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I am a Turbo pascal/Borland pascal/Delphi developer, since 1987. I currently only use Delphi for maintaining old tools that I (and some friends of mine) use privately. Unfortunately all my professional codes have already been ported, some even with my direct involvement :) to other development languages and environments, sad. OK, sorry for this digressive introduction. Let me get to my question.

I currently own Delphi 7 professional. It was an expensive move, never worth what it costed, just for my hobbyist usage.

Now, this XE Starter edition has appeared. At 149€, it looks like a good deal. It seems that it comes with almost everything I use now, and with some things I miss; unicode and generics, specially.

Do you know if there is any hiden (bad) surprise in this offer? So, should I stay or should I go?

What are in your opinion the pros and cons of such a move?

thanks.

PA.
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  • How can you live without Unicode? – Andreas Rejbrand Feb 02 '11 at 21:38
  • oh yeah, how can I live without? hobbyist use, remember. – PA. Feb 02 '11 at 21:43
  • How can we answer this Q without knowing what you develop? What is it in XE that tempts you, other than the bling? – David Heffernan Feb 02 '11 at 21:45
  • that's what I ask you. Is there anything really important beyond Delphi 7 Pro I should evaluate before purchasing? other than generics and unicode. – PA. Feb 02 '11 at 21:49
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    What you also need to factor into the price is: How many evenings of FUN you're going to have playing with all the features, learning all of the new language improvements, and going over your old code to take advantage of them. I'm not even being sarcastic :) – Leigh Feb 02 '11 at 22:08
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    this should be a community wiki. – jachguate Feb 02 '11 at 22:15
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    @PA if you do database programming, you'll miss the TClientDataSet and maybe the DBeXpress. – jachguate Feb 02 '11 at 22:16
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    @Jachguate, for quite a while now, that's not an option. A question can only *become* community wiki after it's been edited enough times. You can't mark something that way to begin with because *nobody* can express what criteria people should use to choose when to set it. (Options that nobody knows when to use are useless options.) – Rob Kennedy Feb 02 '11 at 22:24
  • @Rob Ok, maybe I don't get the idea of wiki content here... but on questions like this I feel not useful that everyone post an answer, but I like the idea of anyone editing question's or answer's to get a complete description of what's involved. Is that possible on SO or I just dreamed about it? – jachguate Feb 02 '11 at 23:16
  • @Jachguate, anyone with sufficient reputation may edit any question or answer. But the check box that people could use to explicitly designate a question as "community wiki" no longer exists on Stack Overflow, so complaining about whether a question should be CW is pointless. (That that there was ever much purpose to such complaints before, either.) The option might exist on other Stack Exchange sites, but I'm not sure. Your reputation score is above the threshold, so if there's something you want to add to the question or to anyone's answer, please go ahead. – Rob Kennedy Feb 03 '11 at 00:06
  • @Rob, thanks, I know my privileges, but I have no idea the button to explicitly mark as community wiki is not there anymore... thanks for the info. ;) – jachguate Feb 03 '11 at 00:20
  • Isn't there a 30-day trial period for XE? My experience with >200 LOC was that the conversion to Unicode would be an important effort, and a large risk for anything that involved files or databases (if you decide to upgrade, make the changes in those areas first, and leave the rest of the warnings for later). – Apalala Feb 03 '11 at 07:17

13 Answers13

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The worst "cons" of Starter is absence of VCL sources (not mentioned in feature matrix, but discussed in blogs

kludg
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    +1. If I were a hobbyist, using Delphi for fun, exploring, learning new stuff, I would not want to be without the VCL source. Documentation and F1-help will only take you so far. Browsing code is invaluable. – Mikael Eriksson Feb 02 '11 at 22:23
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    Lack of VCL/RTL source and lack of Ctrl+Shift+C shortcut will definitively make this edition not worth the money. Even if my Open Source libraries will work with it, I won't buy it. :( And I was the perfect fit for the marketing goal: making no money with my libraries, I was below the $1000 limit. :) – Arnaud Bouchez Feb 03 '11 at 07:52
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    If that source is invaluable, are you surprised it is only in the higher-prised SKUs? – Jeroen Wiert Pluimers Feb 03 '11 at 08:47
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    -1: that's a nonsense. It's a cheap version designed to be an entry-level solution. Even most Delphi libraries come in a cheap version without sources and a more expensive one with sources. And to learn you can also access a lot of Delphi open source code and articles. Statement like this are only from people wanting a "Greed Edition" –  Feb 03 '11 at 09:08
  • @Jeroen - No I am not. I totally understand why Embarcadero has done as they have. But with a choice between Delphi and another dev tool the VCL source is one huge reason why Delphi might come out ahead. – Mikael Eriksson Feb 03 '11 at 10:42
  • @Mikael totally agree with you. Sources are source for fun. – PA. Feb 03 '11 at 12:04
  • @Bouchez, thanks for pointing out the lack of auto completion! – PA. Feb 03 '11 at 12:04
  • I love the idea of a Starter edition. I don't like the lack of command line tools or limited db access, but missing VCL sources is not something I would ask for a "Starter" edition. Oh, I had forgot about auto completion -- given the quality of Delphi help files not having autocomplete is like trying to drive while blindfolded! – Leonardo Herrera Feb 03 '11 at 19:16
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If you're a hobbyist using Delphi 7 you might as well try to switch to FreePascal. Comes with full source :-)

Birger
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Given the missing VCL source AND no command line compiler, Delphi Starter Edition is a NonStarter IMO.

Thorsten Engler
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  • The command line tools are included, see: http://delphihaven.wordpress.com/2011/02/01/starting-starter/. I assume that also includes the command line compiler. – Marjan Venema Feb 03 '11 at 07:03
  • @Marjan Venema, see http://community.devexpress.com/blogs/ctodx/archive/2011/02/02/got-delphi-xe-starter-want-to-install-our-controls-tough.aspx We've hit the same problems when investigating if we can easily support Delphi Starter with NexusDB – Thorsten Engler Feb 03 '11 at 08:46
  • @Thorsten: thanks, hadn't seen that one yet... (And its relevant to me, I use your NexusDB!) – Marjan Venema Feb 03 '11 at 09:30
  • @Thorsten: that's a bummer. It means you would have to use the IDE for a daily build process. – Marjan Venema Feb 03 '11 at 09:36
  • ooh didn't know about command line compilation. For me that is critical!! I `make` most of my tools with a complete chain for automatic versioning, documenting and compiling. – PA. Feb 03 '11 at 11:57
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The only real downside is that Unicode migration can be a significant hurdle if you're using a lot of third-party components, especially if they haven't been updated since the Delphi 7 days.

Other than that, there's no good reason not to update, and plenty to be gained from it. Generics, Unicode, enumerators, extended RTTI, newer OS support, touch, etc, not to mention an upgrade path to future releases.

Mason Wheeler
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    Not entirely accurate. I'd look at the updated [feature matrix](http://www.embarcadero.com/products/delphi/delphi-feature-matrix.pdf) to see if your existing applications use any features that are not included with the Starter edition. You may have to rework some of your code if it depended on features not present in the Starter edition. – Kenneth Cochran Feb 02 '11 at 22:06
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TClientDataset is also missing. Could be an issue for some of you.

Stephane Wierzbicki
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Only you can determine which features are important to you. Please refer to the Delphi XE feature matrix (PDF). It tells you what features are in each edition of Delphi XE. You should also look at the "What's New" document, which also includes links to what was new in the previous three versions (which, even then, still doesn't get you all the way back to Delphi 7).

Rob Kennedy
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    The feature matrix is wrong. The VCL source code is marked as included, and it is not. I can't believe they make such a big "mistake"! – Arnaud Bouchez Feb 03 '11 at 07:50
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    The feature matrix doesn't say source is included for anything. The closest it comes is to say that translations are available for the source code, and it says that feature was introduced in 2010. Since included source code has been a feature of *every* Delphi version, that clearly can't be what the feature matrix was referring to. – Rob Kennedy Feb 03 '11 at 14:33
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As opposed to what Mason says, I'd say the real "upside" is that it will have Unicode strings.

If you want to handle Unicode in your hobbyist programming, then yes, do the upgrade. That was the real reason why I upgraded from Delphi 4 to Delphi 2009.

Generics are nice, but not essential. Theoretically, Delphi 7 will be able to program most-everything you'd want, except for Unicode.

lkessler
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    You've been able to program for Unicode forever. What Delphi 2009 brought was *built-in* Unicode support in the VCL and *enhanced* language and library support. But even Delphi 3 had WideString — it was required for COM. The Tnt Unicode controls let you use Unicode in the VCL. – Rob Kennedy Feb 03 '11 at 14:42
  • I have done both (TNT unicode and native VCL) and it is worth it to have the full VCL native. – Warren P Feb 04 '11 at 17:39
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The XE versions have a much nicer IDE, Unicode, and support for Vista and Win7. I'd go for it if I was still on Delphi 7.

Rob McDonell
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    re: nicer IDE - thats rather questionable, with all unnecessary .NET stuff and VS mimicking. – Free Consulting Feb 03 '11 at 14:07
  • The technical implementation of the IDE has nothing to do with how nice it is. Nor whether it's like someone else's IDE or not. You either like the IDE or not, and on balance I prefer it to the one in Delphi 7. – Rob McDonell Feb 04 '11 at 00:25
  • XE is actually more stable, and functional, not to mention up to date with Win32 platform changes, than Delphi 7. – Warren P Feb 05 '11 at 05:22
  • A nicer IDE? When I went from Delphi 6 to TurboDelphi, I considered that a huge drop. It forced me to install MS-XML libraries and .NET, etc. (Even though it didn't need them, and I was able to uninstall them afterwards with no ill effects).. I don't want/need a VS clone. I use Delphi (or, more recently Lazarus) because it's *not* VS. – Noah Jan 21 '14 at 10:51
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If you mostly want to use it for hobby purposes then staying with an 8-year old development environment and a language that doesn't have a lot of new features is not a good move.

If you want to learn new technologies (as applied to Delphi) or even want to apply knowledge you acquired from other environments to make your life easier in Delphi world then XE is a good choice (as you mentioned Generics, Unicode, extended RTTI, Touch, etc goodness).

Now, is Starter a good choice? Depends on your needs. Check out the feature matrix (as suggested) and decide for your self.

But as the language/IDE goes, then definitely go for it.

alex
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  • well, that is something to thank the original developers of Delphi, 8 years later it still is valuable for windows development. I maintain some desktop tools, file management toos, music and sound tools and some others. – PA. Feb 03 '11 at 12:02
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If I had not already upgraded to Delphi XE, I would certainly go for this offer, even without source code. I am also a hobbiest, and for me, the upgrade cost for professional every couple of years is worthwhile. There are a lot of more expensive hobbys, believe me.

HMcG
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And what about 64 Bit code. I think even the XE does not compile programs for 64 bit which means limitations exist for max 4GB for programs and etc etc. Let's hope they release a 64 bit version soon for XE.

Ronnie
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Don't do this mistake. Wait for a stable version to be released. See this: Brand new installed Delphi XE freezes without reason (it is QC 90864 Delphi bug)

Community
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Gabriel
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    that's another reason (it came out offline) I have also taken into a high account – PA. May 18 '11 at 13:55
  • I'm sure there is a reason. The Delphi IDE has become a huge program with many dependencies. Something could be wrong with your packages, with some DLL or OCX somewhere, etc. (One of the reasons I used to like Delphi was because it was relatively self-contained). – Noah Jan 21 '14 at 10:56
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In my opinion XE2 is appealing because OSX support and 64 bit compiler but such support comes only in pro and upper editions.

So, unless you have $1000 to spend (pro edition), starter could frustrate you because the lack of features that you already have with Delphi 7.

Regards.

ssamayoa
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  • That's the same thing I thought. I can compile for OS X, Windows, and Linux with FreePascal/Lazarus and it works great. (only no 64bit OS X apps for now). While I can hack away for iOS and Android if I really want, I thought it would be nice to play with a fully supported solution like FireMonkey. And I wouldn't mind too much paying for the starter edition - but then it says Windows 32bit only. So...... I'm not sure what I would gain. Both Lazarus and the TurboDelphi I have can make Windows32 apps just fine already. – Noah Jan 21 '14 at 10:54