Increasing traffic on PGD...

[SilverWarior]

Sorry, if I barge in as I am rather new here, but please do not drop support for Freepascal. I am not interested in Delphi but searching for good tutorials for FPC. Most good libraries (e.g. Asphyre) seem for Delphi only. The only exception is ZenGL.

Nobody sad anything about dropping support for FPC. We only talked about increasing support for Delphi. The reason for this the fact that latly most articles are just FPC oriented.
As for the libraries most of them can be ported and used in FPC quite easily. Yes the Asphyre is exception du the fact that it relies on some Embarcaderos libraries wich ships with Delphi. But as far as I know there is a plan to include FPC support for Asphyre in the future.

Sorry, but what you imply is simply laziness. If you have enthusiasm, interest and are wiling to learn, you can always get a scholarship in one of universities with a good computer science program. Here in Mexico, lower class students with family earnings of less than 1000 $MXN per week ($80 per week) can still get to the university almost for free and if they are talented, even get paid to study (!). [Granted, some prefer to consume drugs and shoot their neighbors instead, but that's another story]

Plus, if you get to study to university, you can always opt for Delphi Academic Program and pay roughly $100 for a Professional version.

Here in Slovenia none of our universities doesn't teach programing in any of the pascal dialects. All that you can learn in our universities is Java, .NET and C based languages. And even teaching of theese languages is of poor quality becouse they teach the mostly same stuf as they did 10 years ago. So when most of our students come out of school they still lacks some needed knowledge to become sucsessful programers on their own.
Another problem in Slovenia is that all of theese universities are full. So if you didn't have excelent grades in highschool you don't even have a chance to sign in.
Also here in Slovenia it is werry hard to get any scholarship at all. And even if you do get it, it won't cover all the expenses for study. So many students are forced to do parttime jobs during study. And this means les time and energy for study itself.

I myself haven't got a chance to sing into the university so I was forced to learn all by myself. And since I need money to live I had to find myself a job to earn enough for living. And to be honest I don't like my job wery much. I work as a customs officer. I have 12 hour shifts. The job itself can be verry stresfull becouse I had to work with various pepole (none of them isn't happy to see me). So many times when I come home from work I have no more energy to do some learning or any programing.

[LP]

Here in Slovenia none of our universities doesn't teach programing in any of the pascal dialects. All that you can learn in our universities is Java, .NET and C based languages. And even teaching of theese languages is of poor quality becouse they teach the mostly same stuf as they did 10 years ago. So when most of our students come out of school they still lacks some needed knowledge to become sucsessful programers on their own.

Unfortunately, it is true for Java, .NET and C part. Another unfortunate fact is that here in Mexico the highest paid Software Engineering jobs require Java and/or .NET knowledge, which is probably why they teach these languages in the first place, to ensure student's quick entry into business (I see announcements for these jobs on daily basis).

However, I don't agree with the second part. Ex-students of my 1999-2004 generation from Computing Systems department are all working now in top places in the software development industry, some here in Mexico and others in U.S.

Another problem in Slovenia is that all of theese universities are full. So if you didn't have excelent grades in highschool you don't even have a chance to sign in.
Also here in Slovenia it is werry hard to get any scholarship at all. And even if you do get it, it won't cover all the expenses for study. So many students are forced to do parttime jobs during study. And this means les time and energy for study itself.

You can always try to get to the universities in other countries. Yes, it may be hard to pull it off on your own (living and studying alone in foreign land), but on the bright side you get to know new cultures, make new friends and later on it will be a bonus for the career. In addition, it's never too late to get the degree, when I was studying 6 years ago for M.Sc., most "classmates" (it was research-oriented, so we were technically researchers) were like 20 years older than me. Not to mention my research for D.Sc., where only few people were present and were all > 50 years old.

That's only good for students and academics, and more hassle that getting Visual Studio or Eclipse (which can be download with no fuss).

Yes, I agree with that and it's unfortunate for Embarcadero. However, if you have used Express editions of Visual Studio, you should know that you don't get 64-bit support as well as other platforms such as Windows Phone, so it's very similar to Delphi Starter, except that it is for free. (Honestly, I wouldn't use Delphi Starter even if it was free because of the above limitations).

How, I don't doubt there are good institutions, but "many" is another story entirely, and anyway, that's only for the student side, and only for those students that have taken such a course, so it is only an option for a small minority.

I've never seen such an argument before that contained in itself more logical fallacies than phrases. Cherry picking, base rate neglect, illicit major and hasty generalization among others. Please don't do that.

As you just said, these course take a lot of time. Some require a background. Many are heavy on theory, light on practical aspects, etc. They're just not (and can't be) and alternative to more focused articles. They cater a different crowd with different needs.

Same as above.

"Good" or "bad" institution is subjective and a trend of black and white thinking (yet another fallacy). They are simply institutions with the goal of teaching students. Subjects from computer sciences are present in almost every area of institutions: management, accounting, physics, chemistry, architecture and so on. Yes, you can learn by yourself reading some articles on Internet, but instead of learning random bits by yourself, you can let other people professionally certified to help and guide you with the learning process; in fact, both are not mutually exclusive: you can learn at university and *still* read articles you want.

As for your "time argument", I don't believe there is such thing as "easy" or "quick "money. A person who worked hard and long, who invested time and effort into learning and becoming a professional will usually get higher salary and better jobs than a person who did not. (even though there are always rare exceptions.)

In addition, education is not just programming. If you don't educate yourself enough, you may fall prey easily to Crown manipulation, Brainwashing among other techniques very common on today's mass media including TV, radio, social networks and so on. (And guess what? Many of these techniques are based on careful injection of fallacies!)

[By the way, the Wikipedia links I've provided to crowd manipulation and brainwashing in English are quite biased and misleading themselves. Check other language versions with the Google translator, which are more meaningful.]

What I'm saying is that I don't think PGD should assume a public constituted of software engineering PhDs ;-)

Referring to my point, you are making a logical fallacy called "Appeal to ridicule". I never said what you are mocking (which is disrespectful, by the way), I just said that basic programming skills are taught in the majority of institutions now so instead of reinventing the wheel it is better to focus on people that are already familiar with the language.

Also, there is an entire Delphi section in About web site dedicated to all sorts of programming tips, which is more than sufficient to get you started and even make you proficient in some areas that you may not be aware of.

Edit: Really, please check Delphi section in About.com, it has articles for beginners to start from zero. What else do you need?

[SilverWarior]

Also, there is an entire Delphi section in About web site dedicated to all sorts of programming tips, which is more than sufficient to get you started and even make you proficient in some areas that you may not be aware of.

Edit: Really, please check Delphi section in About.com, it has articles for beginners to start from zero. What else do you need?

I know Delphi About very well. Infact I learned most from that site. But sometimes there is a problem when you try to find something but instead you keep coming to wrong articles. Let's face it while Delphi About does contain a great deal of knoledge it is poorly organized wich makes it hard to find exacly what you need.

[Eric]

However, if you have used Express editions of Visual Studio, you should know that you don't get 64-bit support as well as other platforms such as Windows Phone

That's incorrect, f.i. see http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudi...eveloper-tools

"Good" or "bad" institution is subjective and a trend of black and white thinking (yet another fallacy).

No, it's just a fact of life. If it was a fallacy, then there would be no competition to enter the best ones.

you can let other people professionally certified to help and guide you with the learning process

Well, I've met enough "professionally certified" personnel to take those with a truckload of salt, especially when they're from a pure academic background, and I've met quite few. ;-)

That doesn't mean I say you should throw baby with the bathwater, but that acquiring a degree and mastering a trade are not the same thing, learning in institutions can be highly beneficial, but students have to work beyond academic requirements for that, and search for themselves, yes, in the internet and in other sources, as well as put things in practice in non-academic situations (that last bit being key).

in fact, both are not mutually exclusive: you can learn at university and *still* read articles you want

You not only can, but should IMHO. If only to put the academic learning in perspective.

As for your "time argument", I don't believe there is such thing as "easy" or "quick "money. A person who worked hard and long, who invested time and effort into learning and becoming a professional will usually get higher salary and better jobs than a person who did not.

I guess we have a major incomprehension here, I'm not a student, and many PGD visitors aren't and won't be. They won't be going back to university full-time, and even part-time university can be quite problematic when you have a full-time job already and children.

If you don't educate yourself enough, you may fall prey easily to...

I guess you skipped the part on me saying I already have quite a high degree, and got it, hmmm, almost 15 years ago. So what I'm referring to is mostly what I get from new hires & interns.

Edit: Really, please check Delphi section in About.com, it has articles for beginners to start from zero. What else do you need?

Check the flipcode archives, that's rather the kind of articles I would be expecting on a site like PGD (pity flipcode went away btw).
http://www.flipcode.com/archives/

[WILL]

Well lets not get too off-topic fellas.

Mind you we could open a new thread called "Eric and Yuriy debating about degrees and programming education that I'll never receive at this point in my life." (I'm joking of course... not about the education part though... )

Basically what I want PGD to provide for tutorials is something above what you'd be taught in high school for basic Computer Science which teaches you everything from good ole printf all the way up to the blisteringly daunting lessons of function() vs. procedure() and the like. We don't need to teach programming it's self, but I would like to teach how to program things that can be used to make fun and creative games. To do this from a basic level and go up to a novice and then an advanced game developer's level.

So far we have only novice and advanced. There is a disconnect from the beginners to the people that have been here a while and it shows when those beginners go away and don't return. So it's important to bridge that gap and get more beginner tutorials out there. A part of that problem is that some of the older more advanced guys forget how to think small and simple. Or that it's just plain boring for them and don't want to bother.

(WARNING: This is where I start to get ranty...)

The trick to this however is not to simply teach Delphi or Free Pascal or any specific APIs, but to actually teach game programming. I don't think there has been a single new "game programming" article on PGD in years. (That was a challenge tutorial writers, yes! ) Programming ideology, project management, API/library specific features or how to setup ____ dev tool maybe, but not one single game programming tutorial about game programming.

In fact the last game programming tutorial I read beyond my own Artillery game tutorial (which I never did finish I hate to,but have to admit) was the one about creating a platform game by Alexander Rosendal (our very own Traveler), but that was done years ago and I don't think they are up anywhere anymore and definitely not updated to today's current libraries or dev tools.

We need tutorial writers that write about making games, not making software theory or talking about how to implement some wacky new software language concepts just added to Delphi. Not necessarily to make specific genres, but often just to explain a concept such as faked physics in games or using tile maps, object detection or path finding. These can be applied to ANY game genre and don't need silly advanced programming methods like generics, ducking or object model

...and they get a beginner INTERESTED in programming games not giving up on all the weird stuff we're talking about in the forums.

The advanced stuff is great, really, but not when we don't have anything for newcomers to grow off of to get to that level. I just don't want to entertain much advanced stuff anymore for a while. Not until we have some good solid tutorials that will bring in and KEEP those new Pascal programmers that want something out of PGD. We've failed them and we need to fix it.

Flipcode was pretty cool, but at least we still have NeHe!

[Eric]

Flipcode was pretty cool, but at least we still have NeHe!

NeHe doesn't seem to be active in the way it was (tutorials, rendering techniques) and seem more about news these days.

What I really liked in flipcode was the mix between articles illustrating various techniques, from rendering to AI to physics to using some new API, coupled with the IOTD "Image Of The Day", which was a great way to see what people were doing or start discussions about this or that aspect. It also drew in people that were seeking "technical" exposure for their work, game or engine.

An IOTD might be too much given the (still limited) contributing crowd in PGD, but an IOTW (Image of The Week) or VOTW (Video of The Week) should be possible?

[Relfos]

An IOTD might be too much given the (still limited) contributing crowd in PGD, but an IOTW (Image of The Week) or VOTW (Video of The Week) should be possible?

I think this would be cool
Also I can make some free time to write tutorial about game programming (I'm open to suggestions, because I really don't have a clue what is the best topic to start)

[LP]

That's incorrect, f.i. see http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudi...eveloper-tools

Seems like they provide Windows Phone SDK separately. I stand corrected.

Well, I've met enough "professionally certified" personnel to take those with a truckload of salt, especially when they're from a pure academic background, and I've met quite few. ;-)

Not everyone can teach and those who can teach may not necessarily be good professionals to work for industry. Teaching is not as easy as you may think and there are even professional degrees (e.g. Bachelor/Master/Doctor of Education), which are required in many cases to give classes to children, for instance. The same applies to scientific works as the scientific approach might be different than a purely mechanical work, which is very common when working in companies (ranging from software engineering to top management positions). Perhaps you can't understand it because you have not done any scientific work and/or teaching yourself, but I'm just guessing.

I guess you skipped the part on me saying I already have quite a high degree, and got it, hmmm, almost 15 years ago. So what I'm referring to is mostly what I get from new hires & interns.

No, I saw it but you are moving conversation to a personal level. What you have mentioned is an equivalent of baechelor/undergraduate degree (roughly 4/5-year university education), which is a minimal degree required by most institutions. You should note that you are not allowed to give classes with this degree, nor do any scientific work in "traditional" universities/research centers, which sort of proves my point above. If you wish to pursue this conversation further, I'd like to point out the classical Unskilled and unaware of it article, which you should read first. Please note that I'm not trying to be disrespectful, I believe that degree itself is not everything: education, experience and even personality/attitude are very important factors as well.

(edit) By the way, for comparison, here in Mexico to be *paid* to do research, you need 12 years of university education (5 bachelor + 2 master + 5 doctorate) plus 2 years of professional practice (e.g. postdoctoral stay, which must be done at least in a different state where you have got doctoral degree). To be able to teach lower degrees, you need Master's degree and 1 year of practice. This is somewhat similar to U.S., Canada and EU.

Edit 2:

I guess we have a major incomprehension here, I'm not a student, and many PGD visitors aren't and won't be. They won't be going back to university full-time, and even part-time university can be quite problematic when you have a full-time job already and children.

You are wrong. As I've said before, in M.Sc. and D.Sc. degrees that I took most people had families with children and were working either full or part time. Actually, in my own case (similar to some of my classmates), I got paid to do research in my D.Sc. degree both by institution and by Mexican's council of sciences and technology and the payment was pretty good! In fact, the payment may be even higher than what you receive while working in a company! These degrees give you more labor opportunities and sometimes change your way of thinking, which you may not acquire in your entire life with experience only. This is why I recommend for everyone who want to push farther in their career and life to take one of more advanced degrees and it is never too late to do so.

Yes, it really depends on the institution and indeed some may excel in some things, while other institutions may excel in other stuff, but you can choose even on international scale and pick what you want.

P.S. Jason, sorry for this sort of hijacking, but after all it's a discussion about programming skills taught in institutions as opposed to teaching them here on PGD, so it's somewhat related to topic.

[Eric]

You should note that you are not allowed to give classes with this degree, nor do any scientific work in "traditional" universities/research centers

Actually, I am. :-) Though I've checked "Bachelor", that's two years less than I have, and a university degree. In France we have a system of "Grandes Ecoles" which runs in parallel to universities degrees aren't directly comparable to university degrees (it's another french historical oddity).

Anyway that's besides the point.

To get back on topic, I agree with the suggestions you made earlier.

1) 64-bit development and performance (I've opened the thread about it: no interest).
2) DirectX: nobody cares here because OpenGL is the only way to go for Unix/Mac OS guys, who are the majority here.
3) Mac OS specifics: there was some discussion in Delphi XE 2 news thread with Czar and me, but that's all.
4) iOS specifics: how to use sensors, compass, magnetometer, etc. There are random threads on Embarcadero forums, but I would like to see this material *here*.
5) Databases, networking, multiplayer in Delphi.
6) Publishing of Delphi made iOS apps and publishing in general.
7) Performance optimizations in 64-bit inline assembly in Delphi.
Math materials (libraries, code snippets, etc.)

To me 2, 3 and 4 are specs/docs material subjects, 1 and 7 are about programming in general (choosing the appropriate algorithm, profiling), 5 and 8 is what academic material is about (except multi-player), 6 is what WILL already does.

So all in all, they mostly fall into teaching programming from a gaming POV, and that's IMHO a good angle for PGD. What I disagreed with was

Actually I think teaching programming by itself is not a very useful tactic here because newbies have many options to choose from: C# and XNA, C/C++, Perl, Python, Lua, Java and so on.

When someone needs to do something, he'll use the tool for which material specific to his needs is available.
If all the material assumes you're already a Pascal pro, then you certainly won't be attracting any Pascal newcomers.

[LP]

Actually, I am. :-) Though I've checked "Bachelor", that's two years less than I have, and a university degree. In France we have a system of "Grandes Ecoles" which runs in parallel to universities degrees aren't directly comparable to university degrees (it's another french historical oddity).

Yes, but in France you have also additional degrees such as "Professor", which require even more time to get. However, translating these degrees to other countries is difficult and you may still need to take additional degrees to be able to give courses. This was the case of my brother as Doctoral degree in Ukraine is higher than Ph.D. yet he still had to do 2 postdoctoral stays (4 years total) before being able to do the research.

When someone needs to do something, he'll use the tool for which material specific to his needs is available.
If all the material assumes you're already a Pascal pro, then you certainly won't be attracting any Pascal newcomers.

You are repeating the mocking fallacy. I've never said to assume on PGD that visitors are Pascal "pro"s as you have put it. I suggested to assume some basic knowledge and as you have quoted my first posts, I've actually suggested some educational material with some specifics that not everyone may be aware of.

For instance, I agree that FlipCode had some very interesting stuff and in fact I've implemented some of it in Asphyre. Specifically, I think it will be very cool to have a specialized section here on PGD, which deals with issues such as: 1) calculating square root using pure integer math, 2) search algorithms (this is a general category, path-finding is a special case), 3) fixed-point math (not everyone is yet aware of its usefulness), etc.

Edit: I think Multi-threading Tutorial on PGD by Athena is an interesting topic, but instead of long discussion I would put some rudimentary code to illustrate how threads can be created and used, instead of arguing why they are useful.