Now imagine being used to Delphi and C++ Builder, trying to search for similar tooling on UNIX, back in the mid-90's.
The only options available were a few 4GLs that cost more than even Delphi licenses are worth nowadays.
The only options available were a few 4GLs that cost more than even Delphi licenses are worth nowadays.
One of the many things I loved about Delphi compared to other RAD tools of the time was that it was the only one that supported and encouraged modular separation of logic and UI. In most others (VB!), the IDE did nothing to help you, and most people ended up with all their logic mixed into the UI code, simply because the UI code was the focus of the whole IDE.
The Windows platform was awful so I ran away to Unix, and trying to find something even close to Delphi was just impossible. The best thing we had was Tcl/Tk, which I used a fair bit.
I tried Java at the time and remember saying to myself: You got to be kidding me.
Eventually I gave up on GUI development for Unix and embraced the web browser is the UI philosophy and develop the back-end in Python (then a fairly new language). Best career move I ever made.
I'm still fond of Delphi, it was a great product.