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PascalABC.NET is a Pascal programming language that implements classic Pascal, most Delphi language features, as well as a number of their own extensions. It is implemented on the .NET Framework platform and contains all the modern language features: classes, operator overloading, interfaces, exception handling, generic classes and routines, garbage collection, lambda expressions, parallel programming tools. (more on Wikipedia)
Specs
Pros
Pro Integrated programming taskbook
Comes bundled with 3rd party plugin (see PT4Taskbook) for programming exercises with automatic results verification: very useful for teaching classes, exams or self-education. Basic set of tasks is free (although needs manual license activation), full version requires getting a commercial license. It's also possible to create your own task sets at no charge.
Pro Simplified and modern syntax with many new powerful extentions
Easier to write, read and comprehend, more concise and less error-prone than already classic ObjectPascal: local block variables definitions and scope, optional automatic type inference, automatic memory management and garbage collection, functional-style extensions, auto-classes, generics, tuples, slices, lambdas, dynamic arrays, arbitrary sets, interpolated strings and many more powerful features.
Pro Also partially supports old-fashioned code
Besides its own modernized Pascal dialect, the compiler is able to cope with lots of legacy code for educational purposes, with minimal or no adaptation: try simple Turbo Pascal or Delphi-style sources. Just forget about VCL and other native binary libs and don't heavily rely on pointers or manual memory management -- it's all emulated!
Pro Suitable for schools as well as academia and enthusiasts
Has simple yet powerful (for the target audience) standard and educational libraries. Also supports using external .NET libraries and creating your own libs. You may look at it as a simplified C# with Pascal syntax. It should nicely fit all: young newbies, progressive teachers and various enthusiasts who are not yet professional coders.
Cons
Con Not suitable for professional use (although never really intended for it)
Unfortunately, there're still lots of things in this product that are either missing, not stable enough or not properly designed for use in a real production environment: there're no distinction between stable/non-stable builds or releases (no alpha/beta/dev branches either); one can't easily roll back to any previous build if the current one is buggy (there's no archive of previous builds -- only the latest binary build is officially provided, always presumed to be "stable"); the "project mode" and GUI designer in IDE is buggy and very limited; the code editor is slow, clumsy and pretty basic; the compiler or IDE may crash unexpectedly, especially with big or complex code, on some rare features and in other corner cases; official documentation is incomplete and often quite superficial without detailed examples of proper usage, etc.
Con No formal support in English (yet?)
All official forums, books, examples and docs are currently mostly in Russian due to project's origin and primary target audience (Russian Southern Federal University). But if you ask politely and inspire them to grow bigger, they might open up a separate support section for English-speaking users on their forums. Better yet, help them translate their official docs and tutorials, if you can!