Slashdot Mirror
Borland Linux Developer Survey
Borland is currently running
a poll to test the demand from the Linux community for porting their development tools. What with the Code Warrior folks, and all the IDEs coming around, it's a good signal of interest in the community. As well, Inprise is looking to hire a Seniuor R&D Engineer (for porting Delphi), as well as a Linux Developer Relations Mgr.
Aren't things usually done more modually in a
unix environment? Seperate shell, compiler, editor, debugger, make utility, cvs, etc.. this "integrating everything" with the Borland/Devstudio thing isn't really the unix way, is it?
Why would I use a proprietary tool, with a proprietary language. This would be a strike against portability between Linux and UNIX.
The first one that comes up with a development kit that uses 'autoconf' and can be used by other developers without having to buy the development environment to compile will get my money. (And let me use XEmacs for editing also)
/Jonas U
How about the original Turbo Pascal for CPM and then Turbo Pascal for DOS?
I still have my 8 inch diskettes around here somewhere...
I started to port my irc client from delphi to linux.. you wouldnt believe the troubles.. :).
:).
No decent IDEs for x what so ever. Doing everying thats in my clients GUI at runtime is a nightmare also.
I tried VisualGTK, would help if it generated code that compiles
Sure theres plenty of things in development, but they have been in development for years already.
If delphi for linux comes out, i'm buying it
Entera. Middleware with the server-side usually based on some flavor of unix, although it's possible to run servers on WinNT. Not exactly the most famous Borland product, but it is mainly a unix-based program.
IIRC, OEC developed it and then Borland grabbed it up.
they have already annouced jbuilder3 for linux. Should be available in early 2000.
You may have a point there. But I'll always prefer vendor independent tools, such as make, perl and c/c++.
Interesting that MS has invested in Borland, and Borland still consider porting to Linux.
/Jonas U
Do we really need their technology? It seems it doesn't work. Or do they have problems somewhere else (see the .exe in the URL)?
Why do you automatically equate modularity with a large number of small programs (if you can call gcc a small program ;-). Isn't a system consisting of 50 well-written individual components just as modular as the one consisting of a number of loosely coupled programs? The difference is that with the 50 components, the user never sees the 'modularity', but he/she doesn't care anyway. The important thing is that the components can be reused and repackaged by us, the developers.
In this particular case the developer is of course also a user, but that doesn't change the argument.
The trend in the industry is towards component based software. It is *not* a step away from the "Unix way" - it's the next evolutionary step of it.
pff. Delphi as a language sucks rocks. no multiple inheritance, no genericity, no Java-style interfaces (the attempt in Delphi 4 is a good sign, but not enough). and the lack of these shows in the suspiciously absent container classes, other than the pathetic flat TList and the admission of defeat that is the TStringList.
;)
the only thing Delphi has going for it is its seductive IDE. what I would really, really like is for them to port it to a more sane language, like for example Eiffel. and for them to get the myriad of really, really annoying implementation issues out.
and to use vim instead of that wordstar crap
> I tried VisualGTK, would help if it generated code that compiles :).
Take a look and give a try to Glade. I wrote one GUI-software, desinging GUI with Glade and was content with it, despite a few bugs here or there.
You look for it in GTK+ repository.
The link is correct.
You sounded really smart up until that last part with the frontpage thing. I think I'm going to go port something between Operating Systems now.
Pity I can't get through to filling in the survey. You can't get to it!
Borlands tools have been the best for years and would be the ultimate addition to developing applications for the Linux platform. I would certainly pay the equivalent windoze prices.
Go tell them you're interested. I recall Java was on that form of things to vote for.
They're stable, though, and they run on every platform under the sun. One of the main problems with 90% of commercial compilers is that they tend to only run on one OS (e.g. Windows, SunOS, etc.), or only generate code for one processor.
Unix folks will not take kindly to discovering that someone's code only compiles on such a compiler.
I have a lot of affection for Borland. They were the first company to offer a PC C compiler for a reasonable price. I remember them making quite a splash by offering their first compiler for $99 when everyone else charged hundreds. Quite a big deal in the days before there was open source outside of academia.
They were the ones who allowed me to get my very own C compiler with my limited college-student funds.
Of course times have changed and I doubt they have the same corporate culture now. It saddened me over the years to see each new version get a little more expensive. The last upgrade I got (admittedly the full system, including OWL and everything) cost me $299.
Ummm... They didn't do it. MS bought the company that made netshow -- that company had allready done the port. MS has left it to languish since then.
I presume for most of you, the answer is a resounding no.
ISV's are going to be pissed to find that demand for linux commercial apps is very loud but usually with no money to back it up.
Somehow that's my feeling on this. It just seems like too little too late. My experience with C++Builder 1.0 (I hope 3.0 is better, never tried it) kinda turned me off Borland. And with such great free development tools available (EGCS, vi, a number of IDEs to choose from already, whole SQL servers, web servers, mostly all with source) there is just so little motivation to look at Borland anymore.
I almost wish it weren't true for Borland's sake, but it is.
I think they would do better just porting their end user software. I'd love to buy Sidekick for Linux. Paradox for DOS was great, take the user interface, team it to an SQL database and dump the modes, and Walah, instant user software.
Heck, I think Sprint is still a great word processor.
But they're not going to do any of that. They just haven't done anything since the Great Philipe lost his edge.
This leads me to a partly related question. Some of the things I liked about Borland's IDE was that when you went to compile, you could easily go through the error output and it would move to the line where the error occurred. Also, if you wanted to get help on a library function you could hit alt-f1 (or something) and you'd get a help file on the syntax. If you are running X, then it is simple enough to have another window, and type man fread, I suppose, and if the error message in another window shows foo.c: line 28: syntax error (or whatever) you could vi foo.c then type 28G to get there fast enough... but is there a way to do this in a more Borland IDE fashion under Linux? I find that when I download a package to do something on my system I learn that there was already something there to do it. :) I'll check this space again later.
Has everyone forgotten that Microsoft bought 10% of Inprise last month. 25 million in preferred stock. Announced a "partnership" they did. Money talks.
And I hear it whispering "Embrace And Extend".
Hell yes! For those of us who are out there writing real world vertical market stuff in Delphi (which is where most Delphi seems to be found) this gives us something to take to management as a real sign that Linux is more that "that free thing" as out MIS director once put it. This kicks ass!
I love using linux, however the RAD tools leave something to be desired. I've gotten good at xemacs, I've tried wipeout, code crusador, source navigator, slickedit, xwpe, etc... . These tools are great editors, and are great at looking at code hierarchies, but they are not RAD tools. I code all day long, so for a simple dialog box, or even a complicated one, I don't want to use xemacs or other editors to hack together something in the text editor.
Give me drag and drop to finish the dialog quickly, so I can use my energy for doing the important stuff (Design of the object model, Implementing the objects, Use cases, Business requirements, etc..) I don't want have to fiddle with the makefile or even create the makefile to compile the app.
Linux RAD development tools are in the early 90's compared to some windows tools. (Borland turbo pascal, or borland turbo c/c++ are easier to use than some of the linux development tools)
Tools like QT, GTX, KDevelop, and Java on Linux are getting us there, but for linux to be very successful we need to make it easier on the developer.
We have great linux widget tool kits, great linux editors, but no good RAD tools. (However there are many established windows RAD tools like c++ builder, delphi, dbase, paradox, powerbuilder, visual basic, Jbuilder, PowerJ, Visual Cafe, Access, etc..)
Some people may like using command line and editors for everything. So don't flame me for having a diff opinion. You already have what you want, these RAD tools don't offer you anything. These tools are for the rest who want all options, CLI, great editors, and RAD tools.
Just give the developers all the options. And let them choose how they use the tools.
Just my 2 cents.
Michael
I agree coderush for Delphi is a fantastic product. If only they would create a standalone editor for C++/Pascal/Java I would be soooo happy.
Delphi is a win for linux. BTW you have brief emulation under Delphi/C++ builder/Jbuilder
This is a myth. There are many situations where using multiple inheritance is useful and a perfectly good technique. Java's interfaces are a decent alternative, but are somewhat limiting in certain circumstances.
I have a few comments concerning this subject:
A) Why would someone want to work for a company that has bad management, 'hire & fire' policy and no compiler guy working on the Delphi compiler? (The last Delphi Compiler Engineer left a few weeks ago).
B) The Delphi IDE has no architecture at all! It is one big mess and it will be difficult to port to any other system. Good luck!
Rene Pawlitzek
Senior Software Engineer
Delphi R&D Engineer, '97-'99
I WOULD LOVE VISBROKER FOR JAVA ON LINUX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
TO HELL WITH ALL OF YOU WEENIES WHINING ABOUT GCC, I WANT JBUILDER, VISIBROKER FOR JAVA, AND ITS RUNNING ON LINUX......AND HOPEFULLY THE OPENFUSION PRODUCTS TOO..........
$550 for the initial Borland Turbo C
6 months later,
$250 for the update Borland C++
6 months later,
$250 for the update Borland C++ w/ OWL
New updates for a new fee every 6 months with popular features (Turbo assembler) seperated out for an additional fee, Who needs them? I know I don't.
Guess I need to get a spell check or stop posting late at night :)
-Michael
Michael Swindell
Sen~or Product Manager
Borland Developer Solutions, Inprise Corp
The exe was part of the problem. The CGI was doing WAY too many unnecessary SQL selects and wasn't designed with any kind of traffic in mind. The other problem was that both the CGI and the database were hosted on a pretty mediocre PC that was also hosting about 70 other processes. It was one of those "side project" multipurpose servers. Anyhow the survey has been redone by Infopoll and is on a new server accessible from
http://www.borland.com/linux
Throw out the old URL, it will still be pointing to the old server until Monday.
Cheers,
-Michael
http://www.borland.com/linux
/.'d
link in story goes to old server which was
Pretty funny that I use vi on *nix and vim on NT and I still produce better code faster than all the boys using a GUI IDE. The killer app Inprise can deliver for the Linux platform, to me anyway, is Visibroker for Java maybe even C++. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I would love to be able to install the whole thing on a Linux box and run osagent from a Linux command line. Java, CORBA and Linux - the most excellent platform.
You said "They are a Windows-only shop." You seem to be unaware of Borland's JBuilder and CORBA products, not to mention Interbase/Linux.
Where was I? Oh yeah. 'why we need an IDE'. I won't dispute that an IDE is good for you but I get tired of people telling me that I need one, especially when I used IDEs until about 6-9 months ago. Anyway, here are the arguments against non-IDE development:
-> 'it's too hard to use 500 programs every time you compile' Well, I never thought of that. All that time lost typing 'gcc -o foo.o -cfoo.c; gcc -o bar.o -c bar.c ; gcc -o baz.o -c baz.c ; foo.o bar.o baz.p'....
That's sarcasm if you missed it. All I do to compile is type M-x compile or
-> 'Makefiles are too hard!' Well, I agree. Don't look so surprised, the Makefile syntax must have been developed by a mad scientist or something. But..there's this program you might have heard about, 'automake'? The one that, like, generates makefiles for you 5 times more flexibly than a Windows compiler and almost as easily? (you have to type the names of the files instead of clicking on them, and maybe use a slightly different method of organizing your sources..)
-> 'UI development is too hard!!' It is my strongly held opinion that 'UI builders' were invented to hack around broken toolkits and should be considered harmful (at least in their current form) with modern libraries. The reason is that Windows only allows absolute specification of size and position. Real toolkits like GTK+, Qt, and (editorial comment: Ugh) Swing allow one to say, "line these widgets up in a horizontal row, then put the box in a vertical row with these other widgets". UI builders encourage WYSIWYG design, which throws out the flexibility inherent in this sort of thing -- in addition, half my UIs are dynamically created from configuration scripts anyway, a UI builder would just get in the way.
It's worth mentioning that I can create a dialog box more quickly using a text editor and GTK+ than using a dialog resource editor in Win32.
-> 'UNIX is old and clunky' -- this seems to be the attitude behind a lot of IDE pushers, which may be why they encounter so much hostility, but I don't really even think I should have to answer it, it's so obviously incorrect.
I don't care if you use an IDE (except that I feel they encourage un-Unixy programming; we'll have to wait and see on that though), but I really get annoyed when people start praising IDEs as the best thing since sliced bread, without which no one can live a complete life. It wears on the nerves
Daniel
Can't get to the site. Has it been slashdotted already ???
I very much want to see Delphi for Linux, and will buy it, UNLESS it uses Motif. That would turn me off to it like a light.
With Motif, all executables will need to be statically linked, and nothing would be under 2 megs. That is REALLY BAD..... especially since most software will probably be distributed over the Internet.
Qt would be a good choice *IF* you can work out a licensing deal with Troll Tech to allow commercial development with Delphi out of the box. This would be in everyone's interest - they should be willing to license it, since they'd get a royalty from every Delphi sale and gain a LOT of users.
If you can't work out a deal with the Trolls, I recommend GTK, or maybe developing your own widget set (but please do open source it if you do that).
Thanks
I used to use Delphi when I was in middle school - it's really very nice for UI design. I haven't used it for 3-4 years, but a Linux port would be nice if it can turn out .o files ready for the linker. I could do the guts of a program in C with vi and gcc, use Delphi and its variant of Pascal for the interface (handy, since I've never really been good at building graphical interfaces), and link the results together.
On the other hand, programs built this manner would be difficult to collaborate on or distribute, as you'd have to have Delphi to build or modify 'em. Unless Linux Delphi churned out code that could be built with gpc (is Gnu Pascal still being actively developed? Is it in a usable state?) without a copy of Delphi, it would only be useful for software that's distributed binary-only.
What I wouldn't give for just the Borland project management/build tool to replace GNU Make/Autoconf/Automake tools.
:)
A tool which actually did proper dependancies and did silly things like cache headers so dependancy checks didn't take so long.
A tool which didn't require recursive execution which eats up needless CPU and RAM reparsing the same rules over and over and over and over.
A tool which could actually do cross-directory dependancies easily and cleanly.
A tool which did parallel and distributed builds correctly every time.
A tool which actually understands the compilers and interpreters and understands distribution package files in a way as to know what programs are installed and what aren't correctly.
A tool which doesn't require unnecessarily long human edited files
Unfortunatly, working on primarily open source projects makes commercial tools pretty much worthless for this sort of thing. Sigh.
--
The world is neither black nor white nor good nor evil, only many shades of CowboyNeal.
Not like it was hard porting that server over from Solaris or anything.
The day Microsoft ports any of its GUI-based tools over to Linux will be the day Slashdot goes in-freaking-sane.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Some years ago, I would have been clamoring for Borland tools on Linux, because I really disliked the GNU tools. After a couple years' time, though, I've come to realize why the GNU tools are better. Sorry, Borland...
My Freakin Blog
Posted by Reitzel:
Screw Inprise. Years ago, Borland dropped their OS2 product like a hot potato and climbed directly in bed with Microsoft. Those of us who were servicing the (then) 20 million OS2 licenses were left stranded on the beach.
I wouldn't use a Borland product if it meant I had to write code on clay tablets in cuniform.
Posted by Jeff Martin:
It seems to be flooded right now with hits, I haven't been able to log in all day!
I certainly want to use borland on Linux....it only makes sense.
What I would *really* like to see is Borland write a pre-compiler to translate standard C++Builder code to GCC compatible code. Most would be the same, but you'd need to handle the extra stuff C++Builder has, like the ability to define properties (they look like class members but act like methods, with the ability to do type checking, etc.)
Then, of course, provide their world-class IDE, with *two-way* tools (the IDE generates code which you can edit, unlike most GUI builders).
And include their huge component library, with pre-compiled components for drag-n-drop database access, FTP, HTTP, POP3, GUI Widgets, etc.
If they get the compiler right, they should be able to (mostly) recompile their components to run on Linux. They could use winelib to help them do this easily (though that would give the apps a Windows look and feel).
So, that's what I'd do if I were Borland (and what I hope they do).
Warren E. Downs, Systems Engineer
Advanced BusinessLink
Life's a lot like money-- you spend it, then it's gone. Spend wisely.
On the other hand, the Free software community has done very well for itself in terms of development tools. I can't think of anything we're really lacking that Borland provides. Sure there are somethings but in general, there aren't too many if any development tasks you can't get done already. That leaves me wondering where Delphi, JBuilder, IBM's Visual Age compilers, etc.. all fit in to the linux infrastructure. It provides an attractive option for ISVs who demand support but most OSS/FS projects, if not all, will still use GCC.
I would like to play with Delphi on linux, especially if it can build GTK+ or QT GUIs but I'm not sure I'd shell out the $200 for it and I can't say I know a lot of linux people who would.
Lets hope they don't do try to use Motif. Too many commercial shops make that mistake.
-- Thorin sits down and starts singing about gold.
- Is free with development libs
- Commonly available on any Linux box
- full-featured
If they do pick Motif, then the product will most likely fail (even if they statically link their executables). The obvious choices are GTK and QT. If they do use QT then would Delphi developers need to pay Troll in order to make commercial apps using Delphi, or would Inprise be the only party which needed to pay TrollTech?The wheel is turning but the hamster is dead.
The wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead.
Well.... tried to go to the poll and the darn thing isn't working.
/. effect?
Is Borland broke? Or is it the
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
I will buy c++ builder for linux the minute it :)
hits the shelves, in much the same way I have
for windows, but this time i'll be even happier
Commodore 64, Loading up the dance floor!
>.they allow GUI Apps to be built for Linux using Qt or Java, depending on the *Builder product
If I buy a commercial compiler it is because I
want to be free to sell my code without having
to reveal my source code to the world.
Borland is well aware of our needs as software
developpers and would not tie us to libraries
that we can't use without either giving all the
source away or paying huge prices for a license.
As for using QT if you wish I fail to see why
you couldn't do it. With Borland C++ I've always
bought the source code of the libraries. Just
rewrite the libraries to suit your needs.
I have Borland C++ for OS/2.
Borland dropped support for OS/2 for
political reasons.
Borland's bread and butter lies with winblows
and pissing off Microsoft by releasing an
OS/2 version didn't help them getting support.
Now is a different world with the government's
lawsuit.
Somebody moderate this up - this is right on the money.
It's a Unix system - I know this.
Imagine the ammount of applications written in Delphi being available for linux?
This would be a REAL boost on Linux and Delphi (of course), and Borland knows this.
I like this, I really like this
I am grateful that there are code monkeys out there that enjoy low-level programming. We are forever indebted to them, but . . .
I don't thing my company is going to pay me to write device drivers or hack the kernel. They need rapidly developed, quality apps. Delphi has been an excellent tool to accomplish this, even with the limitations inherent to Win32.
Delphi for Linux would help immensely in the push to the desktop and I would be the first one on my block to purchase it.
Free Mac Mini. Yes, I'm
My pre-order will be in just as soon as they will take my money.
Free Mac Mini. Yes, I'm
Seb writes:
"Now I wonder what their current relationship with InterBase (Inprise?) is."
'borland.com' is a division of Inprise; even before they brought back the name in this *corporate* sense, the *products* still used the old brand. They were and are 'Borland Delphi (etc), from Inprise', only now with an inserted 'from borland.com, a division of'.
The middleware, Entera, Visibroker, and so on, is and was branded Inprise; they reserve the Borland name for the development tools.
And InterBase is, at it has been for years, owned by InterBase Corp. (or Inc, whatever), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Inprise (formerly of Borland).
"As far as I know, InterBase grew out of an independent team of programmers long ago before Borland came to scene. Or am I wrong?"
Yes and no.
Borland acquired InterBase with its buy-up of Ashton-Tate; you know, the guys behind dBase? It was a Borland product for a while, but got spun out into its own subsidiary long (a year, two?) before the name change to Inprise.
So you're wrong, if you meant to imply that Borland bought out the independant gang *directly*; but you're right in that there *was* such a gang (ex-employees of something big -- DEC, perhaps?), that was bought up by Ashton-Tate. I remember a few years ago, when Borland dBase wasn't doing too well and everybody was saying how stupid it was of Borland to buy A-T, how some columnist (might have been John Dvorak, of all people) wrote that perhaps that didn't matter; that perhaps the secret crown jewel that Borland was *really* after was InterBase.
Anyway, InterBase has kind of come full circle, in that it now is a corporation of its own again. Except that it's a subsidiary, of course.
"This way or that way, Linux developers should really take a look into InterBase DBMS. BTW, they still offer (oldish) 4.0 for Linux free of charge."
Yup! See my URL above? Yes, I *did* change it a few months back -- because IB moved the download! Before that, it pointed to where IB4/Linux was *then*; I must have had it for over a year now, altogether.
"Combined with the open-sourced AOLserver (see previous Slashdot story) with AOLserver driver for InterBase, it can be helluva web/db application tool."
Don't forget to go to http://www.photo.net/wtr/ and check out the whole -- freely downloadable, Open Source? -- interactive web site system by Philip Greenspun!
Christian R. Conrad
MY opinions, not my employer's - Hedengren, Finland.
Christian R. Conrad
mail me at iki.fi ; same user ID as here
One of the best ways for Linux to grow is to make it easy to author applications for the platform. With the RAD tools that Borland can provide, this would encourage much more development.
Go vote!
----------
"They misunderestimated me." --George W Bush, Nov. 6, 2000
There is no compiler that I know of that restricts
you from selling source code written and tested
with it, or the binaries that it compiles from
that code.
If you think that's the license for the GNU
compiler GCC, you are mistaken.
My Web Page
>How about the original Turbo Pascal for CPM and then Turbo Pascal for DOS?
How about it?: subscribe to the newsgroup comp.os.cpm, and there you'll find a fellow with a site that has TP/CPM, TP/CPM86, and a bunch else ready for download. CP/M ain't exactly dead yet, despite rumors to that effect.
(Borland denies ever selling such a product now, it seems.)
-> I dislike sigs...
Not to mention that standarization is very important in some corporate environments. I imagine it would be much easier to add/replace developers if you had a standard IDE system rather than one or two guys custom emacs macros and shell scripts. This might impair on an individual developer's flexibilty, but allows management to treat developers more like resources and reduces the amount job-security-enhancing voodoo involved.
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
Hello? Remember Borland C++ for OS/2? It was pretty damn good in my book. Still is for that matter, I just don't use OS/2 that much any more... They are definately not a Windows only shop.
Have you looked into VDKBuilder? It's coming alongi ndex.htm
very well (just passed the one year anniversary mark - congrats Mario & team!). It's all opensourced, and is based upon a library (VDK) that is similar to Borlands OWL/VCL (hence then name). It's got an editor, project manager, widget inspector, and GUI builder. The only thing it lacks up to this point is a good bugger (which I'm sure is on the way). Why not give it a try? http://www.guest.net/homepages/mmotta/vdkbuilder/
Delphi is one of the larger Windows IDE's.
How would you like to be able to write one program to work in Windows and on Linux?
My Journal
Borland deserves some credits from us Linux folks. I've always had good times with Borland tools - from Turbo C coding in old DOS days till these days.
Now I wonder what their current relationship with InterBase (Inprise?) is. As far as I know, InterBase grew out of an independent team of programmers long ago before Borland came to scene. Or am I wrong?
This way or that way, Linux developers should really take a look into InterBase DBMS. BTW, they still offer (oldish) 4.0 for Linux free of charge. Combined with the open-sourced AOLserver (see previous Slashdot story) with AOLserver driver for InterBase, it can be helluva web/db application tool.
IBM is already offering Visual Age for Java betas for Linux.
Not [everyone needs|has the ability|necessarially wants] to write device drivers. Your elitism is showing.
Corporate programmers need tools for their platform of choice. Interoperability is less of an issue. This promotes linux in the Corporate world. This is a Good Thing (TM) because a bigger market means more Linux-friendly SW and HW to choose from.
Not everyone is a free software fanatic. I [have paid & will pay] for quality software on my OS of choice.
Now go away.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
I'm trying but they seem to be slashdoted !!
I think this would be great. It's a few years since I use Borland C++ but I remember having a good time with it.
Which I guess means that their Sr. Product Manager
can't spell the word "definitely". Is "Sr."
short for "Sen~or"? Maybe he should have just
ended his response with "D00d!"
:-P
"Cause there's 40 different shades of black, so many fortresses and ways to attack, so why you complainin'?"
Actually, it was C++ for OS/2 (which I still have.)
The other port was Turbo Pascal for the Mac, which they did long ago.
The main problem with Borland (or any other vendor) porting tools to Linux, or developing tools for Linux, is that so many here seem to think that the Linux/Unix way is the only way, and won't buy the tools after they lobby for the vendor to produce.
Historically, non-Windows has meant unprofitable. As large as the computer industry is, the developer subset is much smaller, and the Linux developer subset may not support any commercial tools.
The execrable state of Linux installation, configuration, and documentation, all speak to the reality that Linux is a cult system, best suited to geeks with Unix in their backgrounds.
Oh, and before you flame me for that, I am a geek with almost no Unix in my background, but who wants almost desperately to move away from Windows. Linux has been my first pick for an alternative, and the complaints I make are based on a couple of months of intensely disappointing experience.
--- Bill
I would be thrilled to see Delphi for Linux, or C++ Builder for Linux, or JBuilder for Linux. Better still, I hope to see all of them, over time.
/. that there are many paths to production of useful software. There are those for whom the low level tweaking is the holy grail, and others who lust after RAD, and there are as many opinions as there are developers.
After all these years of language and IDE development, it should be painfully obvious to anyone who reads
The single most valuable lesson we should all take from Windows is that freedom to choose is essential. This is what MS seek to eliminate, as they strive to control the desktop; it's what Linux strives to return, as it competes with Windows. And, it's what BeOS also offers, in another different flavor.
What I want most is to be able to develop solutions which are not portable (portability is one of the most misused and abused terms in our industry) but are platform agnostic. I want to be able to present users with a hybrid system in which each PC is used for what it does best, and the software environment presents a toolset which is consistent in its presentation on each platform.
The answer to this will not come from Wine, or any other emulator, but from development tools which make make such design and development economically practical.
Language isn't the issue: Borland can offer C++ or Pascal or Java, all of which they already support on Windows.
In the world in which programming is done for more than a hobby, productivity is a major concern, and Borland tools have kept me more productive in Windows than any others. I have no doubt that they will do the same for me under Linux. I am impatient to have them.
What excites me is not becoming intimate with the inner workings of the OS or gcc, or egcs, but the prospect of producing highly effective and stable applications in a short timeframe. That's what RAD is about, and RAD is what Borland's tools are about.
--- Bill
And I know from my own recent conversation with David Intersimone that Borland is serious about Linux. I was only surprised to see notice of a poll so soon.
I hope you will get the URL problem fixed. Soon!
--- Bill
And besides the boatload of work saved, and your honor, the customers would be well served by having platform freedom.
Some of the die-hard gcc folks tend to overlook that what promotes Linux growth is good for all.
--- Bill
Borland has announced that JBuilder is being rewritten in Java, so it will soon be platform independent.
On their site, you can also see that they will preview JBuilder for Linux at their developers conference later this month.
--- Bill
After having spent years in Delphi, I find the gcc alternative depressing. Back to doing everything the hard way, and spending an inordinate amount of time on GUI construction, which is, after all, NOT the reason we write apps.
The beauty of Delphi/CBuilder is the freedom they give to refocus on the real purpose of the app: getting some tasks done. In the best of all worlds, the GUI is simply a nice way of packaging a good tool so that it is easier to use. In Windows (and in X) the GUI management coding is tedious in the extreme. And there are way too many calls to remember.
In Delphi I routinely construct interfaces which would drive me crazy without such an effective tool. Without Delphi, I would not have ventured into developing Windows apps at all, but would have refocused on embedded apps.
My checkbook is ready, Borland. Bring on the tools!
--- Bill
Linux is a strong OS with a painful lack of productive tools. The *nix environment has always been a hacker's wet dream, and I'm sure it's great fun, but many of us are looking for killer tools which will allow us to write useful and solid apps quickly. And these days, that's the only way to do it, in the commercial market.
--- Bill
Delphi will be great on Linux. C++ Builder already supports MFC, but that doesn't tie it to Windows. In fact, the entire VCL for C++ Builder is in Object Pascal.
As much as I hate the C language, I am willing to move to it, if it is all that is supported on Linux. Life would be much better, however, with choices.
My main concern with Linux is for my own productivity. Having used Delphi since it came out, I will hate developing in any language which does not give me such a strong tool.
--- Bill
We gotta go to their site and tell em we want it!
Corndog
Frontpage for Linux? As in, the editor, not just the extensions for Apache? Got a URL?
dBase is being actively developed by dBASE, inc.
www.dbase2000.com is their website.
As much as I hate Pascal the language, I really think that Delphi offers the most important contribution to Linux. Especially if you can trivially port Windows Delphi apps to Linux! That would be unbelievably great, but also quite possible, as Delphi is reasonably removed from the direct Win32 API. C++ builder will soon be in MFC-land, so that would REALLY have to diverge from the Windows version. JBuilder 3 is coming, but written in Java, and it will be competing against VisualAge from IBM. Delphi is the truly unique product out of this bunch.
Oh yeah, and those of you who mentioned using Qt should check out www.kdevelop.org. KDevelop is still experimental, but actually quite good: Visual dialog builder, complete project management, class browser, integrated debugger, etc. And you don't have to use it for or with KDE if you don't want to.
--JZ
I sent in the story a few days ago also. Ah well.
:)
I also agree with the other post under this parent about several issues:
1) I get paid to write Delphi code. Not linux apps. HOWEVER, if our linux server ever went down, we'd all have to go home
2) Compared to the learning curve of C++, Object Pascal (the language behind Delphi) is a breeze to learn. Combined with a good Visual Component Library, Delphi apps are small, fast, and easy to maintain.
3) If Borland/Inprise is really serious about Linux development tools, I suspect JBuilder will be first out of the gate. It's gotten high praise from many developers and it was the main driving force behind the MS + Inprise deal a few months ago. I suspect that MS's J++ tool will be getting some serious modifications after the influx of Java technology from Inprise.
Well IBM payed Borland to develop Borland C++ for OS/2. The 2.0 version didn't suck big time like the previous ones, and it was the last. Inprise and non-Windows development????? BAH!!!!
Also..haven't MS bought some Inprise stock???
Live long and prosper...
I agree. I'll probably still use (X)Emacs with gcc/egcs/gdb, etc. But there are many Windoze developers who are intimidated by the traditional GNU evelopment environment, or simply don't want to take the time to learn it. For these peple, getting high profile, high quality development tools they're familiar with from the Windoze world will be a great boon for them, and for Linux.
:-)
The last somewhat decent argument Microsoft has against Linux is a dearth of available applications. Anything that helps fill this gap is a good thing. And for Linux's traditional geek following, the fact that Borland has always made great software means that they're starting from a position of respect. I've always considered Borland's tools and applications to be far superior to Microsoft's, and seeing Borland lose to Microsoft's inferior products is one of the things that made me grow to hate the whole Windows culture. (And don't give me that tired illogical standards argument.)
Finally, if Borland brings its RAD tools to Linux, the corporate development world will have one more great reason to use Linux. Lots of corporate IT shops use RAD tools such as Delphi and (ptui!) Visual Basic. Delphi is far superior to Visual Basic, so it's quite fitting that it should become Linux's RAD 3.5GL
I for one would love to see Borland port their tools to Linux, but if they don't (or until they do), people may like to check out RHIDE, which provides a similar thing to Borland TC. /.'ed.
Oh yeah, Borland site is still
~ Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity ~
Wishful thinking?
~ Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity ~
Desktop functionality would be a read plus and I figure that porting between desktops is probably much easier than porting between Operating Systems anyway. I am not sure I would use something propietary though (no flames please, use whatever software you please).
Besides, unless Borland change thier product non-trivially, I don't think Delphi or C Builder would blend well with linux anyway.
Oh, before I posted this, there were no comments so I am going to make a prediction. NO, I don't think this is to get back at Microsoft. It is simply a business exploring a new market. Microsoft will too (in fact, they already have frontpage for Linux).
--
That's when I submitted the Borland jobs posting for Delphi for Linux to Slashdot. Delphi apparently wasn't C or Perl enough to be of interest to the /. community.
and missed your submissions. Obviously he didn't find one. He can afford one now that got all that money from anover.
:))
I'm sorry for the convoluted tie-in to prevent off topic moderation, but I could'nt resist.
I'd love to see a Delphi/Linux. But let's face it: Borland has a terrible track record porting their software anywhere. They are a Windows-only shop.
Turbo Pascal for OS/2 anyone? I can't remember any other non-Windows product from Borland. (except for Interbase, which was Unix-based when they bought it)
I'll never forgive them for killing off brief. 'tis the one true editor (for me)! okay so xemacs comes close. But it aint the same!
Since there are so many other compilers/IDEs/tools what are they going to do to make it worth buying?
All very well voting yes, but if the Linux community doesnt put its money where its mouth is. They (and others) wont repeat it....
My tuppence ha'penny worth.
Beth
I was at JavaOne and saw the demo of
JBuilder for Solaris... Quite cool...
Almost the entire thing is written in
java (unlike JB3 for win).
And really good performace.
Once the JDK 1.2 for linux firms up
they should be able to port it
rather quickly.
Sure I use gcc & ecgs because they're free, but they're hardly start-of-the-art as far as optimizing goes. If borland released a cheap optimizing C++ compiler for Linux, I'd sure be interested.
...they allow GUI Apps to be built for Linux using Qt or Java, depending on the *Builder product
... (Not a deciding factor but a nice thing to have) they create a system that allows programming for Win32 as well. One IDE for multiple platforms.
...they keep the product up to par with their Win counterparts.
I use CBuilder 3, JBuilder 2, and I am trying to find a copy of JB3 locally. They all are top notch rapid development enviroments that do not intrude with special tags in the code or any nonsense like that (Unlike Symantec Visual Cafe 3...)
RB
has anyone got managed to get the netshow port to play .asf files? if you have please email me.
it tells me that it needs a codec i cannot seem to find.
-- john
They did port NetShow to linux. It was a piece of crap, but it worked.
"We don't need it we already have gcc". Well, then we don't need a car as bicycle serves our transportation needs just fine. Surprisingly most people, judging by comments in this thread, apparently have no idea what Delphi/C++ Builder is but still feel a need to comment on the subject.
My personal opinion on this(somebody who programs Unix and NT for a living using all kinds of tools like C++, Perl, Smalltalk, Delphi and Java):
Delphi port is the most significant Linux port there is. Netscape and Oracle ports are nothing comparing to push this would give to Linux. There is simply nothing out there that gives comparable performance, convenience and productivity. Not even close. I'd give my money to Borland any day for this thing.
By all means give Inprise a piece of your mind, but unless you love spam don't give them your address. (They flirt with the RBL constantly.)
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
A lot of Java Developers would love to develop on Linux, but the solid tools don't seem to be there.
Java2 support is important for Linux.
I have been a Delphi developer for years. Having recently tried C on Unix & Linix and discovered what a pain it is to create GUIs, I would fully support Borland tools on Linux. This could be an extremely useful step in getting more applications to the Linux desktop.
/. effect has anything to do with it.
Oh yeah, my opinion is that the link to the site is not correct. I am not sure that the much fabled
Yeah!!!! Go Borland Go!!! Geiben zie mir meine Delphi!
MS and Inprise/Borland announce joint partnership agreement, cash infusion, 10% of stock changes hands. Theory: MS invests in Inprise to get a foothold in the Linux development world since they're not willing to lose face in these times of heavy focus on Windows 2000.
Prediction: In a year MS buys the rest of Inprise (or just the Borland part) and suddenly has a full lineup of Linux development tools in its hands.
It's MS' secret plan to develop Linux tools without MS actually doing it themselves! As part of this, Borland makes their C++ tools compatible with VC++ (notice the part about MFC mentioned in the press release) with some kind of compatibility layer, and MS secretly ports their business apps -- like Office -- to Linux. NT/Win2K dies. MS offers migration tools and an emulated environment (can you say "VMware"?) for legacy NT/Win2K customers. Everybody's happy.
(I'm not crying "Conspirary!" here. I'm crying "Yeah! Go for it!")
Alexander Staubo
earlybird@mop.no
Take a look at :
http://www.inprise.com/about/hr/99083.html
"Senior engineering position responsible for research and development of major subsystems of Delphi for Linux. Work with the entire team to create Delphi for Linux."
Also the following was posted on the Borland news server a couple of days ago :
The job offer is definately not a joke . In fact it's not the only job available for Linux at Borland, there are more available right now including for C/C++ on Linux. I wouldn't go so far as to say that we are working on things "in secret", but I will say that we are not yet prepared to make any public announcements. Stay tuned...
Michael Swindell
Sr. Product Manager
Borland Developer Solutions, Inprise Corporation
I was wondering why this didn't start the sallivation. Lots of companies using Delphi could dump Windows like the bad habit it is.
Please, and as soon as possible Borland!
I just spent a year writing a cutting edge app for my industry in Delphi for the Win32 OS. If I could compile a Linux version of this, it could save me a whole boatload of work, not to mention my honor.
If you got a $100 bill, put your hands up...
As you have probably guessed we've had a server problem with the survey :( The volume began to increase exponetially last night around midnight, only hours after it went public. It's our fault, we completely underestimated the response we would receive and placed both the CGI and the database on a P200 already running about 70 other processes. We've aquired two new servers, one for the database and one for the CGIs.
:)
Everything is being restored and should be up shortly. I'll post again when it's live. There will be a new URL, but we'll also redirect the original.
Thanks for all the interest, it's literally overwhelming
-Michael
Michael Swindell
Sr. Product Manager
Borland Developer Solutions
Ok, we've learned our lesson... I guess it's like a rite of passage or something. Anyhow, the survey is now hosted on a server designed for the job. Please toss the old url and try:
http://www.borland.com/linux
Sorry for the delay and thanks for participating! And if you filled out the survey on the old server you can fill it out again on the new server if you like - we won't be merging the data.
-Michael
Michael Swindell
Sr. Product Manager
Borland Developer Solutions, Inprise Corporation
I maintain several large legacy apps written in in M$ FoxPro 2.6a -- going back to FoxBase 2.11. M$ does not use the same definition of backward compatibility that Fox Software used before they were purchased. Moving any of these to VFP (Visual FoxPro) definitely requires a re-write. (Guess what software we will not be using to do that). There are probably others out there like me.
If Inprise A.K.A. Borland has no major need to carry forward the dBase product then mabey if they were to release the dBase code under the GPL this could be developed into a new strain of the xBase Language. If such a thing could be developed then much code from old xbase applications could be salvaged for future use.
Preferably this new "strain" would be a middleware layer that would be capable of working with existing back end databases (i.e. Oracle, DB2,.....).
xBase was a great database programming language in its time. It's too bad M$ embraced extended and killed it.