Turbo Vision
| Company type | Software framework |
|---|---|
| Industry | Software development |
| Founded | 1990 |
| Founder | Borland |
| Products | Text user interface framework |
| Owner | Borland |
Turbo Vision is a text-based text user interface framework that was distributed with Borland Pascal, Turbo Pascal, and Borland C++ around the year 1990. Borland utilized this framework to build the integrated development environments (IDEs) for these programming languages. Applications created with Turbo Vision emulate the look and feel of these IDEs, incorporating elements such as edit controls, list boxes, check boxes, radio buttons, and menus that include native mouse interaction. Eventually, it was superseded by the Object Windows Library, the Win16 API, and the graphical user interface components found in Borland Delphi.
In 1997, Borland made the C++ edition and its source code publicly available by releasing it into the public domain. This allowed an open-source community to continue its development on SourceForge under the terms of the GPL license. Additionally, an enhanced version of Borland's code maintained by Sergio Sigala is offered under the BSD license.
The Pascal variant, which was included with Borland Pascal 7 as a supplementary disk, was never distributed under a free license. The Free Pascal initiative developed Free Vision, a text-mode clone inspired by Leon de Boer's graphical-mode adaptation. This project has since matured and stabilized across all platforms and architectures supported by FPC. Its text-mode IDE closely resembles the original Turbo Pascal environment, merging compiler functionalities with IDE features alongside improvements such as code folding.
Unicode support
A significant drawback of Turbo Vision’s original Borland release was its absence of Unicode compatibility. As of October 2020, Unicode-enabled versions are available for both C++ and Free Pascal implementations.
Third-party implementations
| Project name | Active | Latest release | Last update | Unicode support | Language | Graphical | Platforms | License |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turbo Vision (magiblot) | Yes | No stable releases (per GitHub) | Template:Sort | Yes (UTF-8) | C++ | No | DOS, Linux, Windows | MIT |
| Free Vision | Yes | FPC 3.2.2 | Template:Sort | Yes (since February 2022) | Pascal | No | Most platforms supported by FPC (tested on Linux, Windows) | LGPL with linking exception |
| TVision port to the GNU compiler | No | 2.0.3 | Template:Sort | No | C++ | No | DOS, FreeBSD, Linux, QNX, Solaris, Win32 | GPL |
| Port for Virtual Pascal | No | 2.1 Build 279 | Template:Sort | No information | Pascal | No | Windows, OS/2, Linux | No information |
| GraphVision | No | 2.01 | 2001-04-23|}
No information on Unicode support |
Pascal | Yes | DOS (graphics mode) | No information | |
| TVision (Sergio Sigala) | No | 0.8 | 2001-08-10|}
No Unicode support |
C++ | No | Linux, FreeBSD | BSD-like | |
| Port for TMT Pascal | No | Not specified | 2000-08-18|}
No information on Unicode support |
Pascal | No | DOS (TMT Pascal) | No information | |
| Graphics Vision (MKM Software) | No | 3.0 (DOS/DPMI/Windows), 2.10R2, 2.01 (DOS) | 1999-02-09|}
No information on Unicode support |
Pascal | Yes | DOS, Windows, Linux (GV/FPC), DPMI | Free for individual use; commercial license; DOS libraries - LGPL | |
| Super Vision | No | 2.2 | Unknown | No information on Unicode support | Pascal | Yes | DOS (SVGA) | No information |
Software utilizing Turbo Vision
- Dos Navigator
- IBM Handshaker
- SET Editor
- RHIDE
- OSPlus Text Editor
- TMBasic
- NE (Not EDLIN)
- EditV
- IDA (DOS edition)
- turbo (text editor)
- tvterm (terminal emulator)
Related topics
External resources
- Free Vision – Turbo Vision implementation for Free Pascal
- TVision official site
- Sigala’s Turbo Vision variant
- Turbo Vision resource collection
- Java-based Turbo Vision-like implementation