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Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.


2005-10-25 02:17:42 AM
delphi72
I have heard just about everything I need to so far! It is the first
time in a long time I feel comfortable that Borland "gets it".
Good statements from Scott, Danny, and Allen! Allen said the #1
request for support is 32bit compiled code (not .Net)!!! Scott
said that he tries to follow the lead of his development team and
they feel that a native 64win compiler is needed, so I support it
and the team 100%.
About my only complaint is that it sounds like Danny only gets to
work on W64 and Unicode when he has time, which puts in question
when we will see it as a product. It would be real nice to see
a preview compiler and VCL in the Avalon time frame!
He did mention that we might see just a 64bit compiler only preview
with Highlander, but only if he finished everything early for
Highlander, which he doubted.
I am feeling more comfortable with the future of my code base
and Delphi. And maybe the management team aren't such idiots
after all, but not convinced there yet :-)
PS - hoping for more detailed information from Borland at
Borcon on W64 delivery!!!!! (for John Kaster)
--
Thomas Miller
Chrome Portal Project Manager
Wash DC Delphi SIG Chairperson
Delphi Client/Server Certified Developer
BSS Accounting & Distribution Software
BSS Enterprise Accounting FrameWork
www.bss-software.com
www.cpcug.org/user/delphi/index.html
sourceforge.net/projects/chromeportal/
sourceforge.net/projects/uopl/
sourceforge.net/projects/dbexpressplus
 
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

"Thomas Miller" <XXXX@XXXXX.COM>writes:
Quote
It would be real nice to see a preview compiler
For me, these are a complete waste of time. I'd rather have them take
an additional 6 months and get it finished, then diverting resources to get
a preview compiler out the door.
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Quote
>It would be real nice to see a preview compiler

For me, these are a complete waste of time. I'd rather have them take
an additional 6 months and get it finished, then diverting resources to
get
a preview compiler out the door.
Me too.
But I guess everyone is different, presumably some people find them useful.
But I find it hard to believe that people interested in, say, the .net CF
have not got themselves a copy of VS.NET and are already doing CF
development. The .NET CF preview doesn't let you do anything you can not do
already or learn CF programming any better, it just shows it can be done on
Delphi but as yet without IDE support.
Perhaps it is good for marketing.
Lauchlan M
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Lauchlan M writes:
Quote
>For me, these are a complete waste of time. I'd rather have them take
>an additional 6 months and get it finished, then diverting resources to
get
>a preview compiler out the door.

Me too.

But I guess everyone is different, presumably some people find them useful.
How much extra work does it require? All that a preview compiler is is
a work in progress. They're basically working on something and release
it half way through the development process (with unit testing/ongoing
QA that they would've had to do anyway). that is good to get feedback
from early adopters. Personally, I welcome the previews.
The .NET preview compiler gave me an opportunity to try out ASP.NET
early using Delphi. Without Kylix and the Delphi.NET preview compiler
Delphi 7 was of little use as a separate release- I would have stuck with
Delphi 6. However, I think that the "between releases" previews are a
much better idea.
Quote
But I find it hard to believe that people interested in, say, the .net CF
have not got themselves a copy of VS.NET and are already doing CF
development. The .NET CF preview doesn't let you do anything you can not do
already or learn CF programming any better, it just shows it can be done on
Delphi but as yet without IDE support.

Perhaps it is good for marketing.
Actually, I would say its good for community building. As an example, I was
a Visual J++ user in the early days because of the preview release that
Microsoft put out. Microsoft knows how to do this community preview
stuff, I am glad to see Borland is figuring it out too.
Cheers,
Kevin.
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Well, you seem to have successfully argued both sides of the argument. Which
way do you want it? <g>
Lauchlan M
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

"Lauchlan M" <LMackinnonAT_NoSpam_ozemailDOTcomDOTau>writes
Quote
Well, you seem to have successfully argued both sides of the argument.
Which
way do you want it? <g>
Maybe>1 Kevin on the planet?
- Roddy
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Quote
>Well, you seem to have successfully argued both sides of the argument.
>Which
>way do you want it? <g>

Maybe>1 Kevin on the planet?
What a ridiculous idea. <g>
Two Kevins? In the same ng? Posting in the same thread? :)
Lauchlan M
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

"Lauchlan M" <LMackinnonAT_NoSpam_ozemailDOTcomDOTau>writes
Quote
What a ridiculous idea. <g>

Two Kevins? In the same ng? Posting in the same thread? :)
Well, I hear they're working really hard to clone Danny Thorpe, among
others. Maybe the Kevins are an experiment? ;)
While I don't think a 'preview version' as such is sensible, I would recommend
aspects of the "release early, release often" approach.
Allen B's series of much-applauded patches are a great example of the
"release often" approach - although it is a shame it took around 9 months for
them to surface...
- Roddy
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Kevin writes:
Quote
How much extra work does it require? All that a preview compiler is
is a work in progress. They're basically working on something and
release it half way through the development process (with unit
testing/ongoing QA that they would've had to do anyway). that is good
to get feedback from early adopters.
I would be surprised if it involved much effort at all. I mean, I'd
think the most work being done on a preview compiler would be getting
the lawyer to write a bullet proof disclaimer stating that the preview
compiler shouldn't be used for production work, etc, etc. Other than
that, grab the most recent stable/working build, slap it in a .ZIP with
a LICENSE.TXT and maybe a short README.TXT explaining any funky command
line options and call it good.
Will
--
Want native support in Delphi for AMD64/EM64T? Vote here--
qc.borland.com/wc/qcmain.aspx
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Kevin writes:
Quote
For me, these are a complete waste of time. I'd rather have them
take an additional 6 months and get it finished, then diverting
resources to get a preview compiler out the door.
Yes, because using Notepad and running WinRAR clearly requires
everyones complete involvement.
Will
--
Want native support in Delphi for AMD64/EM64T? Vote here--
qc.borland.com/wc/qcmain.aspx
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Roddy Pratt writes:
Quote
Well, I hear they're working really hard to clone Danny Thorpe, among
others.
1/8 size. They'll call him "Mini D", and I understand he'll be working
on the CF stuff. :)
--
Regards,
Bruce McGee
Glooscap Software
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Quote
Two Kevins? In the same ng? Posting in the same thread? :)
Correct. I looked at that and said, "Hey, I agued against myself!!" :)
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Quote
Yes, because using Notepad and running WinRAR clearly requires
everyones complete involvement.
I guess you have not produced a release before.
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

It is too bad everyone is focusing on the possibility, how slim it
may be, on the preview w64bit compiler. There would be no VCL
included, so you would have to write all the code raw, ala
C++. So let's get over this. It would be nice to play
with, but not that big of a deal.
What was really important was the other information talked about.
#1 - Borland recognizes that compile code is the #1 platform it's
clients are interested in. It so happens that is w32, but at least
I feel confident that compiled code is firmly on the front burner.
I definitely had the impression that w32 was an after thought for
quite sometime (D7, D8, D2005. More improvements to inlining are
coming, better memory management, move fixes to the VCL then normal
(at least that is what it sounded like to me)!!!!
#2 - Scott said that he takes the lead on technology direction from
the BDS team. They told him W64 native was needed and he supports
their decision. Danny said quite clearly that upper management
green lighted moving w64 from experimental to production.
This is the big news in my mind!!!!
Thomas Miller writes:
Quote
I have heard just about everything I need to so far! It is the first
time in a long time I feel comfortable that Borland "gets it".

Good statements from Scott, Danny, and Allen! Allen said the #1
request for support is 32bit compiled code (not .Net)!!! Scott
said that he tries to follow the lead of his development team and
they feel that a native 64win compiler is needed, so I support it
and the team 100%.

About my only complaint is that it sounds like Danny only gets to
work on W64 and Unicode when he has time, which puts in question
when we will see it as a product. It would be real nice to see
a preview compiler and VCL in the Avalon time frame!

He did mention that we might see just a 64bit compiler only preview
with Highlander, but only if he finished everything early for
Highlander, which he doubted.

I am feeling more comfortable with the future of my code base
and Delphi. And maybe the management team aren't such idiots
after all, but not convinced there yet :-)

PS - hoping for more detailed information from Borland at
Borcon on W64 delivery!!!!! (for John Kaster)

--
Thomas Miller
Chrome Portal Project Manager
Wash DC Delphi SIG Chairperson
Delphi Client/Server Certified Developer
BSS Accounting & Distribution Software
BSS Enterprise Accounting FrameWork
www.bss-software.com
www.cpcug.org/user/delphi/index.html
sourceforge.net/projects/chromeportal/
sourceforge.net/projects/uopl/
sourceforge.net/projects/dbexpressplus
 

Re:Stuff going on at the BDNRadio show.

Quote
It is too bad everyone is focusing on the possibility, how slim it
may be, on the preview w64bit compiler. There would be no VCL
included, so you would have to write all the code raw, ala
C++. So let's get over this. It would be nice to play
with, but not that big of a deal.
A whole bunch of code could get ported to it before the VCL is, like
chunks of JCL for non-visual side or KOL/CLX for the visual side (not
very rich, but quite enough for config screens of services & DLLs).
Visual code that revolves around OpenGL, SDL or DirectX doesn't really
need the VCL either.
Only code that wouldn't stand much of a chance with a preview compiler
would be VCL based, UI applications. But these aren't really the primary
targets for native 64bit.
Quote
#1 - Borland recognizes that compile code is the #1 platform [...]
#2 - Scott said that he takes the lead on technology direction [...]
Might be they also learned from JBuilder: when you do not control the
platform, you can be ousted from any role by the competition.
On Java they'll now be selling Eclipse fringe tools, but they must be
aware that their position there is fragile... some IBM-financed free
Eclipse plugin could dislodge them at any time in the future, just as
Eclipse itself dislodged them from the Java IDE market.
In Delphi, they control the compiler, the language, the framework, the
compatibility, and maybe even more importantly, they control the
philosophy.
A Java shop can switch to any Java IDE without any negative effect on
their codebase, not so for Delphi. All they have to do to preserve their
Delphi market is to show commitment and keep customers happy, which is
quite a bit easier (and financially safer) than battling heavy-weights
like MS or IBM on their own turfs.
Quote
This is the big news in my mind!!!!
Indeed!
Eric