Delphi (programming language)

Embarcadero Delphi is an integrated development environment (IDE) for console, desktop graphical, web, and mobile applications.

Delphi's compilers use their own Object Pascal dialect of Pascal and generate native code for several platforms: Windows NT (IA-32 and x64), OS X (IA-32 only), iOS and Android.

Delphi was originally developed by Borland as a rapid application development tool for Windows, and as the successor of Borland Pascal. Delphi and its C++ counterpart, C++Builder, shared many core components, notably the IDE and the Visual Component Library (VCL), but remained separate until the release of RAD Studio 2007. RAD Studio is a shared host for Delphi, C++Builder, and others.

In 2006, Borland’s developer tools section were transferred to a wholly owned subsidiary known as CodeGear, which was sold to Embarcadero Technologies in 2008.

History

Delphi was originally one of many codenames of a pre-release development tool project at Borland. Borland developer Danny Thorpe suggested the Delphi codename in reference to the Oracle at Delphi. One of the design goals of the product was to provide database connectivity to programmers as a key feature and a popular database package at the time was Oracle database; hence, "If you want to talk to [the] Oracle, go to Delphi".

Object Pascal

Object Pascal refers to a branch of object-oriented derivatives of Pascal, mostly known as the primary programming language of Embarcadero Delphi.

Early history at Apple

Object Pascal is an extension of the Pascal language that was developed at Apple Computer by a team led by Larry Tesler in consultation with Niklaus Wirth, the inventor of Pascal. It is descended from an earlier object-oriented version of Pascal called Clascal, which was available on the Lisa computer.

Object Pascal was needed in order to support MacApp, an expandable Macintosh application framework that would now be called a class library. Object Pascal extensions and MacApp itself were developed by Barry Haynes, Ken Doyle, and Larry Rosenstein, and were tested by Dan Allen. Larry Tesler oversaw the project, which began very early in 1985 and became a product in 1986.

An Object Pascal extension was also implemented in the Think Pascal IDE. The IDE includes the compiler and an editor with Syntax highlighting and checking, a powerful debugger and a class library. Many developers preferred Think Pascal over Apple's implementation of Object Pascal because Think Pascal offered a tight integration of its tools. The development stopped after the 4.01 version because the company was bought by Symantec. The developers then left the project.

Programming language

A programming language is a formal constructed language designed to communicate instructions to a machine, particularly a computer. Programming languages can be used to create programs to control the behavior of a machine or to express algorithms.

The earliest known programmable machine preceded the invention of the digital computer and is the automatic flute player described in the 9th century by the brothers Musa in Baghdad, at the time a major centre of knowledge. From the early 1800s, "programs" were used to direct the behavior of machines such as Jacquard looms and player pianos. Thousands of different programming languages have been created, mainly in the computer field, and many more still are being created every year. Many programming languages require computation to be specified in an imperative form (i.e., as a sequence of operations to perform), while other languages use other forms of program specification such as the declarative form (i.e. the desired result is specified, not how to achieve it).