Articles by David Bolton
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C++ and C: How These Languages are Diverging
C++ started life as “C with Classes” back in the 1980s, though it was quickly renamed “C++.” For much of the past thirty-odd years, C++ has been regarded as a superset of C; any C program could b… -
4 Reasons to Employ Older Developers
Despite legislation making it overtly illegal, ageism persists in the technology industry. The fear is particularly acute because of fears that automation and A.I. will erode the overall number o… -
5 Reasons to Use a VM for Development
I started using virtual machines (VMs) on my development PC about six years ago; I was keen to learn Linux, having been a Windows developer since the mid-1990s. At first, I used an old Windows PC… -
Writing Faster Python with Functions, Lists, and More
Python is a great language that’s easy to learn (just keep in mind: "always indent after colons"), but it’s also possible that your written code ends up being quite slow. Such inelegantly written… -
Joys of Raspberry Pi Development: A Walkthrough
My first computer, an Amstrad PC1512 that I bought new in 1989, cost $1,200 (or roughly $2,460 in 2019 dollars). It came with 512Kb of RAM and two floppy disks, and ran at 8 MHZ. Thirty years lat… -
Eclipse IDE: Getting Started, Plugins, and More
With the recent quarterly release of the Eclipse IDE, it’s a good time to see how both the IDE and the larger Foundation are progressing. I started using Eclipse about 14 years ago, not long afte… -
PHP: A Quick Introduction to a Complex Language
PHP is a quarter-century old… and for the first 20 years, it had no written specification. That’s astounding, and probably explains why it was a bit of a challenge for many developers to get thei… -
Speeding Up a SQL Application: a Walkthrough
Not so long ago, I had to figure out why an old desktop application, written mainly in Delphi and using a proprietary file-based database, felt a bit slow when moved to SQL (with a bit of C# adde… -
Five 'Gotchas!' in a Nightmare Delphi, C++ Project
This is a tale of the "fun" I've had creating some software. It involves taking a Microsoft technology called Virtual Channel and using it with an older programming language, Delphi. I want to sh… -
Python Debugging: How to Improve Your Skills
When you work with visual programming languages such as Delphi, C#, and VB.NET, you're a bit spoiled for debugging options as they’re nicely integrated into their IDEs. But when it comes to Pytho…