BorlandTalk.com Borland discussion newsgroups   Archives   FAQ   Search   Memberlist   Usergroups   Register   Profile   Log in to check your private messages   Log in  VCL vs MFC Study Goto page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9  Next          BorlandTalk.com Forum Index -> C++ Builder (Non-Technical) View previous topic :: View next topic   Author Message Michael Swindell (CodeGea Guest Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2007 11:04 pm    Post subject: VCL vs MFC Study Years ago I did some VCL vs MFC LOC comparisons that I used to demonstrate the productivity and maintainability increase you get with C++Builder over VC++. They were very impressive and real world. I've recently received several VCL vs MFC comparisons from a customer and I think it's over due to start doing this again. This particular customer rebuilt the exact same VCL app with the exact same functionality with MFC for a 64bit deployment requirement the difference was 57k LOC in VCL vs 251k LOC in MFC. Sure there is some IDE generated code in the MFC app, but in general it was between a 4:1 to 5:1 difference in both time, complexity, and code. That's very significant in time to market, cost, quality, and maintainability. I'm interested in getting many more Chars/Words/Lines comparisons between VCL and MFC based apps from C++Builder users. I'm not really interested in biased or inflated examples... I'm looking to be as objective as we can get. Metrics I'd be very interested in are word/line count comparisons between functionally similar/identical VCL and MFC apps, ie unix cmd Wordcount is good for that. Semicolon counts are also a good measure as they eliminate formatting and comments. If you'd like to participate in this please sendcomparisons to mswindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com - the applications can just be a sample app you build for this (redoing the BCB demos would be a great example) or ideally a real world app that you've either brought from MFC to VCL or vice versa - you can just send the comparison results, but source code if available is also useful, provided you don't mind it being published. Other optional items that would be useful to include: - your name/company/position - description of the application - screenshots of the running apps - any anecdotes on the development of the two apps and your comments on VCL and MFC Thanks! This should be fun. -Michael Back to top dhoke Guest Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 4:30 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study - how 'bout WTL too? As long as your soliciting information, might be interesting to solicit values for apps using WTL also. I doubt its as widely used as MFC, but I know it has some use, and I have even considered it as a possible alternative myself. I realize that may not be entirely inline with your immediate objectives, but I'm probably not the only person who would be interested. (I believe the latest versions of WTL require a later version of ATL than is shipping with the current b/cb releases, but I think slightly earlier ones can run on b/cg's shipping version of ATL.) "Michael Swindell (CodeGear)" <michael.nospam.swindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com> wrote in message news:462f9840$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: Years ago I did some VCL vs MFC LOC comparisons that I used to demonstrate the productivity and maintainability increase you get with C++Builder over VC++. Back to top Hendrik Schober Guest Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 5:19 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study Michael Swindell (CodeGear) <michael.nospam.swindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com> wrote: Quote: [VCL vs MFC comparisons] If you'd like to participate in this please sendcomparisons to mswindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com [...] Wasn't there a clause in the license agreement forbidding giving away any kind of benchmarks results (and couldn't, what you ask for, be considered benchmark results)? Quote: -Michael Schobi -- SpamTrap (AT) gmx (DOT) de is never read I'm HSchober at gmx dot de "My hope is that if more people start reading books, the world will become a better place." froarulv in afp Back to top Helmut Giese Guest Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 6:30 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study Hi Michael, though I cannot contribute I wish you luck with your inquiery. My only exposure to MFC (well, not even that, really) was some 10 years ago: When meeting a former collegue he mentioned in passing how much effort went into the attempt to have a red button (because the boss wanted it that way) - and that after almost one week they eventually resigned. I was mostly using Delphi for GUI development at this time and I didn't quite understand the problem they were having: Why, I would just select the button's color property in the object inspector and have it turn red. Couldn't be that difficult with MFC, could it? It was only some time later after having heard similar stories that I eventually realized that: yes, simple things like this can be a daunting task in MFC, and (as a corollary): Thanks, thanks, thanks for the VCL - life facing the Windows API is hard enough, but at least getting the basic visual stuff done really is a snap. Hm, that has almost grown to a little story. What I actually wanted is asking a question: Has the comparison you are planning still any merit? I mean, is MFC still in use today? I thought everybody working with Microsoft tools is using WinForms under .NET - or whatever it's called now (I don't follow suite and might be a little behind the current trend/terminology). Or did I fell for Microsoft's marketing and in reality MFC is still in widespread use? Comments welcome Helmut Giese Back to top Captain Jake Guest Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:14 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study "Michael Swindell (CodeGear)" <michael.nospam.swindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com> wrote in message news:462f9840$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: I'm interested in getting many more Chars/Words/Lines comparisons between VCL and MFC based apps from C++Builder users. I can give you examples of opens ource C++ code that compiles in VC++ but not C++ Builder. Is that useful? Back to top Kathire Guest Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:49 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study "Captain Jake" <jake (AT) NOSPAMJsNewsreader (DOT) com> wrote in message news:4630ec14$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: I can give you examples of opens ource C++ code that compiles in VC++ but not C++ Builder. Is that useful? Please list them. I remember David Dean was asking about the popular libs that cannot be compiled with BCB. I'm maintaining a list of free libs that cannot be compiled with C++ builder. Have a look at : http://codepaks.sourceforge.net/broken-libs.htm -Kathire Back to top David Dean [CodeGear] Guest Posted: Fri Apr 27, 2007 6:36 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study In article <4630f424$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com>, "Kathire" <kathire@@-----yahoo-------.com> wrote: Quote: http://codepaks.sourceforge.net/broken-libs.htm Thank you, BTW. -- -David Dean CodeGear C++ QA Engineer <http://blogs.codegear.com/ddean/> Back to top Helmut Giese Guest Posted: Fri Apr 27, 2007 8:10 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study On Fri, 27 Apr 2007 06:20:15 +0200, Andre Kaufmann <andre.kaufmann_re_move_@t-online.de> wrote: Quote: Helmut Giese wrote: Hi Michael, [...] daunting task in MFC, and (as a corollary): Thanks, thanks, thanks for the VCL - life facing the Windows API is hard enough, but at least getting the basic visual stuff done really is a snap. I agree that VCL is far more easier to handle than MFC. Though regarding the buttons background color I had the same problem recently with the VCL. I couldn't figure it out, how to simply change a buttons background color. Or did I miss something ? Hi Andre, sorry I can't help with this. The tale was from years ago and I don't have Delphi installed on this machine. Best regards Helmut Giese Back to top Andre Kaufmann Guest Posted: Fri Apr 27, 2007 8:10 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study Helmut Giese wrote: Quote: Hi Michael, [...] daunting task in MFC, and (as a corollary): Thanks, thanks, thanks for the VCL - life facing the Windows API is hard enough, but at least getting the basic visual stuff done really is a snap. I agree that VCL is far more easier to handle than MFC. Though regarding the buttons background color I had the same problem recently with the VCL. I couldn't figure it out, how to simply change a buttons background color. Or did I miss something ? Quote: [...] Comments welcome Helmut Giese Back to top Daniel James Guest Posted: Fri Apr 27, 2007 3:39 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study In article <462f9840$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com>, Michael Swindell (CodeGear) wrote: Quote: Years ago I did some VCL vs MFC LOC comparisons that I used to demonstrate the productivity and maintainability increase you get with C++Builder over VC++. I can't give you concrete examples from my own experience as the only time I have coded substantially the same thing in both VCL and MFC I was working on a client project that I no longer have to hand. My own experience, in general, is that it is much easier to knock up a quick demo with VCL than with MFC, but that the resulting VCL code has rough edges that need to be shaved away. Getting a VCL app to production quality requires MORE work than doing the same with MFC -- especially when using the supplied VCL components (some of the third-party libraries one can buy are much better) and especially when the default behaviour of the components being used has to be overridden in some way. In general, I find that the GUI aspect of most of my projects represents so small a proportion of the total coding effort that the choice between MFC and VCL is not an issue. Quality of code produced by the compiler, ease of management of the whole project space, and compliance with standards -- to name but a few -- are far more important. Quote: This particular customer rebuilt the exact same VCL app with the exact same functionality with MFC for a 64bit deployment requirement the difference was 57k LOC in VCL vs 251k LOC in MFC. I didn't think VCL was available for 64-bit environments? Quote: Sure there is some IDE generated code in the MFC app ... Yes, the VS IDE generates a good bit of the code for you with MFC. Line counts aren't really the important thing, here, though: as MFC is a lower-level library you do have to write a little more code to drive it -- but that code is very simple, low-level, easy-to-understand and quick-to-write code. It's not a great burden to write or maintain, it doesn't add significantly to the complexity of the app, and producing it can be automated (more than by using MS's supplied 'wizards') to some extent. I'm not suggesting that this makes MFC "better than" VCL -- just the mere LOC isn't really a useful metric. Quote: ie unix cmd Wordcount is good for that. Semicolon counts are also a good measure as they eliminate formatting and comments. Yeah, thanks Granny, but we know eggs ... I do like using VCL -- especially when I use Delphi. In Delphi it's the only game in town and its fun to play and produces good results. When I use C++ I'm much more aware of standards and portability issues. I want to use a framework that makes best use of the features that the language provides 'for free' and builds on those features to produce code that is naturally portable and cross-platform. (I have a feeling that a marketing person would misuse the word "leverage" here, so I won't.) I want to ensure that my work can use third-party libraries that are written with the same principles in mind without any clashes with my code or the framework, or any duplication of effort (what's the point of having three different string classes in your app, when the language itself provides one?). It worries me that the VCL used by BCB is written in Delphi's Pascal (and as I understand it, can't be compiled on any other Pascal compiler). That makes BCB a one-shop tool, and that makes it a commercial risk. Some years ago I tried to persuade a client to accept a solution using VCL (in Delphi, actually, but the argument applies to BCB as well) and was told to use C++ and MFC because VCL was a risk, whereas MFC was supported by a range of compilers (Borland and Symantec were shipping C++ compilers with MFC support at that time). That may seem like a stupid decision, and stupid grounds for making a decision, but it's people who think like that that control the cash-flows in this industry (so help us!) What I'd like to see is not a comparison between just VCL and MFC, but between those and WinForms, Qt, wxWidgets, FLTK, and others (someone mentioned WTL) ... ... not just something that looks at lines of code; but something that consider time to implement and ease of maintenance, portability, compiler support, Unicode support, and internationalization support. I'd like to see an analysis of how well the different frameworks utilize (rather than duplicating) the standard library features, a discussion of the available tool support for these libraries and an account of how that affects their usability and the maintainability of projects using them. I don't suppose that's in your remit, though. Cheers, Daniel. Back to top Bruce Salzman Guest Posted: Fri Apr 27, 2007 9:54 pm    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study "Michael Swindell (CodeGear)" <michael.nospam.swindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com> wrote in message news:462f9840$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: If you'd like to participate in this please sendcomparisons to mswindell (AT) codegear (DOT) com - the applications can just be a sample app you build for this (redoing the BCB demos would be a great example) or ideally a real world app that you've either brought from MFC to VCL or vice versa - you can just send the comparison results, but source code if available is also useful, provided you don't mind it being published. Other optional items that would be useful to include: - your name/company/position - description of the application - screenshots of the running apps - any anecdotes on the development of the two apps and your comments on VCL and MFC Time spent reloading the IDE after it crashes... -- Bruce Back to top Darko Miletic Guest Posted: Sat Apr 28, 2007 5:20 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study On Fri, 27 Apr 2007 06:20:15 +0200, Andre Kaufmann <andre.kaufmann_re_move_@t-online.de> wrote: Quote: Helmut Giese wrote: Hi Michael, I agree that VCL is far more easier to handle than MFC. Though regarding the buttons background color I had the same problem recently with the VCL. I couldn't figure it out, how to simply change a buttons background color. Or did I miss something ? In this area MFC and VCL are the same. In both cases owner-draw button is needed. http://delphi.about.com/od/vclwriteenhance/l/aa061104a.htm Darko Back to top Darko Miletic Guest Posted: Sat Apr 28, 2007 7:26 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study On Thu, 26 Apr 2007 11:49:08 -0700, "Kathire" <kathire@@-----yahoo-------.com> wrote: Quote: "Captain Jake" <jake (AT) NOSPAMJsNewsreader (DOT) com> wrote in message news:4630ec14$1 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... I can give you examples of opens ource C++ code that compiles in VC++ but not C++ Builder. Is that useful? Please list them. I remember David Dean was asking about the popular libs that cannot be compiled with BCB. I'm maintaining a list of free libs that cannot be compiled with C++ builder. Have a look at : http://codepaks.sourceforge.net/broken-libs.htm I see that you mention curl as a problematic library. Just to test it out I downloaded it and was able to compile it with Turbo C++ . Not out of the box, but the fix is trivial. As far as I can see in a lot of cases there are just not enough people interested to participate in submitting fixes for Borland/codegear compilers. Back to top AlexB Guest Posted: Sat Apr 28, 2007 8:11 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study Michael Swindell (CodeGear) wrote: Quote: I'm interested in getting many more Chars/Words/Lines comparisons between VCL and MFC based apps from C++Builder users. Good example is PageControl. With VCL you can simply drop it on form and use. With MFC you must create a lot of dialogs/resources, manually keep track of page switching and recreate page dialogs and values and so on... It's nightmare. -- Alex. Back to top Andreas Hausladen Guest Posted: Sat Apr 28, 2007 8:11 am    Post subject: Re: VCL vs MFC Study Darko Miletic wrote: Quote: As far as I can see in a lot of cases there are just not enough people interested to participate in submitting fixes for Borland/codegear compilers. Have you ever tried to create fixes for Qt 4.x ? It isn't possible without rewriting a lot of code. -- Regards, Andreas Hausladen Back to top        BorlandTalk.com Forum Index -> C++ Builder (Non-Technical) All times are GMT Goto page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9  Next Page 1 of 9 Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2006 phpBB Group .