SD Times has a review of RAD Studio XE (by Andrew Binstock), but they get quite a few things wrong, including features Delphi will have next year. Not doing a good service to the product, not because they point out problems, but because they confuse potential buyers.
- First, there is an interesting intro in which the author claims to have suggested Borland to "shut down non-core assets, including Delphi,". Good they didn't listen!
- Second, saying that "RAD Studio XE, is technically an update to RAD Studio rather than to Delphi," is not really correct, as you can buy Delphi XE or the complete suite. Your choice.
- Third, and more relevant, "Delphi is the anchor product in XE in that it defines the suite. Delphi generates pure Windows binaries, as well as binaries for Mac OS X and Linux". Ops, that's coming but not quite there!
- Fourth, it continues about Delphi claiming it "The famous Delphi component palettes have been expanded with widgets for REST transactions, Facebook interaction, Google Maps and other technologies." Facebook and Google Maps? I missed those! Maybe there is some confusion with the RadPHP palette, which has those components.
- Fifth, his reconstruction that the "neglect of C++ has long roots, going back 10 years when Visual Studio’s feature set began to surpass Borland’s C/C++ offerings" doesn't really match to what I recall. When was MFC superior to Borland's offering? Not clear.
There are certainly a few interesting points in the article, and it is way better for Embarcadero to have an article with errors than no mention, but it is really misleading, particularly about the ability to generate Mac binaries. When I read an article with similar oversights, I wonder if they are all like this, only that I don't know because my knowledge is generally more limited. However, this particular article seems really at odds. Maybe SDTimes could get someone from the Delphi community, if not to write at least to review future articles on the product.