-> Delphi?  It is a pain in the butt.  The bottom line - since I want
-> to sell this thing once I complete it(it still is not 'complete' -
-> whew.) - is that a DOS apps will run under DOS, under Win 3.1, under
-> Win 95, under Win NT and under
-> IBM's OS/2.  That is five operating systems I can support and market
-> to instead of just Win.
I agree that Delphi, Windows programming for that matter, can be a pain
when starting out. Delphi, takes a bit of a different mind set that once
you have, programming becomes much easier...at least it did for me.
Understanding at least some very basic OOP concepts from a Delphi point
of view. Secondly, Programming in Delphi requires the event driven
mindset over the old linear mindset as used in DOS. Once these areas
clicked, programming in Delphi became much easier. I used VB before
Delphi was available, and it helped prepare me for Delphi...but I think
a pascal programmer can pick up Delphi quickly if the spend some time up
front getting some of the Visual Programming basics down such as using
forms, controls, events, properties, etc.
From a Cross Platform compatibility standpoint and your business
position as you describe, I can certainly see your concerns. Alot of
your comments (I don't wan't to quote them all in this message) made
perfect business sense to me. You need to do what makes the most sense
for your business...both now and in the future. So, only you will be
able to make your final decisions on what to do. I think it comes down
to how much non Windows 95/NT business you are and will be doing. As
time goes on, the MS products will likely become less DOS compatible, so
I don't know if DOS apps are the right choice though. If most of your
customers are using DOS or Windows based machines, Delphi seems like a
good direction. If you have a large Non windows based market, then maybe
DOS for now and Java down the road as you suggested. I would suspect
that most of the OS makers will eventually stop worrying about DOS
compatiblity as time goes on, so you'll still have to deal with that.
It's a tough decision, and I think the jury is still out on Java, so
we'll have to see.
I think my main point here, is don't give up on Delphi. Because it's
pascal based, you can probably do the quickest port to it than anything
else with the smallest amount of pain.
Steve
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