After years in embedded programming, I have to develop a Windows app. I dug out my old C++ Builder and Delphi. These are great and the latest version costs over $1k, so I won’t be going there.
What I particularly like is the VCL (visual component library) which let’s me code my own components and share them with others, plus the thousands of existing 3rd party components. I noticed that there is now also a RAD PHP from Borland too.
I realize that MSVC, QT, NetBeans, etc are good enough IDEs for RAD, BUT does anything offer the ease of the Borland products for developing additional components – and does anything else have thousands to choose from?
PC based? Cross-platform is good. Browser based? Free is always good 😉
I don’t particularly care about the programming language.
I went with Lazarus and am pretty happy with it. I can’t just recompile my code and expect it to run, but it covers 90% of my existing Delphi code. I’d recommend giving it a whirl before spending $1k for Delphi
Try Lazarus, Lazarus is a cross platform visual IDE for Pascal and Object Pascal developers. It is developed for and supported by the Free Pascal compiler. is available for several Linux distributions, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows (win32/64/CE) and Mac OS X (including IPhone/IPad). The language syntax has excellent compatibility with Delphi (classes, rtti, exceptions, ansistrings, widestrings, interfaces).
for additional info check theses links