Embarcadero Delphi - Versions

Versions

Borland Delphi

Delphi (later known as Delphi 1) was released in 1995 for the 16-bit Windows 3.1, and was an early example of what came to be known as Rapid Application Development (RAD) tools. Delphi evolved from Borland's "Turbo Pascal for Windows", itself an evolution with Windows support from Borland's Turbo Pascal and Borland Pascal, very fast 16-bit native-code MS-DOS compilers with their own sophisticated integrated development environment (IDE) and textual user interface toolkit for DOS (Turbo Vision). Early Turbo Pascal (for MS-DOS) was written in a dialect of the Pascal programming language; in later versions support for objects was added, and it was named Object Pascal. Delphi has always used Object Pascal, which continued to be developed, as its underlying procedural language.

Borland Delphi 2

Delphi 2, released in 1996, supported 32-bit Windows environments. Delphi 1 was bundled with it for creation of 16-bit Windows 3.1 applications. New Quickreport components.

Borland Delphi 3

Delphi 3, released in 1997, added TDataset architecture separated from BDE, DLL debugging, the code insight technology, component packages, component templates, DecisionCube and TeeChart components for statistical graphing, WebBroker, ActiveForms, MIDAS three tier architecture, component packages and integration with COM through interfaces.

Inprise Delphi 4

Inprise Delphi 4 was released in 1998. IDE became dockable, Added anchors and constraints, method overloading, dynamic arrays, Windows 98 support, Java interoperability, high performance database drivers, CORBA development, and Microsoft BackOffice support. It was the last version shipped with Delphi 1 for 16 bit programming.

Borland Delphi 5

Borland Delphi 5 was released in 1999. Added concept of frames, parallel development, translation capabilities, enhanced integrated debugger, XML support, ADO database support and reference counting interfaces

Kylix

In 2001 Borland released a Linux version of Delphi, named Kylix. The IDE was dependent on the Wine libraries rather than Linux's native system libraries (glibc) in order to get a product out quickly and relatively cheaply. The expense of developing a native glibc version of Kylix, combined with the lack of Linux adoption among programmers at the time, caused sales to go soft, and Kylix was abandoned after version 3. This was the first attempt to add Linux support in the Delphi product family.

Kylix used the new CLX cross-platform framework, instead of Delphi's VCL.

Borland Delphi 6

Attempts to support both Linux and Windows for cross-platform development were made, and a cross-platform alternative to the VCL known as CLX shipped in 2001 with the release of Delphi 6. This was the second attempt to add Linux support to the Delphi product family (see Kylix above).

Delphi 6 included the same CLX version (CLX 1) as the first version of Kylix. CLX 1 had been created before Delphi 6; its feature set was based on VCL 5 and lacked some features added to the VCL 6 shipped with Delphi 6.

Borland Delphi 7

Delphi 7, released in August 2002, became the standard version used by more Delphi developers than any other single version. It is one of the most successful IDEs created by Borland because of its stability, speed and low hardware requirements, and remained in active use as of 2011. Delphi 7 added support for Windows XP Themes, and added more support for building Web applications. It was the last version of Delphi which could be used without software activation.

Borland Delphi 8

Delphi 8, released December 2003, was a .NET-only release that compiled Delphi Object Pascal code into .NET CIL; the IDE was rewritten for this purpose. The IDE changed to a docked interface similar to Microsoft's Visual Studio.NET. Delphi 8 was highly criticized for its low quality and its inability to create native applications (*.exe). The inability to generate native applications is only applicable to this release; the capability was restored in the next release (Delphi 2005).

Borland Delphi 2005

The next version, Delphi 2005 (Delphi 9, also Borland Developer Studio 3.0), included the Win32 and .NET development in a single IDE, reiterating Borland's commitment to Win32 developers. Delphi 2005 includes design-time manipulation of live data from a database. It also includes an improved IDE and added a for ... in statement (like C#'s foreach) to the language. However, it was widely criticized for its bugs; both Delphi 8 and Delphi 2005 had stability problems when shipped, which were only partially resolved in service packs. The ability to compile native windows applications (*.exe) was added back into Delphi 2005 after being removed in Delphi 8.

Borland Delphi 2006

In late 2005 Delphi 2006 (Delphi 10, Borland Developer Studio 4.0) was released and combined development of C# and Delphi.NET, Delphi Win32 and C++ (Preview when it was shipped but got stable in Service Pack 1) into a single IDE. It was much more stable than Delphi 8 or Delphi 2005 when shipped, and improved even more with the release of service packs and several hotfixes. CLX support was dropped for new applications from this release onwards.

Turbo Delphi and C++

On September 6, 2006 The Developer Tools Group (the working name of the not yet spun off company) of Borland Software Corporation released single-language versions of Borland Developer Studio components, bringing back the Turbo name. The Turbo product set included Turbo Delphi for Win32, Turbo Delphi for .NET, Turbo C++, and Turbo C#. There were two variants of each edition: Explorer, a free downloadable version, and the Professional version, priced at US$899 for new users and US$399 for updates, less than the full Borland Delphi, which opened access to thousands of third-party components. Unlike earlier Personal editions of Delphi, Explorer editions could be used for commercial development.

Codegear Delphi 2007

Delphi 2007 (Delphi 11), the first version by CodeGear, was released on March 16, 2007. The Win32 personality was released first, before the .NET personality of Delphi 2007 which is based on .NET Framework 2.0 was released as part of the CodeGear RAD Studio 2007 product. New features included support for MS Build and enhancements to the Visual Component Library for Windows Vista, but the C#Builder feature was dropped in this release as sales where not as high as expected due to Visual Studio also offering C#. The Windows Form designer for Delphi .NET was also dropped in D2007 because it is based upon part of the .NET framework API which had been changed so drastically by Microsoft in .NET 2.0 that updating the IDE would have been a major undertaking. Delphi 2007 also introduced DBX4 as the next version of dbExpress. For the first time Delphi could be downloaded from the Internet and activated with a license key, a capability powered by the new InstallAware installation technology (itself authored in Delphi, and now shipping in a free, limited edition inside the box with Delphi). Internationalized versions of Delphi 2007 shipped simultaneously in English, French, German and Japanese. RAD Studio 2007 (code named Highlander), which includes .NET and C++Builder development, was released on September 5, 2007.

Delphi Prism

Delphi Prism was developed by RemObjects Software and distributed by Embarcadero from 2008 to replace Delphi.NET. It is a combination of RemObjects's mostly Delphi-compatible .NET compiler (without RTL or VCL), a version of the Microsoft Visual Studio Shell without C# or VB support, and some Embarcadero technologies such as dbExpress. Prism is cross-platform capable insofar as it supports the Mono .NET libraries. Prism is a separate product line with new releases; Embarcadero Delphi Prism XE2 was released at about the same time as Delphi XE2.

Embarcadero Delphi 2009

Delphi 2009 (Delphi 12, code named Tiburón), added many new features such as completely reworking the VCL and RTL for full Unicode support, and added generics and anonymous methods for Win32 native development. Support for .NET development was dropped from the mainstream Delphi IDE starting with this version, and was catered for by the new Delphi Prism.

Embarcadero Delphi 2010

Delphi 2010 (code-named Weaver, aka Delphi 14; there was no version 13), was released on August 25, 2009 and is the second Unicode release of Delphi. It includes a new compiler run-time type information (RTTI) system, support for Windows 7 direct 2D, touch screen and gestures, a source code formatter, debugger visualizers and the option to also have the old style component palette in the IDE. The new RTTI system makes larger executables than previous versions.

Embarcadero Delphi XE

Delphi XE (aka Delphi 2011, code named Fulcrum), was released on August 30, 2010.With Delphi support for Amazon EC2, Microsoft Azure were bundled.

Delphi Starter Edition

On January 27, 2011 Embarcadero announced the availability of a new Starter Edition which gives independent developers, students and micro businesses a slightly reduced feature set for a price less than a quarter of that of the next-cheapest version.

Embarcadero Delphi XE2

On September 1, 2011 Embarcadero released RAD Studio XE2 (code-named Pulsar) which included Delphi XE2, C++Builder, Prism XE2 and RadPHP XE2.

Delphi XE2 natively supports 64-bit Windows (except the starter edition), in addition to the long-supported 32-bit versions, with some backwards compatibility. Applications for 64-bit platforms can be compiled, but not tested or run, on the 32-bit platform. Delphi XE2 is supplied with both the VCL, and an alternative library called FireMonkey that supports Windows, Apple Mac OS X and the Apple iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad portable devices. FireMonkey and VCL are not compatible; one or the other must be used, and older VCL applications cannot use Firemonkey unless user interfaces are recreated with FireMonkey forms and controls. Third parties have published information on how to use Firemonkey forms in VCL software, to facilitate gradual migration, but even then VCL and Firemonkey controls cannot be used on the same form. Embarcadero says that Linux operating system support "is being considered for the roadmap", as is Android, and that they are "committed to ... FireMonkey. ... expect regular and frequent updates to FireMonkey".

Embarcadero Delphi XE3

On September 4, 2012 Embarcadero released RAD Studio XE3 which included Delphi XE3, and C++Builder.

Delphi XE3 natively supports both 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows, and provides support for Apple Mac OS X with the Firemonkey 2/FM² framework. iOS support was dropped with XE3 release initially (with intent to add support back in with a separate product - Mobile Studio), but applications can continue to be targeted to that platform by developing with Delphi XE2.