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Closed 10 years ago.
We have an application made in Delphi 7 that has been evolving for over a decade. We are currently migrating to XE2, but that will take a bit of time.
I recently discovered FastMM replacement memory manager. After reading this seems like a no-brainer step for any application in Delphi 7 (or earlier?). Sadly, we are just discovering it; I suppose to do lack of knowledge or exposure.
My question is are there other additions like FastMM that are also no brainers when creating an application with Delphi 7, other small tweaks, components, tools or units like this one that most people would agree should be added to virtually any application for Delphi 7. I know many things have come to light over the years or components come into existence that we may not be aware of. Googling for this information gives most out of date results.
Any guidance is appreciated.
This kind of question (and answering it) has the risk of raising lots of discussion, but the information you ask for is valuable for others, so here is my answer:
use development productivity tools like ModelMaker Code Explorer, Castallia, cnPack IDE Wizards or GExperts (this or is not exclusive)
use FastMM4
use an exception catcher like madExcept
use a logging tool like CodeSite or Eurekalog
use a GUI control suite like those from DevExpress, Raize, JVCL, etc (there are way more)
use a base library like JCL
There is far more, maybe we should make this a community wiki.
From an upgrade perspective, my experience is that you best can upgrade all your 3rd party libraries to the latest version one by one, and then finally upgrade Delphi. That makes transitioning a multi-step process, which is easier to manage.
Related
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Closed 10 years ago.
You guys know any open source Blackberry applications. IMO looking at source code of good projects helps learn the system better, faster and not to mention reduces development time. Is there a recommended list of such projects or if not, can we build such a list? I think it will really be useful to other developers.
My apologize for delay in answer. Here are links for useful Java BB apps, libraries and code:
Wordpress for BB
LogicMail - alternate mail client
Facebook SDK for BB - FB SDK not from RIM nor FB
Wireless music sync app
BB Tracker - quite old one
BB tools - also quite old one
I'm not saying that code from there is standard (For me the LogicMail is most acceptable) but there are plenty of useful code about networking, storage, gps and ui. As well please take in attention advanced UI samples from RIM mentioned by #Nate
I only have time to post one link here, but this is one I would definitely recommend for all beginners, because it helps understand UI development, which (in my opinion) is definitely more difficult to learn on BlackBerry versus other mobile platforms (especially Android or iOS).
See information about it on BlackBerry's site here
or the github repository here
If you're using the legacy BlackBerry Java APIs (OS <= 7), you will certainly wind up subclassing the built-in RIM UI classes, to add functionality of your own. There's a good chance that many of the things you want to do are already done, or at least started, in this Advanced UI project.
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Closed 10 years ago.
So, since one cannot build metro style apps with F# and it isn’t possible to reference a F# library from within a metro style app, where is the place of F# in Windows 8?
I mean what is its future?
Won’t F# have the same fate as Silverlight after a while? Does Microsoft have the will to develop it farther?
I know, I know I can still develop asp.net, WCF and desktop applications in F#, but the question is what are the long term plans of the Microsoft with it?
Will it perish some day, or will live forever?
Edited:
Well, I’m fine with impossibility to build metro style apps in F#. I assume that its Lightweight\Verbose syntax and the need for indentation make it difficult to write a XAML pre-processor or write a VS template. The question is, is it an experimental project aimed to take the best parts of it and include them into C#, or F# has a future in Windows eco-system?
I think your assumptions are wrong - it should be possible to reference F# library from a C# Metro-style application if you create Portable Library project in Visual Studio 11.
So, F# will definitely continue to be useful as a langauge for developing the "difficult" part of Windows application where you implement your domain model, algorithms, network communication etc.
Moreover, with projects like Pit (or commercial WebSharper), it is possible to write F# applications that will be truly portable and can run not just on Windows 8, but also on Android tablets or on the iPad as JavaScript applications.
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Closed 11 years ago.
I am an independent consultant and I have developed a product which is liked by my customer that I am trying to port from Java to Delphi. Delphi satisfies couple of my important needs: Native code compilation that gives speed and obfuscation and the language is highly productive as I tried.
Question that I have is:
Would you invest in Delphi, given its turbulent past?
Is there any alternative to Delphi if I want to chose a platform that compiles to native code and is portable to MAC and highly productive?
Does a turbulent past necessarily mean a turbulent future? Look at the current state of Delphi as it has been since Embarcadero took over and evaluate based on that.
Apparently your other choices might be C# .NET with Mono, C++ with a cross-platform GUI library such as wxWidgets or Qt, or Java. But it's a subjective call as to whether one would call those "highly productive".
There's a nice Squidoo article on Cross Platform GUI Programming that will give you some things to consider in your choice, and it lists a few other possibilities.
The latest Delphi XE2 supports cross-platform native development for Windows 32bit and 64bit, Mac OSX 32bit, and iOS with its new FireMonkey framework.
If you don't want to use Delphi, you can use FreePascal (which Delphi uses internally for its iOS support until a native iOS compiler is created).
I would certainly highly recommend using Delphi if you are in consideration of its abilities. Especially with the release of RAD studio XE2, where you can compile 32/64bit/mac/mobile apps, you'll be impressed at the capabilities. I regret to say that I'm not that familiar with many other languages, but I have basically come to be extremely comfortable with Delphi.
If I had to compare it with another language, I'd have to say C#, which Delphi is pretty much the Father language of C#. Delphi is great for pure lower-level programming, whereas C# seems to have an extra layer over it (including .NET). C# is widely used in .NET applications such as websites (ASP.NET), windows forms applications, service applications, etc.
Both Delphi and C# can pretty much do the same thing, but in a different approach (and far different syntax). I'm not sure however if C# can be used on MAC platforms. But Microsoft Visual Studio is the software you want for C#.
I also recommend that you point your interest in FireMonkey, which comes with XE2. This is an HD application language. It's basically a re-write of the entire VCL library for better graphics, and much more.
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Closed 10 years ago.
I've been a fan of Turbopower Async Pro for years, now taken up on SourceForge and it works very well. However, it's complex and I've never really made use of its features other than the port component. I'm updating my code for D2009 etc and am tempted to move to something simpler since I have my own wrapper around it. There are lots of port components out there but are there any recommendations here? Thanks.
Lars Dybdahl recently blogged about the open source TComport component that's sprung back to life, and how Delphi 2007 and 2009 support have been added.
Lars's blog: http://compaspascal.blogspot.com/2008/11/delphi-bigger-than-c-tcomport-history.html
TComport home on SourceForge: http://sourceforge.net/projects/comport/
Also take a look at SynaSer (towards the bottom of that page). I have used his TCP/IP library for quite some time now and have found it extremely easy to use and extend and would expect his serial comms library to be similar.
Is anything in Delphi really future-proof? Stick with open-source anyway - If it's on Sourceforge at least you have the source, and it won't vanish if the company that makes it goes out of the Delphi software business.
Use whatever works for you. If Turbopower Async Pro (duh, what a name) works then don’t change it. :)
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Closed 10 years ago.
I think the best part of flash is the possibility to create not squared user interfaces, so I like the idea to create desktop apps using flash. I know AIR is for that but it doesn't allow real access to OperatingSystem apis and dlls and the commercial options are kind of difficult to customize.
You can try ScreenweaverHX:
http://haxe.org/com/libs/swhx
It's the Haxe-based successor of the old Screenweaver. However, it's not as simple as the old version used to be. Most likely you need to take a look to the basics of Haxe and Neko, the 2 technologies it's based on.
There's another project on top of SWHX that it's called HippoHX. It aims to "complete" SWHX providing that extra functionality you might miss (simple ActionScript APIs and a GUI). However, it's in its early stages:
http://hippohx.com
DISCLAIMER: I'm the owner of HippoHX, so my point is obviously biased.
As far as I know SWHX is the only Open Source alternative at this point.
Try flajector. it's powerfull converter from flash to exe. You can to develop your application using AIR. And then you can convert it into desktop application .exe