Just another viewpoint. Xojo isn’t a charity, it’s a business. There is harm you can do by buying something you don’t necessarily need just to “support the company”. You enable the company to not perform because they are getting money for things you aren’t using. When businesses make goods and services that enhance YOUR value, they should be rewarded. Economies and businesses run in a healthier manner that way.
I didn’t agree with most of Phillips list (though respecting what he values, that’s okay with me).
32-bit??
Factually I don’t see how 32-bit will be “harder to deploy”, if the OS allows 32-bit it does or it doesn’t. As of Sierra there are no 32-bit issues.
Mobile??
Mobile is an AND thing, you don’t have to care about mobile. If it becomes important, then get the latest Xojo - Xojo just added value to you. But no one really NEEDS it for basic things.
Bug Scare
The “bug scare” he invokes - no, most RS and Xojo releases for the last 7 years have been stable with no bugs that would really bite you in any significant way; in other words, all can be avoided or workaround.
Plug-In Compatibility??
“I also need to use a large variety of plugins that also generally require access to newer Xojo features.” I don’t know what this means. Plugins do their own thing and their only relationship with Xojo is their function interfaces, and that’s only data types, whcih haven’t changed significantly in years. Plus, when you say PlugIn you really are saying MBS, and I’m using RS2011 and MBS is compatible WITH THAT.
Feels Native
This makes no sense. One of RS/Xojo’s mantras (like, forever) has been to use native-OS controls whenever possible, and most stuff in Xojo are native controls. So as long as you are compiling for Cocoa (Mac), your app will feel as native as possible automatically. A new Xojo version won’t and can’t improve on this.
I still work with RS2011r3 and I sell thousands of 32-bit Carbon apps to Mac people running Sierra and they are plenty happy with the apps. I get that I’m behind the curve, and I’m going for Xojo this year, but I want a BIG payoff by upgrading. Part of that is 64-bit, and it’s only now that you can debug in 64-bit. I’m still going to wait until things settle down.
I don’t mean to pick on Phillip, but just my point of view.