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Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

getlazarus.org

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Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#31

Post by emptyfile »

SwellJoe wrote: post #24
Hexcles wrote: post #18

In China, Pascal is a very popular language for high school beginners of Olympiad in Informatics (see http://www.ioinformatics.org/ for the international competition). And it's probably the most used language in the provincial level competition, National Olympiad in Informatics in Province. Yet those who reach the national level will likely switch to C++ for many reasons (STL, performance, etc.). I myself started pro…

Pascal was the teaching language of choice in the US for a very long time. My high school AP (advanced classes that provided college credit) programming classes were taught with Pascal, after the introductory class using BASIC. But, I was in high school a long time ago, and programming was taught on Apple II computers (there were some IIe computers in the lab, as well). I don't think there's widespread Pascal usage f…

I'm not from the US, but in my high school Pascal was taught up until a few years ago when they switched to Python. Other schools here usually teach C.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#33

Post by meekins »

welfare wrote: post #30
kriro wrote: post #21

Pascal always takes me down memory lane...to the very young me, family just got the first PC. I wrote the first "programs" in good old QBasic but that couldn't create executable files so I bought a random book on Pascal (yellow book, something with 7.0?) I saw in a store which came with a floppy that had a compiler (and thus allowed me to create the magical .exe files). Thinking about this makes me smile for multiple…

I have almost exactly the same memories of Pascal. Being a kid tinkering with QBasic (and later QuickBasic that also created the mystical executables). It was when I started tinkering with computer graphics I realized that QBasic was not that performant and stumbled upon Pascal. It was in Borland Pascal I first learned about pointers, vectors, memory management etc.

Funny, that's exactly how I moved from Basic to Pascal... And eventually to C since I realized that my awful self-implemented 2d graphics library would never have the performance nor the set of features of for example the Allegro game programming library.

I also tinkered a lot in Delphi after that and I'd really like to give Lazarus a try now that I'm an adult who actually knows how to program.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#34

Post by barrystaes »

Good times.

I often wondered if there is an OSS project/example that just aims to run the same code on as may platforms as possible..

You know an example? Please share here. :)

My followup question would be if they test regressions for all the target platforms manually?

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#35

Post by dejv »

moonshinefe wrote: post #2

Do people code in Pascal still?! I remember it from years ago in high school and it seemed like it was already ancient then. Nothing against the language itself, it was straightforward and easy to learn on. Just surprised to see a new compiler for it coming out.

Sure, there are not much new development, but there is still a lot of people working in it every day. I am one of those people, maintaining and developing big business system.

You can find Pascal/Delphi projects everywhere: a lot of scientific instrumentation software has GUI written in Delphi, there are tons of business software, even big amount of machines has UI for their front panels written in this language.

I think Delphi/Lazarus is still best software for writing small to medium sized desktop apps available.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#36

Post by baq »

lordfoom wrote: post #22
PvsNP_ZA wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In South Africa, Pascal and Delphi are still taught in schools... In fact, the University of South Africa actually has about 2 Delphi semester modules also, along with C++. Some schools have switched over to Java, and most other universities have jumped onto the Java/.NET bandwagon. So in a nutshell, I think it's still pretty prevalent in 3rd world countries. It's not a bad starting language to introduce students to…

Point of fact: the RSA department of education removed Java as the language being taught, and replaced it with Delphi, despite objections (from some like myself). Here's an article: http://mybroadband.co.za/news/columns/89295-is-delphi-better...

i'd say it's a good decision for everybody except perhaps hiring companies, and then i'm not sure about that either in the long run.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#37

Post by barrystaes »

andreiv wrote: post #7
moonshinefe wrote: post #2

Do people code in Pascal still?! I remember it from years ago in high school and it seemed like it was already ancient then. Nothing against the language itself, it was straightforward and easy to learn on. Just surprised to see a new compiler for it coming out.

The firm where I currently work has a rather huge Delphi legacy software. You'd be surprised how much is still being "extracted" out of if. The more modern (and better built, but I'm biased, as I'm part of the team developing it) web app, which is meant to replace the Delphi one, has not had the same success. It's picking up momentum though...

Assuming you're no longer in Germany, say hi to Vanessa and Tommy from me.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#38

Post by andreiv »

clouddrover wrote: post #17
andreiv wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The firm where I currently work has a rather huge Delphi legacy software. You'd be surprised how much is still being "extracted" out of if. The more modern (and better built, but I'm biased, as I'm part of the team developing it) web app, which is meant to replace the Delphi one, has not had the same success. It's picking up momentum though...

If it's better built then why hasn't had the same success? What are your metrics for "better"? What does "more modern" mean exactly? I don't see that there's much value in pursuing design or implementation purity if the software isn't getting the same end user take-up.

The Delphi app has been continuously "enriched" with features and special cases, based on direct feature requests for each client that requested one. This has lead to the case where there are several thousands switches which need to work together, in every combination possible. They don't always work, by the way. The new app has selected the more relevant use cases and could be better structured and implemented. Modern means primarily a cleaned up UI, but also the dynamic way of customizing the GUI (defined per JSON and capable of on the fly changes for individual users or groups of users, instead of hard-code and compiled or yet another flag stored in the DB).

The clients are usually pleased with the web app but the project managers are a bit hesitant, due to the different installation process. The Delphi app has been sold/installed for well over 10-15 years and people are used to copying .exe files on a server. Copying files and .dll-s and tinkering with IIS seams to be less appealing...

The need to go "online" has been the driving factor for the web app.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#39

Post by hsivonen »

moonshinefe wrote: post #2

Do people code in Pascal still?! I remember it from years ago in high school and it seemed like it was already ancient then. Nothing against the language itself, it was straightforward and easy to learn on. Just surprised to see a new compiler for it coming out.

The HTML spec migrated from a Python-based cross-reference generator (https://bitbucket.org/ms2ger/anolis/) to a Pascal-based one (https://github.com/whatwg/wattsi) recently.

Re: Free Pascal Compiler Version 3.0.0

#40

Post by andreiv »

barrystaes wrote: post #37
andreiv wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The firm where I currently work has a rather huge Delphi legacy software. You'd be surprised how much is still being "extracted" out of if. The more modern (and better built, but I'm biased, as I'm part of the team developing it) web app, which is meant to replace the Delphi one, has not had the same success. It's picking up momentum though...

Assuming you're no longer in Germany, say hi to Vanessa and Tommy from me.

Sorry? I think you're confusing me with someone else :) FYI, still in Germany and don't know any Vanessa or Tommy.
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