We're maybe 50-100 Delphi developers and most of us can't wait to jump to C#.
To each his own :)
I miss Delphi
31–40 of 194 posts
Re: I miss Delphi
#32If anyone using Delphi to build big apps in early 90s was told that to do the same function in 25 years time they would need HTML, CSS, JS, Ruby or PHP or similar, some SQL, some Rust or Go and probably a few DSLs - it would take months longer to build - require multiple servers - and would need more test code than app code to get it 98% as stable - you wouldn't have believed a word of it. Every single time I have to…
>I strongly suspect the generation after this will rediscover the power of desktop apps and some of the dev tools that were around at that time.
The biggest thing desktop apps are missing was the delivery mechanism. With web apps:
* a new user is just a hyperlink away * pushing app updates is a page reload * server-side state eliminates all of the migration headaches for client-based state
People are fickle and they will decide not to use a service if it takes a couple of seconds to load. When you require them to download an app and install it, you've already eliminated two major categories of users: impatient users, and users who don't know how to (or aren't allowed to) install applications.
Re: I miss Delphi
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
I recently had to write a desktop GUI app, and chose Electron[1] because I figured that for once I'd try something new and hip with lots of OSS libraries because it wasn't too critical and I needed to pass it on to someone else and figured there are lots of frontend web devs around. Well, it's kinda OK, but man, that thing is held together with spit and baling wire, and you feel like it's all going to come down with…
What I mostly hate in webdev is exactly that, helding together with spit and baling wire, a pile of HTML tags meant for document publishing, CSS and JavaScript, while pretending the browser is a proper application VM. Than switching browsers, including the same one but a different version, and start implementing workarounds. Multiplying this experience for each browser/version/OS required by the customer.
And it's not just web. I also used Julia in that project, and while the language itself is really awesome for numerics (especially as I had to migrate a lot of existing Matlab code, which is a pleasure with Julia), good luck trying to package a standalone app (especially if you're using native libraries). Oh, and the startup time? It's funny how some people complain about the JVM in that regard.
Every once in a while I try to pull my head out of the JVM world to try other stuff, see what else is out there, and people seem to be putting up with a lot of pain that's downright unacceptable with more established tech. I'm guessing people may be coming over from scripting languages where they're used to this stuff (and they may it jarring to work on the JVM). Even when things aren't that bad, like with NPM, they're miles behind the sturdiness of the Maven ecosystem (which is far from perfect in itself).
Re: I miss Delphi
#34There's this http://www.unigui.com make all your web apps in Delphi :-), they've been in beta for a long time but seems to work.
VirtualUI is another interesting way to have a remote web interface to a Win32 Delphi app. Not necessarily scalable to a large number of users but a nice option if it fits your requirements:
Re: I miss Delphi
#35If anyone using Delphi to build big apps in early 90s was told that to do the same function in 25 years time they would need HTML, CSS, JS, Ruby or PHP or similar, some SQL, some Rust or Go and probably a few DSLs - it would take months longer to build - require multiple servers - and would need more test code than app code to get it 98% as stable - you wouldn't have believed a word of it. Every single time I have to…
You're still using Rust / Go ? I've been using Luna on the Rocket stack, with Huston for distribution and Apollo for stack management, and it fixes mostly all the problems you've mentioned.
I seriously can't tell if those are things or not. I'm so far behind!
Re: I miss Delphi
#36If anyone using Delphi to build big apps in early 90s was told that to do the same function in 25 years time they would need HTML, CSS, JS, Ruby or PHP or similar, some SQL, some Rust or Go and probably a few DSLs - it would take months longer to build - require multiple servers - and would need more test code than app code to get it 98% as stable - you wouldn't have believed a word of it. Every single time I have to…
You're still using Rust / Go ? I've been using Luna on the Rocket stack, with Huston for distribution and Apollo for stack management, and it fixes mostly all the problems you've mentioned.
I invoke Poe's law.
I'm out of the loop of the cutting edge of UI stacks, so I genuinely do not know whether you are sarcastic or sincere...
Re: I miss Delphi
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
What I mostly hate in webdev is exactly that, helding together with spit and baling wire, a pile of HTML tags meant for document publishing, CSS and JavaScript, while pretending the browser is a proper application VM. Than switching browsers, including the same one but a different version, and start implementing workarounds. Multiplying this experience for each browser/version/OS required by the customer.
It's at least better than it once was, heck everything is better with modern Javascript etc., transpiling from TypeScript, tooling or whatever. But yeah, the issues with the underpinnings is in my opinion still funny enough exactly as readily apparent as ever.
The only thing that pleasantly surprised me while working on that project was Typescript and its IDE support (vscode). Java is still easier overall, but given what they have to integrate with (untyped libraries and legacy code, separate type declaration files) it's pretty damn impressive.
Re: I miss Delphi
#38I work with Delphi professionally. And we maintain a code base of about 150,000 lines of Pascal and about 300,000 lines of T-SQL (written to work in both Sybase and Microsoft SQL). Delphi may be easy, but it's not simple. Once you get into the meat of things, Delphi's ecosystem truly becomes a limitation. Delphi's main drawback is its lack of library availability. If you are in the marked for modern technology, using…
> I've written a web server - and maintain a web server - in Delphi
Are you using a framework for that or is it your own implementation? I've found mORMot to be useful:
Re: I miss Delphi
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Note that Vala is apparently more or less dead.
Yep, GNOME seems to be adopting Rust, with librsvg and GNOME Builder being the first places to spot it.
Awesome. I will take a look at it, it seems I haven't kept up with the times.
From what I see, it comes with a profiler, which is an excellent addition and the UI seems to be very similar to XCode.
Re: I miss Delphi
#40If anyone using Delphi to build big apps in early 90s was told that to do the same function in 25 years time they would need HTML, CSS, JS, Ruby or PHP or similar, some SQL, some Rust or Go and probably a few DSLs - it would take months longer to build - require multiple servers - and would need more test code than app code to get it 98% as stable - you wouldn't have believed a word of it. Every single time I have to…
>I strongly suspect the generation after this will rediscover the power of desktop apps and some of the dev tools that were around at that time. The biggest thing desktop apps are missing was the delivery mechanism. With web apps: * a new user is just a hyperlink away * pushing app updates is a page reload * server-side state eliminates all of the migration headaches for client-based state People are fickle and they…
webassembly + full page canvas. games already work like that. hopefully sanity is just around the corner.