Marco Wobben has been using Delphi since the 1.0 version. He submitted his software (CaseTalk) as a showcase entry at the Delphi 26th Showcase Challenge and we got to talk to him about his Delphi adventure after many years of developing with it. You can check out his software through the CaseTalk website.

When did you start using RAD Studio/Delphi and have long have you been using it?

I have been using Delphi since version1.0, but to be honest I was a Pascal fan starting at Turbo Pascal 3. Graduated University using Turbo Pascal for Windows.

What was it like building software before you had RAD Studio/Delphi?

I have built various off-the-shelf applications using the TTT toolkit, before even TVision was available. Building Windows applications using TP for Windows, was doable, but extremely cumbersome. Every form had to be made up with a resource editor, and completely independent of that the code had to match up the resources. Lot’s of trial and error in case of a mistake.

How did RAD Studio/Delphi help you create your showcase application?

CaseTalk is entirely built in Delphi, I could not have built such a rich client interface without the superb IDE which integrates OOPascal, Components, Live Designers, and neatly integrated debuggers.

What made RAD Studio/Delphi stand out from other options?

We’ve tried Java using jBuilder for a project once. The IDE worked, but there were so many resource leaks, that we spent a large part of our time working out how to control application memory/garbage collections. Developing in Delphi with full control is amazing and beyond comparison.

What made you happiest about working with RAD Studio/Delphi?

Delphi is amazing, it allows developers to go high level design to low level api and sql code. It all works as expected and newbies can grow into it at any pace and level. Being able to use ready made components, libraries, API’s, and database frameworks, and even being able to swap one out for another, is just very productive.

What have you been able to achieve through using RAD Studio/Delphi to create your showcase application?

With Delphi, the speed of debugging, compiling, adding new features is a dream. It is so fast, with a click of a button, the application is compiled and running. The level of service I can give to my customers is amazing. It’s almost an instant delivery from design to hand-off.

What are some future plans for your showcase application?

Currently, CaseTalk is developed in to a suite of Delphi applications. It contains the Information Modeler, which performs model to model transformations. The CaseTalk manager provides a Teams solution to store multiple models and versions in centralized dbms. The CaseTalk Viewer shows ER and UML diagrams, and now the CaseTalk Portal will be released, which is a Delphi build web service to publish all data to all users in the enterprise. Thank you, Marco! Check out the link below for his showcase entry.

Showcase