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I use Delphi and last year I upgraded from D5 Enterprise to Delphi 2010 Profession. Occasionally I get emails asking when I will have a version that runs on a Mac.

Is there a version of Delphi out there that will create software that runs on a Mac?

If not, do you know if Embarcadero plans on rolling out a version that does this in the near future?

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  • at this moment no, you can not make binaries for Mac from Delphi. maybe in the future. at this moment the only reliable solution is DelphiPrism or you can try a shot with FreePascal. Commented Mar 12, 2011 at 14:44
  • I think many users will vote for this question because many users need it Commented Mar 12, 2011 at 16:26
  • Note that whether you consider Lazarus, or a future Delphi version that runs on mac, you will have to make a lot of UI changes to adapt to a different platform. You can start getting ready now by making sure your UI layer (your Views, which in Delphi would mostly be Forms and Frames) runs completely separate from your model and or controller objects. Commented Mar 13, 2011 at 19:31
  • I don't see a need to do that completely. Removing some state from the UI is a good thing (kill TComponent.tag), but unless you plan a webfrontend, MVC is overkill IMHO. Commented Mar 16, 2011 at 9:10

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Have you tried the Lazarus IDE which is usign Free Pascal and is free? This has native support for Mac OS including Linux and Windows. It should be relatively compatible with Delphi. Although I haven't tried it, my guess is that it will be able to convert most Delphi applications with little to know change required.

Many of the third party vendor component makers, even make the components compatible with Lazarus. So there is a chance that any third party controls you have might work with Lazarus and Free Pascal.

Free Pascal not only supports several operating systems, it also supports 64 bit compiling, so while Embarcadero have all these things on the roadmap, waiting for them to be released would be a bit like waiting for the lottery ticket to bring you a fortune (sorry Embarcadero, I'm still waiting for 64 bit). As I mentioned I haven't tried Free Pascal/Lazarus my self, so it is a bit of a guess how complex moving from Delphi to this solution is; I guess it depends on your project, but you could be lucky and the transition is smooth.

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But will it be more than converting to an Embarcadero Delphi/Mac? I don't think so. Porting applications to Kylix that weren't designed with Kylix in mind was no picknick either.
It will probably be easier to Emba Delphi/Mac because the language will be the same and the RTL should be close to native. Depends how much GUI code you have.
My understanding of Free Pascal is that it is indeed very close to Delphi. And from what I've seen so far the differences between the two lies only in the class libraries, and not in the language. But I could be mistaken.
David: If you have code that hasn't been moved to Unicode, Free Pascal is actually closer, dialect wise. (since it is more D2006-D2007ish)
@TommyA There are diverse implementation of string (=UnicodeString since Delphi 2009), generics and attributes. FPC has a "Delphi mode", which makes it compatible with most existing Delphi code. And the LCL tries to emulate the VCL (that's why it's so huge, by the way, whereas FireMonkey will go in another direction, by not using the VCL architecture).
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  • Native Delphi only produces 32 bit Windows executables. These can only run on Mac with some form of emulation layer.
  • Delphi Prism targets .net and can produce Mac apps using Mono. It sounds like you have an existing native Win 32 Delphi app which means this option would not be terribly attractive.

Embarcadero are working on a version of Delphi that will produce native Mac executables but my impression is that this is still some way off release. Even when it is released there will be a significant porting effort required, especially if your app has significant amounts of GUI code. The VCL will not be available in the same form as on Windows.

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And there is of course the question if Delphi/Mac will access a native API, or build on Embarcadero's existing QT based libraries (CLX/VCLX).
@David: You know there is all sorts of random downvoting here... A week ago (or so) someone apparently downvoted every answer I gave that week. [You need 125 points to downvote. Maybe that is a bit low... I'dont know.]
@Marco The impression I get is that CLX is dead, cremated and the ashes have been sent to outer space. I think they were talking about a native Mac framework that would not be particularly compatible with VCL. It's funny that Borland missed the chance to play nice with Mac, one OS that has a rich Pascal tradition.
I would definitely jump onto the Delphi/VCL bandwagon when it becomes possible to produce native Mac executables. There was a glimmer of hope in the beginning that might be the case for the .NET platform, and although the Mono project has stepped in to fill the void, I've never been completely happy with their UI on OS X. This has the potential to be some very interesting news...
@Cody I thought you couldn't live without Visual Studio and did not trust things from Scotts Valley. ;-)
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See the roadmap: http://edn.embarcadero.com/article/39934 Project "Pulsar", slide 13.

In the short term, many Delphi apps run just fine on the Mac in emulation, such as Parallels Workstation.

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This (emulation/parallels) has satisfied many of my users. They have had the experience often enough to expect it from time to time.

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