don't have anything to do with how your system runs or what you run on it, they are simply provided to slim down an application's shipping size.
- earache
;)
Every time I've pointed out how i thought an 'offtopic' troll comment was actually original and funny (its rare, but it happens) i've always gotten a -1 for paying attention to the expressions of free speech delivered by the 40 year old virgins posting crap here. But now, score:3 for pointing out an onion article. /. keeps hanging and this is as far down the page as i can see...
HAW HAW! (my best Nelson Muntz impression in ASCII)
This PROVES anyone with enough spare time to moderate has just got to be on the pipe. I'm only killing time now to write this because the #@!! server for
Oh yeah--I'll submit another "slash style creative writing page" someone has started, i think its called freshmeat or something like that.
IMO, I don't think we need BASIC, because we already have languages that are much better. However, development tools ( such as GUI buiders and IDEs ) to go on top of those languages would be cool.
Cheers,
I agree. What an ass!!!
Linux currently lacks a way to make quick one-off GUI apps, which is the sort of thing Visual Basic excels at. By the time you toss something together in any existing GUI language for Linux (including PyGtk and other script bindings) it's become a Real Project.
Given that most open source programmers are "vi+gcc" gurus that would consider a VB-alike beneath them, I think it's terrific that companies like Borland/Inprise are filling in the gap. To use an ESR-ism, Delphi and other RAD tools will lower the barriers for scratching your own itch. That'll result in more Linux software and more World Domination. Bring it on!
Can't wait for quasimodo and friends
What do those of you who despise RAD tools use for quickly developing GUI applications? I am a fulltime programmer doing Java and my CS degree gave me C++, but I still just don't know where to start for making GUIs easily in the languages I know (Java, C++).
There's just something inherently discouraging about seeing a page full of code whose sole purpose is to simply open your main program window, followed by another several pages just to populate some menus...
interesting article, delphi on linux will be a good thing... but before you add this clear-seeing-oracle (amazing the business insight he brings to the game, he should consider giving up programming for management) to your list of future geek-gods, he is an asshole (opinionated while ignorant or fond of glossing over the truth).
for the record (again), apple lost it's lawsuit against microsoft due to a lame licensing agreement--xerox and their contributions had nothing to do with the outcome of the lawsuit.
oh, and the title, great prez-ronny-type story, but a person with integrity should draw a clear line when their words could be mistaken for truth.
It's nowhere near ready for use yet. In fact, it's so early in development that it doesn't really have much of a homepage. You can't download it, except from GNOME CVS, and few people know about it.
But it exists.
It's called GNOME Basic.
Basically, it's an offshoot of Gnumeric, which is the default GNOME spreadsheet. Since Gnumeric is intended to be feature-for-feature compatible with Microsoft Excel, one of those features is the built-in scripting language, VBA.
So, they decided to do a VBA clone, and it is turning into something that can run VB code.
Note that it is very early, under development, and does not yet have an IDE (just a compiler). Its homepage (as such) is here.
Enjoy!
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think you just crossed it.
--
- Sean
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think I just crossed it.
- Sean
Since it is more stable than GNOME, and has more features.
I don't think anyone would have a fair argument against having a tool that, as you say, allows you to do a bloody good job at building apps with a tool you are comfortable with.
One of the reasons everyone is so excited about Delphi on Linux is because Delphi is such an excellent rapid application tool, with a very good easy to use and easy to understand programming language, with great GUI capabilities.
Most technical/programmer people, in the Linux world at least, like well designed software that does a good job, and which fundamentally makes sense most of the time. The reason I personally find Delphi to be enjoyable as an environment, and which many people agree with me on, is that it makes programming *FUN* again - and the way that happens has a lot to do with the sensible design of the Delphi environment, and the Object Pascal language.
There is a lot of nonsensical design in Visual Basic however, which does *not* make sense. If you want to read a good article that describes a lot of problems with the way that Microsoft has designed Visual Basic, I suggest you read this article:
Thirteen Ways to Loath Visual Basic
I point this out not to be inflammatory, but to show you one of the reasons why you get so much flack as a Visual Basic programmer, and to point out that Delphi on Linux is a really good thing because a) it provides the ease of use that you're used to on Visual Basic, without any of the utter stupidities of VB (see article for details), and b) it's a very powerful environment for creating world class apps in its own right.
And, lastly, the design of Object Pascal and the Delphi environment is so good that, dare I say it, it will actually c) make you a better programmer.
And that's why its exciting that Delphi is coming to Linux.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
I think you're misreading the comment he made...
The quote is: "Any Linux advocate who says Delphi is not welcome in the Linux space is a hypocrite." (Emphasis mine). This is not a matter of advocating Delphi or not, this is a matter of trying to turn it away entirely.
Meaning that:
(1)Borland tries to make a Linux version of Delphi.
(2)"Linux Advocate" admonishes that they are not welcome.
(3)Borland takes this to heart and stops development.
(4)Other people don't get to use it.
This meaning other people who have no problem with the freedom (or lack thereof) of said Delphi For Linux (DFL). People who would be willing to use it anyway. Ergo, they are deprived of the choice of using DFL, if they so desire.
Hence, the advocates of an operating system that claims to be all about choice, have in fact, restricted the choice of others.
They don't have to use the non-free DFL themselves, but neither should they have attempted to stop its development.
In that sense, they are hypocrites, and I think that's what Mr. Thorpe was getting at.
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think you just crossed it.
--
- Sean
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think I just crossed it.
- Sean
The more the merrier. I think that when Linux gets a base of 40-50 million in the US it will probably be as commercially successful as Windows 9X. At that time most newbies will buy full copies so they can get the tech support and that will be good for the vendors and the FSF/Debian group. Delphi is a pretty cool language from what I hear and it could add another incentive to take the Linux plunge. Of course if we don't get an official port it might be necessary to haggle GNU into trying to get a team together to make one anyway :)
Please. What is there to love about C/C++? Hell, even Java is more fun to code in.
Delphi looks very much like a tool to bind widgets against odbc data sources, God forbid it, even against parameters of a stored procedure; with so-called resync points.
That's about the best way to guarantee that your application will never run across the internet.
These are legacy concepts implementing outdated technology. Who needs stored procedures, bound data widgets and all that crap?
Furthermore, only in the simplest of applications one can map a form against a master-detail type of join of a few tables in the database. The real world is so much different.
Can't you see developers getting stuck? When they want to bind against something else than odbc/jdbc, they will have to wait for Borland to adapt the back engines to the new types of datasources that are bound to spring up in the future (xml-rpc, soap, xml-cgi, et cetera), or otherwise rewrite the whole application.
If Borland doesn't open-source, I won't use their shit, because they're bound to make me lose out on new markets and lose serious money, one day or the other.
That's why I'm sticking to what is available open source. At least, when the shit hits the fan, you can do something about it. See it as a life insurance.
can't borland hire someone who can write an article that stays on topic? it was pretty good, then all the sudden he starts yapping about "the window manager being closer to windows than unix" and "linux being a clone of something old from a long time ago" and "people involved in linux who don't know the technological history of it" and on and on -- nothing to do with delphi at all. if that isn't bad enough, some of it is just wrong. everything in any gui system can trace it's roots to xerox parc or mit, not apple or mshaft. it's doesn't matter what they look like now. I only use xfce, and that looks like CDE, not an apple or a microsoft. none of my friend's desktops look like apple or mshaft. it was a dumb thing to write. why should anyone need to know the technological history of mshaft, apple or linux to comment on it? this is america, after all. from what i've heard, linux has a lot of features that are fairly unlike any unix system. i can run way more desktops, desktops far more capable than an mshaft or apple system. yet he says nothing abou that. he's whining about whiners. well, at least he's honest. but he oughta focus more on his job rather than whine about the customer base. that's pathetic and unprofessional. so what's professional? ibm and jikes, plus remember how they wrote that paper on improving the threading scheduler under linux? that's about people doing good work and giving back. that was a professional, on-topic paper. this guy was just venting at the user base because of his personal issues or something.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
Actually, if you have an application QPL'd by anyone other than Troll Tech, then you can't combine it with QT. This is because you'd have to give the application developer the right to create non-free derivatives of the combined app, which you can't do.
The GPL may be incompatible with the QPL, but at least it's compatible with *itself*.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
Linux on x86 or multiplatorm?
rbf aka pulsar
As a originator of the lazarus project I tip my hats off to them. To convert the vcl to something that runs on linux is a totally daunting task. It has taken us a year to do it but we are now down to basic component finishing and ide codeing. We started out by having to totally abstract the widget toolkits from the vcl to allow it to run on anything what a bitch. We had to totally recreate our own vcl using no borland source which is useless anyhow (to much api junk). The cool thing about this is that we have a abstract vcl that we can plug in any kind of widget set into by just creating a interface unit. We had to use GTK for our first set but that is another story in itself. GTK is a bitch to write object based wrappers around since it is written so flat. Well anyhow I wish them the best of luck it is a hell of a job. Cliff Baeseman Lazarus Project http://lazarus.freepascal.org "GPL / LGPL"
Unfortunately, Danny's book is out of print, last time I checked. My own copy will only be pried from my cold, dead fingers. Danny Thorpe is a very thoughtful and insightful software engineer whose communication skills are as great as his coding skills. If you can get a copy of his book, do it!
--- Bill
Doh mr. Senior Engineer tell me more...
From the message at http://community.borland.com/article/0,1410,21171
I think I have learned something new, but I just want to bounce off to you guys. Is the thing that I've quoted on the above paragraph something that is true?
I thank you for any help you can render.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Sure, there are other languages better suited for different jobs. For an allrounder, though, Delphi rules.
Why? Combine a low lerarning threshold with decent power and you have a winner. Sure VB is easier, but you end up wanting more juice. Sure C++ is a lot more powerful, but debugging (esp other peoples code) is a nightmare. Sure perl is nice, up to 20 lines of code...
What Linux is lacking is RAD tools to quickly put a dummy-proof layer between the code and the user.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
As a long time Delphi programmer and new linux user i am waiting for them to publish portability guidelines, as i have many projects that I would like to make Linux/Delphi Ready..
any1 has any suggestion about this?
using pure VCL as much as possible is certainly a good start.
Since some people have been inquiring about if there already existed a VB tool for Linux, it's here. XBasic. Runs on both Windows(95|98|NT) and Linux. Click here for screenshots.
--
Why pay for drugs when you can get Linux for free ?
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
> Linux on x86 or multiplatorm?
x86. Borland does not have multiplatform compiler backends. They already have great x86 backend.
Linux executables may not be compatible with win32 executables, but the x86 machine code generated is mostly the same inside. The compiler backend for x86 Linux was the *easy* part of the Kylix project.
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
> There's just something inherently discouraging about seeing a page full of code whose sole purpose is to simply open your main program window, followed by another several pages just to populate some menus...
Uh, try Delphi instead?
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
Free Pascal. I wrote a cheesy command-line util in Delphi and ported it to Linux using the FPC.
A number of posts have stated that RAD tools such as Delphi and Visual Basic are "for the masses" and that their users are not true programmers, while others bemoan Delphi because it is not open source.
While it is true that many Delphi and especially VB users are not hard core programmers, this hardly means they therefore are "the masses." They often tend to be accountants, engineers, or other professionals who have some interest in developing computer-based solutions but whose actual focus lies elsewhere.
Needless to say, unless computer applications meet these professionals' needs, then most computer applications are a waste of time. Their direct involvement and contribution matters greatly. Much of Microsoft's success results from its ability to harness their energies through VB and VBA. That this is not the fanciest programming is really secondary. This approach solves solves these professionals' problems one heck of a lot better than input from some geek who may write tight code but wouldn't know a debit from a debenture in a million years.
I would prefer to see an open source RAD Tool. Either Viaual Perl or Visual Python sounds quite feasible. I can think of nothing that would hold such a project back except perhaps an elitist distain for "the masses," many of whom actually know as much or more than any programmer - but in a different field.
This is something I liked from the article:
"The biggest risk for Linux is that true control of Linux features and progress lies in the hands of an elite few who manage the Linux source code archives. Personalities and egos can be a effective at steamrolling personal agendas into Linux as Microsoft's corporate OS agenda is for Windows. The Linux commmunity must be ever vigilant of abuse of power."
I think that's pretty true. In many cases we've heard how an arrogant top Linux hacker tries to make it "his way", and obstructs some novel improvements over the kernel. I guess we can find examples for the ego problem. For instance, take the thread implementation in Linux. I'm sure it's there because of Linus's personal decision. In fact, I don't think Linus would *let* anyone do something slightly more different than what he would approve of. I'm also sure things aren't very different with other free projects such as GNOME. So, I think we should take an experienced developer's criticism quite seriously.
--exa--
This is what I do too. As I speak, I am debugging a scheduler program that uses 700 + lines to code to 1: Define a new stock item (that really has very few characteristics) and 2: add that Item to a schedule for manufacturing! It's a mess of code with no rhyme or reason. I've done a bunch of stuff for this company (at $75 an hour, in a state in bottom five of cost per living)all like this. A while back I did a whole new program from scratch. The guy was amazed how fast it came together, how fast it was (even against a crappy Access databsae). I just said "see what happens when you have a REAL programmer, who actually thinks through the design, do something?" VB is my tool. I'm getting to know it inside and out. I can adapt to different databases (not really all that different) for a back-end. But I have no desire to learn another language when VB can do 95% of what I want and my firm can always outsource a COM object to a C++ programmer if we have to (we haven't yet). I won't recommend linux desktops to a client until they have VB for it. Period. That's not to say it's a bad tool or anything, but it's not what I know. I'm trying to learn some linux, but I have a list of things a mile long to learn and since I've yet to have a SINGLE client who has even heard of Linux, let alone brought it up!, it's pretty far down on my list.
---
DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
Whether or not you agree with anything he said about Delphi, Linux, Microsoft, etc, it is a nice change to get some frank, direct commentary from a large software company. He handled a lot of "tough" questions head on. More typically we just get a vague "statement of direction" etc. Re Inprise, I think now that Philippe is largely out of the picture things can only get better. If Xbase for Linux does not speed up soon, I will very likely be learning Delphi. Tom Rombouts, Torrance, CA
The word I am getting is QT support first, followed next with Gnome. Eventually, the goal is to make an IDE that allows a variety of interfaces to be supported.
Python is just plain awful. No freedom. To regimented and way too much reinvention of the wheel for my tastes. Dance with the one what brung you. Perl. Perl in 1987. Perl in 1994. Perl in 2000. comments.pl?
There is a big mistake with Kylix - attempting to keep the flawed VCL object model. Dev's in Inprise know that it has problems, dev's outside Inprise know it has problems - so why not fix the problems, code to GTK (which is also portable to Windows, BeOS etc) and forget the Window's legacy. C'est la vie - they want to keep their 300k developers - small fry in the big picture.
This is splitting hairs too fine to be seen. A modification to the application IS NOT a modification to Qt! Troll's license only covers Qt, while the application's license only covers the application. Unlike how some view the GPL, copyright law does not grant the author rights to the works of third parties. Troll has no claims to any modifications of mine unless they they are modifications to Qt, not nothing else.
Hypothetically speaking, it might be possible to have a single code fragment that modified both the application and the library at the same time, but it would be extremely unlikely. I can't imagine this situation in any realistic code.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
In 16 bit Windows DLLs, each DLL could have its own data segment, independent of the host application. For that to work, though, the DS register had to be changed when the application called into the DLL, or when one DLL called into another DLL. Typically, this was taken care of by compiler codegen in the prolog of every function "exported" from the DLL. The prolog code normally sets up the stack frame, initializes local variables, etc, and also saves DS and replaces it with the DLL's local data segment selector. The function epilog, in the process of returning to the caller, restores DS to its original value at the start of the call.
.so module, code assumes EBX always contains the GOT pointer. Therefore, when an application calls into a .so, or one .so calls into another .so, somebody has to save off EBX and load the GOT pointer appropriate to the module being called. This is typically done in the prolog code of functions exported from the .so... just like DS switching in 16 bit Windows DLLs.
PIC requires all references to code and data be made relative to the Global Offset Table, a magic value unique to each module fixed up by the loader at load time. This is a very common approach on RISC architectures, but unfortunately it is hard to implement cleanly on the x86 architecture. Intel doesn't support EIP relative addressing, so PIC on x86 requires "burning" a register to hold the GOT pointer. Burning a register is no big deal on a RISC chip with 32 or more general registers, but it really stings when you've only got 6 general registers to play with.
To fetch a global variable in PIC, you can't code MOV EAX,[0x80045231] (where the constant is the address of the global variable), you have to code MOV EAX,[EBX+$5231], assuming EBX contains the GOT pointer (with value 0x8004000). This allows the loader to place the module code and data anywhere in memory without having to modify ("fixup") those absolute references in the machine code.
Inside a
-DT
Apparently, you're trying to say it's bad that he doesn't believe in Linux.
But he isn't saying that -- he's only saying that's not why he's working on Kylix.
Sure, could be that he absolutely doesn't believe in Linux (though I doubt it).
Could also be that he believes in it like all hell -- only that he believes in Delphi even more.
I very nearly fell for that, you know.
Christian R. Conrad
MY opinions, not my employer's - Hedengren, Finland.
Christian R. Conrad
mail me at iki.fi ; same user ID as here
And why was this attack never reported in the news media?
Christian R. Conrad
MY opinions, not my employer's - Hedengren, Finland.
Christian R. Conrad
mail me at iki.fi ; same user ID as here
JBuilder is even available for Linux nowadays, AFAIK.
HTH!
Christian R. Conrad
MY opinions, not my employer's - Hedengren, Finland.
Christian R. Conrad
mail me at iki.fi ; same user ID as here