Nothing against the language itself, it was straightforward and easy to learn on. Just surprised to see a new compiler for it coming out.
array[0]
notation worked is because subscript references are equivalent to referencing the first element in the array like a variable. Therefore the FillChar started from there and properly filled the rest of the array.
If I had to say anything about Pascal, I would say that it's very readable. Even with multi-years gaps between me having to work on this, it's very easy to re-familiarise myself with the code and it's very easy to understand what it's doing.
This might be related to style and, as Delphi was my first real language I've learned waybackwhen in the mid-90ies, yes, I have made a mess with my Pascal too, but it feels like it's much harder to produce a mess than it is in any other language I've worked with so far.
Of course this is all just a matter of taste - just giving my 5 cents.
Some schools have switched over to Java, and most other universities have jumped onto the Java/.NET bandwagon.
So in a nutshell, I think it's still pretty prevalent in 3rd world countries. It's not a bad starting language to introduce students to programming concepts, although I would prefer Python for a first language.
It is quite nice that those universities still teach it, as that way at least those students will learn that C and C++ aren't the only way of doing systems programming.
Many people are turned off to programming encountering Java, C++, etc because they think programming is inherently that difficult.
What does "more modern" mean exactly? I don't see that there's much value in pursuing design or implementation purity if the software isn't getting the same end user take-up.
The clients are usually pleased with the web app but the project managers are a bit hesitant, due to the different installation process. The Delphi app has been sold/installed for well over 10-15 years and people are used to copying .exe files on a server. Copying files and .dll-s and tinkering with IIS seams to be less appealing...
The need to go "online" has been the driving factor for the web app.
Either spend even more years adding the needed features while fighting the upscale hill.. (especially when introducing bigdata)
..or develop an alternative made out of simpler beasts: clean separation to avoid hydra scenario's. It takes time to beat that, but i see reasons to go away from a huge monolithic beast.
We wrote 2 database engines and a web development IDE using Delphi (compiles Object Pascal to JS). You can use it for just about anything: low-level, high-level, servers, games, LOB applications, mobile, and you can't beat it for code structure. It's highly readable and maintainable, and the compilers/libraries/runtimes are very backwards-compatible, so you can be assured that your coding investment will continue to produce returns for many years. You'd be surprised how many LOB applications are out there that are written in Object Pascal.
You can find Pascal/Delphi projects everywhere: a lot of scientific instrumentation software has GUI written in Delphi, there are tons of business software, even big amount of machines has UI for their front panels written in this language.
I think Delphi/Lazarus is still best software for writing small to medium sized desktop apps available.
In the end there are 3 tribes. freepascal, Delphi and the Elements Compiler (C#, Swift, Oxygene Language is Pascal).
There are many more traditional Pascal environments too. Smartmobile (HTML 5 apps), XEROCODER (based on FPC) for Grid developments and an integration into Visual Studio Code ...
FPC Version 3 is a huge step and a great one. While I personally admire all of the people's work I must confess the evolution of freepascal as well as the Lazarus IDE is exceptional.