4 ms·

That is the downfall of Delphi, they didn't adapt to market trends. When free and open source languages challenged it, they didn't make a free version. Other FO

That is the downfall of Delphi, they didn't adapt to market trends. When free and open source languages challenged it, they didn't make a free version. Other FOSS IDEs came out and took away business from them. Delphi was good in the 1990s and competed with Visual BASIC. Those were the salad days. Now Delphi is more of a niche market as people moved on to different languages and platforms. Kylix I think was the Linux version of Delphi. It didn't do so well.

giancarlostoro 11y ago
I am still surprised they don't somehow try to team up with FreePascal / Lazarus to benefit from their work and bring financial support, they could do something along the lines of what JetBrains does where they have an Open Source IDE and a community IDE that's open sourced. Part of me would still love to learn Delphi / Pascal if they ever got back into line because of native RAD development, it really makes making a GUI based application so much simpler. Sure we have Java and .NET but it's not the same feeling as a native application (not always).
- orionblastar 11y ago
  Yeah Free Pascal and Lazarus don't do the full Turbo Pascal and Delphi Object Oriented Pascal features. I was going to write a book on Free Pascal, and an Intro to Pascal using Free Pascal. But my Pascal skills are so out of date it would only be text based code and not OOP. Free Pascal and Lazarus need some books written on them. But I'm not skilled enough to write them. There used to be a Borland Museum that gave away DOS versions of Turbo Pascal, Turbo C, Turbo C++ etc. I think the current link is here: http://edn.embarcadero.com/museum/ http://edn.embarcadero.com/museum/ I haven't tried it in a while. They have the specs on Delphi 1.0 but never gave away Delphi 1.0 which would have been a 16 bit Windows program. I've seen versions of Delphi on Bit Torrent sites, but I stay away from pirated software. Sometimes the cracks are infected with viruses. Better to stay with Free Pascal and Lazarus instead. Besides Free Pascal and Lazarus are cross platform. Delphi isn't cross platform. Trade Wars Game Server is still written in Delphi, it is based on the old BBS Tradewars 2002 written in Turbo Pascal. http://www.eisonline.com/ http://www.eisonline.com/ They went from modem connections to Internet Telnet connections. People still play it and buy it.
  - giancarlostoro 11y ago
    Ironically FreePascal was written on a free version of Turbo Pascal until it was self-compiling (or whatever the phrase is) when they decided to stop making the free versions. I feel the same about pirated software. Besides, once you get enough into programming piracy doesn't seem right, in some cases you're either recoding it for yourself or you realize there was genuine work put into the software to the point where piracy just feels wrong completely.
    - orionblastar 11y ago
      Piracy feels wrong because programmers worked hard to get the code working and deserve to earn money from the sales of the software from their company. Some people used piracy to try a software program before they decide to buy it. For example Microsoft Windows was pirated by BBS systems, and it got popular and pirates would buy their own copy after trying it out first. People who pirated Windows 3.X for example, went on to buy Windows 95 when it came out. I used to work for PC Shops and they would give us copies of floppies with MS-DOS and Windows on it to install for customers without paying Microsoft OEM fees. This was before activation keys and online activation. I felt bad about doing it, but if I used a legit version and charged for it I'd be fired. It was custom PC and AT systems with parts made in China and Taiwan and sometimes a 386 as well when they could afford it.
  - yaowenjiaozi 11y ago
    There are some books for Lazarus and Free Pascal: http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Pascal_and_Lazarus_Books_and_Magazines http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Pascal_and_Lazarus_Books_...
takeawayandrun 11y ago
Is that the real reason? Isn't it more that it just didn't get enough traction? MATLAB has cashed in and they don't have a free version. Octave isn't eating their lunch. And it's not like the C/C++ guys made a ton of cashmoney - so "just make it free" isn't generally a viable business model
- giancarlostoro 11y ago
  MATLAB fits a specific market, whereas Delphi is very general and open ended. Their great benefit is RAD (Rapid Application Development) of GUI applications in relatively less time.
nobleach 11y ago
Yep, I worked for a software dev company at the end of the 90's that did Clipper, FoxPro, VB, and Delphi. When Borland announced Kylix, we bought into it totally. We purchased Delphi 6. I did really enjoy working with it, but it seems like an eternity ago. One could purchase all these VCL components (Datepickers and all that) from third party people. Now days, it seems so odd to think of purchasing something for 100 dollars to put into a program. I can remember loading Kylix on one of my linux boxes, starting it up, and trying to load up one of my projects. It gave me so trouble and I just gave up. (The truth was, none of our clients were running linux desktops anyway!) I still miss that whole era before I became a web developer.
- pjmlp 11y ago
  Component One libraries cost a bit more than 100 dollars. Yep also used all those languages in the 90's. Even the transition from Clipper to Visual Objects.
detaro 11y ago
They had free versions for a while if I remember correctly (Around Delphi 7?), and before that you could get them for really cheap (as in, "Delphi for kids" books bundled them), but then they went full enterprise and left all that behind. Was relatively popular with students here around that time, because it was by far the easiest thing that made GUIs.

giancarlostoro 11y ago

I am still surprised they don't somehow try to team up with FreePascal / Lazarus to benefit from their work and bring financial support, they could do something along the lines of what JetBrains does where they have an Open Source IDE and a community IDE that's open sourced. Part of me would still love to learn Delphi / Pascal if they ever got back into line because of native RAD development, it really makes making a GUI based application so much simpler. Sure we have Java and .NET but it's not the same feeling as a native application (not always).

orionblastar 11y ago
Yeah Free Pascal and Lazarus don't do the full Turbo Pascal and Delphi Object Oriented Pascal features. I was going to write a book on Free Pascal, and an Intro to Pascal using Free Pascal. But my Pascal skills are so out of date it would only be text based code and not OOP. Free Pascal and Lazarus need some books written on them. But I'm not skilled enough to write them. There used to be a Borland Museum that gave away DOS versions of Turbo Pascal, Turbo C, Turbo C++ etc. I think the current link is here: http://edn.embarcadero.com/museum/ http://edn.embarcadero.com/museum/ I haven't tried it in a while. They have the specs on Delphi 1.0 but never gave away Delphi 1.0 which would have been a 16 bit Windows program. I've seen versions of Delphi on Bit Torrent sites, but I stay away from pirated software. Sometimes the cracks are infected with viruses. Better to stay with Free Pascal and Lazarus instead. Besides Free Pascal and Lazarus are cross platform. Delphi isn't cross platform. Trade Wars Game Server is still written in Delphi, it is based on the old BBS Tradewars 2002 written in Turbo Pascal. http://www.eisonline.com/ http://www.eisonline.com/ They went from modem connections to Internet Telnet connections. People still play it and buy it.
- giancarlostoro 11y ago
  Ironically FreePascal was written on a free version of Turbo Pascal until it was self-compiling (or whatever the phrase is) when they decided to stop making the free versions. I feel the same about pirated software. Besides, once you get enough into programming piracy doesn't seem right, in some cases you're either recoding it for yourself or you realize there was genuine work put into the software to the point where piracy just feels wrong completely.
  - orionblastar 11y ago
    Piracy feels wrong because programmers worked hard to get the code working and deserve to earn money from the sales of the software from their company. Some people used piracy to try a software program before they decide to buy it. For example Microsoft Windows was pirated by BBS systems, and it got popular and pirates would buy their own copy after trying it out first. People who pirated Windows 3.X for example, went on to buy Windows 95 when it came out. I used to work for PC Shops and they would give us copies of floppies with MS-DOS and Windows on it to install for customers without paying Microsoft OEM fees. This was before activation keys and online activation. I felt bad about doing it, but if I used a legit version and charged for it I'd be fired. It was custom PC and AT systems with parts made in China and Taiwan and sometimes a 386 as well when they could afford it.
- yaowenjiaozi 11y ago
  There are some books for Lazarus and Free Pascal: http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Pascal_and_Lazarus_Books_and_Magazines http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/Pascal_and_Lazarus_Books_...

takeawayandrun 11y ago

Is that the real reason? Isn't it more that it just didn't get enough traction? MATLAB has cashed in and they don't have a free version. Octave isn't eating their lunch. And it's not like the C/C++ guys made a ton of cashmoney - so "just make it free" isn't generally a viable business model

giancarlostoro 11y ago
MATLAB fits a specific market, whereas Delphi is very general and open ended. Their great benefit is RAD (Rapid Application Development) of GUI applications in relatively less time.

nobleach 11y ago

Yep, I worked for a software dev company at the end of the 90's that did Clipper, FoxPro, VB, and Delphi. When Borland announced Kylix, we bought into it totally. We purchased Delphi 6. I did really enjoy working with it, but it seems like an eternity ago. One could purchase all these VCL components (Datepickers and all that) from third party people. Now days, it seems so odd to think of purchasing something for 100 dollars to put into a program. I can remember loading Kylix on one of my linux boxes, starting it up, and trying to load up one of my projects. It gave me so trouble and I just gave up. (The truth was, none of our clients were running linux desktops anyway!) I still miss that whole era before I became a web developer.

pjmlp 11y ago
Component One libraries cost a bit more than 100 dollars. Yep also used all those languages in the 90's. Even the transition from Clipper to Visual Objects.

detaro 11y ago

They had free versions for a while if I remember correctly (Around Delphi 7?), and before that you could get them for really cheap (as in, "Delphi for kids" books bundled them), but then they went full enterprise and left all that behind. Was relatively popular with students here around that time, because it was by far the easiest thing that made GUIs.