Recently , i was in discussion with my manager as well the client in creating / moving an application from Delphi to .NET ( Visual Studio 2010 ) and thought myself Which one is Better?? and was struck up with no clear answer.

Here’s i compare two technologies ( Not Technically but just about what i feel ) and this is just my opinion and others might well disagree with me too . Here we go .

Anders Hejlsberg was involved in C# and for Delphi too and this puts me in a quetion on there might be similarities too …

C# / .NET

  • C# is a simple and very well defined language .
  • Its from Microsoft and .NET is the future for Development on the Microsoft Platform.
  • Visual Studio’s Code Editor and the Options of the Extensions / Addons to the IDE brings me more functions to be brought together in single IDE / Place especially Code Compare too and Data Compare tool etc
  • Excellent Community Support for .NET . Check the following sites

1. MSDN - Has lots of categories like ASP.NET , C# ,Windows Phone 7 etc.
2. WWW.ASP.NET
3. WWW.WINDOWSCLIENT.NET
and Many more…

* Active Support from Microsoft Valuable Professionals ( MVP’s ) throgh Blogs , Forums etc .

Cons :

  • When a references are added , and the setup is installed , the required dll’s are copied to the Application Folder and this might frustrate if the number of Dll’s are more .
  • The right framework has to be installed for the Application you developed . The framework/runtime has to be distributed . But this doesnot look as a problem since most of the windows update would install the framework too for the latest Operating Systems .By Default , the operating system’s comes with the .NET Framework installed . Windows 7 Comes with .NET 3.5 SP1 Installed .

You can find Vijay’s article on “What version of the .NET Framework is included in which version of the OS?”

There are quite a lot of other things too , but really the good things in Visual Studio overshadows other negatives of the product.

Delphi

    • Delphi is a great tool to work with . I work on Delphi 7 and havn’t tried much on Delphi 2010 , the latest one from Embarcadero .
    • Delphi 7′s IDE is much faster and especially when i compare with the Visual Studio 2010 :( and is 100 times faster.
    • Delphi 7 compiles the exe to a Native Code and thus is highly optimised and high performance too .
    • Delphi was easier to learn and c# more easier than that too , but if you wanna learn the entire .NET Framework that might take you some time .
    • Nice components from the Developer communities like Torry’s Delphi

Cons

  • The Demand for Delphi Professionals …
  • The Marketing strategy for Delphi . I seriously think Embarcadero require a free Express Edition of Delphi , something that Delphi 7 had ( Personal edition ) and what Microsoft provides ( Express Editions for C#,Visual Web Developer , VB.NET , SQL Server Express etc ).
  • More Community involvement is also needed like MVP program etc…

I feel neither Delphi is better than C# or C# is better than Delphi . It just lies in the kind of Application you are building and on which language one is comfortable with .So its a 50-50 Situation for me :(

Just a wind up incase an existing migration from any language has to be done, the following things should be observed.

  • Expertise or proficiency of the Developers ( Language )
  • What Environment the application is targetted for ?
  • Database and other Technologies used .
  • Cost of the Development Environment and IDE’s etc.
  • Updating to the Newest and stable Technology .
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