[fpc-pascal] What to do to get new users

[DougC]

---- On Tue, 15 Oct 2024 19:07:58 -0400 Rainer Stratmann via fpc-pascal <mailto:fpc-pascal at lists.freepascal.org> wrote ---

At the Lazarus Congress in Cologne in October 2024, it ended up being very 

interesting. An important question came up.



Why are no new users coming to Lazarus/Freepascal?

Why do we find it so difficult?

How can we get new, younger users to come to us?











The most fundamental reason more people are not adopting Pascal as a programming language is because in the mid-1990's Pascal lost out to Java as the initial language that was taught in university settings. Because that was the last place Pascal was widely used, it quickly became obscure. Also, C was always thought to be the pinnacle of achievement. That is, if you could program in C you were considered elite. That continues today, although those promoting Rust are making a commendable and stalwart effort to have it accepted into the Linux kernel.



Today, Python is probably the most widely used programming language. Its appeal is based on ease of learning and relaxed rules that increase ease of use. While it is as severely flawed language from a strict design viewpoint, it has taken over.



So, faced with this situation, what can be done? Short of a massive and expensive marketing effort, not much, except to remove obvious attributes that hinder adoption. One such attribute is the messy, cluttered look of the IDE. An IDE redesign with a cleaner, simpler, and visually appealing presentation would help enormously. It looks like that is what is being proposed here. 



I have always found that the self-contained nature of Pascal/Delphi executables is a big advantage over other language systems. Just copy the file and run it, even on a system that has never seen a Pascal/Delphi executable before. If we could do that with the IDE/compiler it would be magic! The install process is far from that goal right now.



Doug C.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.freepascal.org/pipermail/fpc-pascal/attachments/20241015/6abd3846/attachment.htm>