Tim

>I don't have a percentage, but the actual number is 35 EDB-LCL purchases since early 2013. Not an insignificant number, but not exactly setting the world on fire.

I'm surprised its that high.

>So far, we haven't had any requests for Lazarus module support for EWB, apart from this thread.
>
>I think your general sense is largely correct: developers that use free development environments tend to also not pay for their components/add-ons. My hunch is that a large part of this is due to the fact that the exchange rates are so horrible for certain countries/regions that it makes US/EU products *extremely* expensive, so hopefully I'll get a chance to test that theory in the next year. Of course, I could be completely wrong and it's something more fundamental.....

I don't think you're particularly wrong .... but I think this is the originally suggested scenario:

I like the look of EWB - hmm less than $400 that look good I'll evaluate it

Still looks good, price is OK, lets see if I can do the advanced stuff like build a module

Woops I need to spend $unmpty thousand to build a module - forget it.

Move on look for next tool.

ie your market is limited to people who already own Delphi XE or later.  That's not a particular problem since you aimed it at people who know and love pascal. Who knows if you can convert the unbelievers?

The scenario you propose:

Lazarus user: coo this EWB looks good - nearly $400 forget it

I fully agree with

Roy Lambert

Trinione


>The gist of the discussion about Lazarus ignores one key aspect - developers left Delphi because of price and short cycle. People were paying a reasonable price for years without issue. So, to say it's just freebiers is not correct.

I originally didn't upgrade because I didn't want the hassle of moving to unicode. Now its mainly price with a side helping of problems being reported in the embarcadero groups for every new version (some significant). This is more of a hobby than a business for me. My main business app is written using D2006 and have made a few £s selling it.

I also think that its a case of the cost of upgrading the entire tools set rather than just buying a new version of Delphi. Some of my components I have the code and could upgrade, some vendors (ie Tim) will allow me the new versions free, some I'd have to buy. Overall it would double the cost of an upgrade for me moving from D2006.

>Within this thread I am reading exactly why Delphi has gotten so unattractive. When I bought my first development package, Borland C++ 2.0, the price was reasonable, even for a student with interests in the field. All the way thru my Delphi 2007 purchase, the price was reasonable enough not to cause stutter.

I think there are other reasons, but the price certainly doesn't help.

>I dare say there are more non-XE developers than there are XE developers. Some still happily use D7. Delphi is a very flexible product.

I have recently (ie withing the last year) seen posts on embarcadero asking for help with D4 !

>If EWB can have the feature to use Lazarus to develop modules, fantastic.That makes it a much more complete and robust product. If not, I will never write a Module.

I'm not sure how much financial benefit Tim would gain from it though.

Roy Lambert

> If EWB can have the feature to use Lazarus to develop modules, fantastic.That makes it a much
> more complete and robust product. If not, I will never write a Module.

Instead of moduls, you can create your own complete HTTP server for EWB using Indy. This is what I
do and it's not that much of code to write.

cu Christian

<< Instead of moduls, you can create your own complete HTTP server for EWB using Indy. This is what I
do and it's not that much of code to write. >>

Christian:
That sounds like an option for sure.

Do you have any code you can share? Would you consider adding it to the Binaries thread, even a starter app where other developers can have as a guide?

One benefit a Lazarus Module building option would have is that it would be part of EWB and no need to build your own. However, I see the benefit in understanding the web server better - so this is a good option.

<< I'm not sure how much financial benefit Tim would gain from it though. >>

Roy:
I don't think it will be a direct financial benefit, but moreso a benefit in terms of flexibility of product. For example, just seeing that there is a Linux option for EDB was one of the reasons I adapted it. I may never buy or use it, but knowing it is an option allows me to 'sell' the product to companies/customers.

We have to face facts, Delphi is no longer the go to Pascal development tool. And, price is a major part of that. MS Visual Studio has been free for sometime for example, so too are other development offerings.

This is why I believe the focus should be on Pascal, not Delphi. EWB for example, is not a 'Delphi' based tool. It is a Pascal based tool.

LOL... This should have been its own thread.

On 9/29/2015 3:05 AM, Roy Lambert wrote:
> Still looks good, price is OK, lets see if I can do the advanced stuff like build a module
> Woops I need to spend $unmpty thousand to build a module - forget it.
> Move on look for next tool.
> ie your market is limited to people who already own Delphi XE or later.  That's not a particular problem since you aimed it at people who know and love pascal. Who knows if you can convert the unbelievers?

I don't know if i fully agree with this - EWB itself one can use with
any back-end relatively easily and Delphi requirement really only comes
in with modules (i.e. you want/need to do back-end server programming
for something not already supported).

However implementing any other back-end web server (using indy or iis or
php or node.js or ...) to support dataset handling is not that difficult
either and you will have 100% control for free also (but involves bit
more work).

Or you can get Delphi by saving some time but having to pay for it.

Raul

On 9/28/2015 10:38 AM, Tim Young [Elevate Software] wrote:
> The bigger issue is that I would have to figure out how to open up a lot of the underlying EWB source code, and *that's* a problem in terms of time.  If Lazarus could get binary package support, it would really open it up to more support from 3rd party vendors that can't/don't want to necessarily provide source code to certain parts of their products/components.


I totally forgot about this one - now that you mention i do recall last
time i tried lazarus it does want to be able to (re)compile any 3rd
party packages for them to even show up (or something along those lines).

If it's still the case then yes - that would severely limit 3rd party
commercial components - though i guess it means the 3rd components don't
need whole bunch of binary versions available to support various lazarus
versions.

Raul

Raul

>I totally forgot about this one - now that you mention i do recall last
>time i tried lazarus it does want to be able to (re)compile any 3rd
>party packages for them to even show up (or something along those lines).
>
>If it's still the case then yes

Its still the case. I was having a play with it over the weekend (I do every so often). I can now get something that approximates the D2006 IDE combined with a D7 IDE. Its usable but moving controls around on a form is still a bit naff.

Roy Lambert

<< I dare say there are more non-XE developers than there are XE developers. Some still happily use D7. Delphi is a very flexible product. >>

Yes, it certainly is.  However, I think you're underestimating how much Delphi has been changing since D7.  Every year it gets harder and harder to justify support for Delphi versions that are 10+ years old, especially as they lack some critical features that impede doing new things in the base product without some seriously convoluted IFDEF'ing of the code base.

<< If EWB can have the feature to use Lazarus to develop modules, fantastic.That makes it a much more complete and robust product. If not, I will never write a Module.

This is like tying a plug in to JQuery and not plain vanilla Javascript when you may be able to. >>

Since we're targeting Object Pascal developers under Windows, I think it's perfectly reasonable for us to target existing Delphi developers *first*.  I'll be looking into Lazarus support as things roll on but, as I say above, the source code requirement is a bit of an issue that slightly complicates things.  It may end up being a non-issue if the structure/delineation in the units is good, which I think it is, but I haven't analyzed the whole thing yet.

Tim Young
Elevate Software
www.elevatesoft.com

Roy,

<< ie your market is limited to people who already own Delphi XE or later.  That's not a particular problem since you aimed it at people who know and love pascal. Who knows if you can convert the unbelievers? >>

You, and others, seem to be under the impression that pre-Delphi XE users outnumber Delphi 7 users.  This may have been the case several years ago, but not now.

I only have numbers since 2010, but looking at our downloads, Delphi XE7-8 outnumber everyone, and even Delphi XE is more than Delphi 7.  There are many more combined XE* downloads than all of the Delphi/C++Builder products prior to XE.

Tim Young
Elevate Software
www.elevatesoft.com