Pascal is one of the reference programming languages in computer science. Pascal was developed by Swiss Niklaus Wirth in 1970 to implement structured programming, which is easier to compile.
One of its great advantages is its similarity to natural English, which makes it the ideal language for those who are in the first contact with programming. Pascal is based on the Algol language and was named after the mathematician Blaise Pascal, credited for building the first numerical computing machines. Wirth has also developed the Modula-2 and Oberon languages, similar to Pascal.
The most popular implementations of this language were Turbo Pascal and Borland Pascal, both from Borland with versions for Macintosh and DOS, which added objects to the language and were continued with versions for visual programming for Microsoft Windows, used by Microsoft Windows, and also used by Delphi development for Linux (Kylix).
At present, there are other more or less popular, but free, implementations, including Free Pascal and GNU Pascal.
Although it is currently relatively rare in the software industry, it is still useful to students who want to get started in programming. Unlike BASIC, which in the past was the basis of programming learning, Pascal is a structured language. Therefore, it forms a certain type of thinking, similar to modern languages, such as C++, but does not have the complexity and abstraction of the latter, being easier to understand because of the simple syntax and close to the pseudo code.
Free Pascal (or FPK Pascal) is a 32- and 64-bit Pascal compiler. It is available for several processors and operating systems: Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, DOS, Windows, BeOS, SunOS (Solaris), QNX and Classic Amiga.
The language syntax is (semantically) compatible with Turbo Pascal, as well as most Delphi versions. In addition to Turbo Pascal, Free Pascal supports overloading functions when working with objects.
Object Pascal is a programming language derived from Pascal, which allows the use of structures in the object-oriented programming model: objects, inheritance, polymorphism, etc. Object Pascal contains classes specific to the actions in the operating system, GUI components, etc. Object Pascal is used by the Delphi development environment.
Borland Pascal is the name of the compiler and integrated development environment for the Pascal language produced by Borland. Launched in 1984 as Turbo Pascal, it has quickly become one of the most popular PC development environments. Borland Pascal 7.0, launched in 1992, also included a development environment for Microsoft Windows.
Borland Pascal was the precursor to the Borland Delphi language and development environment.
Embarcadero Delphi, formerly known as CodeGear Delphi and Borland Delphi, is a software development environment for Microsoft Windows, originally produced by the North American company Borland, currently owned and developed by Embarcadero Technologies.
Delphi 2010 is the latest version and is distributed in three editions: Professional, Enterprise and Architect.
Delphi uses a variant of Pascal, called Object Pascal, and compiles in native code x86.
The environment includes the VCL (Visual Component Library) library and supports a large number of third-party components. Emphasis is placed on database connectivity, and Delphi offers a rich set of components dedicated to this purpose.
Kylix was a compiler and integrated development environment, sold in the past by Borland, but whose production was discontinued. It’s the Linux version of Delphi and C ++ Builder environments running under Microsoft Windows.