As a different datapoint Pascal is still taught here in Romania in secondary school just as it was the case 20 years ago.
Bigger problem is that they teach the fundamentals with the abandonware that is turbo pascal instead of using something like the modern Free Pascal Compiler. Which means knowledge of what is possible outside curricula is limited.
Last year I almost was tasked with porting some Pascal codebase to a modern language. Problem was the project had a bus factor of 1, legacy overengineered and would only compile on windows with some proprietary compiler.
Maybe that company would use Claude/Codex or something like that, today, to port the project.
> Bigger problem is that they teach the fundamentals with the abandonware that is turbo pascal instead of using something like the modern Free Pascal Compiler. Which means knowledge of what is possible outside curricula is limited.
FreePascal can compile TP programs with no changes except for the MS-DOS graphics. A student can swap FP for TP and the code will keep running. But yes, I would switch to FP from the start if I were in charge.
jqpabc123 · · focus · HN ↗
1) The code isn't as "optimized" as it could be.
2) The talent pool is limited --- chicken or egg issue.
It has been this way for a very long time so I don't see it changing.
mhitza · · focus · HN ↗
Bigger problem is that they teach the fundamentals with the abandonware that is turbo pascal instead of using something like the modern Free Pascal Compiler. Which means knowledge of what is possible outside curricula is limited.
Last year I almost was tasked with porting some Pascal codebase to a modern language. Problem was the project had a bus factor of 1, legacy overengineered and would only compile on windows with some proprietary compiler.
Maybe that company would use Claude/Codex or something like that, today, to port the project.
AlexeyBrin · · focus · HN ↗
FreePascal can compile TP programs with no changes except for the MS-DOS graphics. A student can swap FP for TP and the code will keep running. But yes, I would switch to FP from the start if I were in charge.