Mild Pascal rant:
Thank you for considering Pascal. Contrary to popular belief, Pascal
is indeed a modern language. Though developed some time ago it has
evolved the to include most of the extensions seen in 'modern'
languages. It should be noted that modern is not synonymous with
recently invented.
Pascal is fully OO. Many would say the implementation of OO is better
and more complete than C++. Performance is on par with C and C++. Any
differences usually related to automatic and predictable garbage
collection present in Pascal. Accessing C libraries is also simple.
Coming from a long background in large scale application design and
management, Pascal has other advantages. The syntax is somewhat simple
than C and Java. As well, experience and studies have shown that the
same skill and effort applied to a C and Pascal project usually results
in about 50% less productions bugs in the Pascal code.
FPC specifically has more advantages. First is the active (and
somewhat rabid:) development community. It is centered in Europe,
where the 'language du jour' does not hold as much sway as it does in
North America. Also, there is a large collection of libraries, tools
and utilities available.
FPC handles many different flavours of the language. It is portable
(as is Lazarus) over many operating systems and processor types. It is
far more portable than Java and .Net (for different reasons)!
A thought-out design of your application can be as fast and portable as
you wish.
Thank you for considering FPC and good luck with your project.
</RANT>
On Mar 3, 2006, at 12:01, Matt Henley wrote:
I belong to a mailing list for a defunt open source chemical process
simulator (Sim42). Members of the list are now showing interest in
restarting the effort. It was originally written in python which
cause some speed issues. Several of the list members (including me)
suggested freepascal and lazarus. The gentleman spearheading the
effort sent the following and I would like to know what is the best
way to respond. I do not know what features define a "modern
language" and would like to know what points to bring up.
"My personal objective is not just to put out a simulator, but a fast
and efficient simulator. Furthermore, personally, I do not consider a
program portable if it is written in a language which very few can
understand. A modern language such as any of the .NET languages will
meet the efficiency objective but portability remains an issue. While
I do have the Visual Studio .NET and I am happy with it, I understand
that not everybody has it and it is not cheap. I looked at the
Lazarus project and (at least at a first glance) it is indeed very
"Visual" and will likely do the job. It will however, limit us to
Pascal which is not really a modern language. For those of you who
are in favor of using Lazarus, can you assure the rest of us that
Pascal has been modernized? "
Thanks for any help
Matt Henley
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P Davidson
Corax Networks Inc.
http://CoraxNetworks.com
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