I remember reading somewhere on a blog from a Delphi developper that in his company they were coding in C, C++ and Delphi, and that out of the three, the Delphi projects were the only ones meeting both the deadlines and staying within budget with the highest customer satisfaction. I can only agree with that, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that was still the case even today.

I’m 25 so I may have a different perspective on this matter somehow. But I can tell you during my 5 years software engineering courses I NEVER had ANY Delphi class. But I had Java, C# and all the other “mainstream” languages.

There’s no denying it, C# is sexy, and I was impressed when I saw it first. But as a young developper that knows nearly every single language out there (C/C++,C#,Java,PHP,Javascript,Python heck even ASM and of course Delphi – albeit not more recent versions than 2007) I feel like Delphi still has what it takes to be up to the challenge against C# and the others.

C# isn’t truly better (the language itself feels like a “cleaner” mono-platform Java – ah ah, sorry for the lame pun), it’s just that younger programmers have ZERO access to the language whereas MS is giving away the FULL EDITION of VisualStudio for FREE (the school pays yearly for it but from student’s PoV it seems “free”) to nearly every IT student out there through the “MS Academic Alliance” thing.

No wonders teachers feel like teaching on these tools (or free ones like Java + Eclipse) rather than Embarcadero’s expensive tools. It’s sad but true.

New people will NEVER realize the power of Delphi as their tool of choice for their future steps into the professionnal world if nobody shows it to them.

Let me walk you back in time with myself. I discovered Delphi something like 13 years ago when the full version 1 (then 2 came in some months after) of it was shipped for free with PCWorld magazine in the UK (special non-business-use licence), I was 12 – I was shocked.

Despite outdated, the tool was nothing short of impressive compared to Basic, and so damn EASY to learn and use!!!

Then I wanted to use more recent versions as years went by, but I couldn’t pay them so… I went to the dark side and got those binaries I could get from the wires or shady places… only the standard editions. Then one day (was 14 or 15) I BOUGHT Delphi 4 Pro (crazy year) after saving up a lot of pocket money (and because a store was selling it legally for a very cheap price). At that age thinking of spending money in that obsolete software (when I wouldn’t get any pocket money ever anyway or maybe like 2$ in 10 months) did show a LOT how I was amazed by the software and believed in it’s potential (it was so strange a request that my father ended up buying it for me because my eyes were sparkling ever since I saw the ad of the package).

After opening, installing and then using it I really REALLY liked what I saw (ability to produce working code to databases, networking, office, activex/com applications in mere seconds with a few clicks, source code of VCL components, user manual, documentation in books BOOKS!! BOOKS! Poster of VCL hierarchy … it was more than what I could have dreamed for – except I so damn wanted the Architect edition after seeing all the components I was missing on that giant poster)!

After that I felt even more hurt that at the very same time on the very same planet was successful at selling stuff that was like a millions years behind in terms of maturity. It was beyond understanding, it was madness!

But it went on. Even though I was using Delphi regularly as a hobbyist programmer and the community was great, I graduated from highschool and started studies in computer science.

Little did I know that it would be a Delphi-void curriculum. But there I learned C (easy as hell to learn with Delphi background, and even better, the delphi programmer I was wrote BETTER code in C then others because Pascal’s strict coding rules enforcement would make me lay out code following the industry’s best practices instinctively and I already knew about pointers and OOP so it was like icing on the cake.

From there onwards I would spend my semesters swearing on GTK programming, C++, Java… with their so-called RAD and broken features set. creating GUI apps with pure code so often made me desperate. I even asked my teachers several times if they would accept I’d submit the homework as Delphi projects (to no avail).

NOBODY in school knew about Delphi beside me, and NOBODY believed what I said bout it being SO GREAT! They were saying “well if it was that good to begin with then teachers would know what it is and MS would have made the same tools, look at VS, it’s great enough!” (even without Delhi I’d have killed just to be using Borland C++ Builder instead – I used it alongside Delphi to look at what it was, but Delphi was better – but I digress). Sadly, you cannot convince blind people without mind blowing proofs and apart from me coding whatever “impossible” program they wanted me to code in less than a day on multiple occasions, they didn’t want nor need to believe because it didn’t come from themselves.

And after 4 years we suddenly started learning C#. Oh the irony! 4 damn years! You know what? They were amazed, they said “wow this is so cool!”, I felt like crying… I mean… really. I wouldn’t believe what I was hearing nor seeing, and then I started coding on it too, and it was really good. Of course, it was a playskool toy in front of the mighty Delphi 4 Pro (and other versions that you never heard me saying I had) at home. Nothing to build truly complex business apps. But I saw how far MS had advanced (still it was sluggish as hell compared to compiled win32 Delphi) but I felt like the game was changing (and after using free Eclipse, I was having serious doubts on JBuilder’s future)

Nowadays I’m coding in Java, I didn’t touch Delphi since maybe 3 years. It’s been hurting to see how Delphi went from up to down and anywhere in between. Also from my career perspective there is little room for Delphi. I don’t feel like buying it, but if I could have a go at it and were impressed by it then I sure wouldn’t hesitate to buy it. But for IT seniors/managers Delphi programmers are too few for it to be attractive. Maybe if high profile projects could be advertized more and how serious gains could be acheved with Delphi they would reconsider it, but I can’t help but feel like apart from die hard fans or IT depts with hudge Delphi apps, would start new projects using it. There are just not enough “fresh” developpers proficient with it, that’s the most critical issue.

One has to realize students DON’T learn nor use Delphi. If they were it would be much MUCH more different. I don’t know where Delphi is right now (feel free tell me if you do), but cross-platform dev could be cool enough for me to buy it immediately, but I’d rather test it before.

When there’s a great tool available, it only takes putting it on the hand of non-believers for them to open their eyes and use it.

Remember when I said nobody around me knew of Delphi? It wasn’t entirely true because after 4 years of studies, one of my classmates went on internship and improved an “in-house” ERP for a big french industry military corporation all coded in Delphi.

When I met him again he was all giggling on how insanely powerful Delphi was and how he made dozens of fully working apps in a couple of weeks with the VCL taking him only a week to learn the whole language for the first time.

Delphi is just THAT awesome! I want to believe it’s still as good as before, but no matter what, even if it’s not perfect, if there are good points about it, SOMEBODY MUST ENSURE at least hundreds of IT students get to USE, THINK, BREATHE and DREAM OF DELPHI. Give it to them for free! It’s not like they’re gonna make money out of it with the usual tough non-business academic licence. I dunno, just feed millions of young chinese programmers with it day and night, whatever, just DO IT!

Don’t forget that kids nowadays are scary and can learn programming very quickly! Compared to C# or Java, learning Delphi will be a PIECE OF CAKE for them! Don’t focus on training people already fluent with C# and others, they just don’t want to learn Delphi. But the future’s programmers are out there. If there’s anybody worth converting, it’s them!

Teenagers programmers are not stupid, they are big enough to immediately notice when a tool will give them an edge. And if said edge is big enough they’ll want to use it and push for it because it’s a win-win situation! I’ve been there, I know about it. Sure I’m not as faithful as I used to be but whenever I do GUI in Java or see my colleague here working on VS to code some C++ win32 app I laugh to myself (I told my boss I’d do the same stuff in half the time with Delphi if I were given the chance but like at school nobody believe me – and the poor C++ guy’s position would be endangered so I can’t do anything).

(sorry for the long post, but I wanted to tell you all about my experience and how I feel – not all hope’s lost and even “youngsters” like me can still want Delphi, just don’t repeat Borland’s mistakes with programming teachers/schools/classes and ensure student DO learn and use the right tool!)

PS: I’m french, please excuse any poor english wording and such, I didn’t proof-read.

>>… what effect are you seeing?
Now half a year we are a lot wiser … so … In october I thought the discussion will end and it did. Thanks god.

The effect – Take a Delphi developer that works on D 40. Do you think this person who decided to go the first time in live with desicion for .net and C# into the world of “big technologies” will be happy. A lot came back, not because of .net or the language.

Here’s another one of those Stack Overflow discussions. Please feel free to add your experiences.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2407259/if-you-were-developing-shareware-softwares-for-windows-would-you-target-the-net/2409993

I’m seeing more questions being asked in forums like Stack Overflow by people who are new to Delphi, and I’m personally seeing more active Delphi projects locally, which suggests more Delphi activity, not less.

If you’re interested, you should look at what the latest Delphi has to offer. The discussion I linked to really only covers up to Delphi 2009, and Delphi 2010 improves on this even further.

You mentioned that you haven’t used Delphi since Version 7. Without taking anything away from the .Net platform, there have been a LOT of changes to Delphi since then.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/305016/what-are-major-incentives-to-upgrade-to-d2009-unicode-excluded/305262

That said, I still have always prefered the Pascal language above C.

Personally I have the impression that there is some kind of ‘revival’ happening. At least here in Belgium !

I seem to be getting an awful lot of requests for Delphi Development lately. Quite a lot of them are modifications to existing application, but I have been getting requests for completely new apps as well.

Regards,

Stefaan