Re: Ada and Automotive Industry

[Chris Hills <chris@phaedsys.demon.co.uk>]

In article <32A4368E.41C67EA6@escmail.orl.lmco.com>, Ted Dennison
<dennison@escmail.orl.lmco.com> writes
>Of course even if the problem were what you said, it wouldn't mean much.
>ALL software has bugs; C software and Ada software.

> The point is that if
>your primary goal is low-error software, you should choose tools and
>methodoligies that are the least error prone, and make it the easiest to
>spot (and non-intrusively fix) errors. In this day and age, there is
>little doubt as to the relative ranks of C and Ada in this regard. 
 
If Ada, Mod2, C and C++ had an [approx] equal number of users who
exersicsed comparable implimentations the order for safe reliable code
would indeed be Ada Mod2 C C++ 

However the point I was trying to make that by sheer wheight of numbers
C tends to be exercised more than other languages and most of the bugs
in any particular implimentation found and better understood.  I was
told that the C compiler is the most completely understood form of SW on
the planet because of this. It does not mean that all C compilers are
perfect or all are used correctly

>You
>must then staff the project with people who know how to properly use the
>tools, or it is all for naught. 
>
This is probably the real bottom line. A good assembler programmer could
turn out a safer program than a cowboy with Ada?

I have seen a project (in C) where all the compiler warnings were turned
off because "they were not ERRORS" and besides there were 100's of them
ad it would take too long to sort them and any way the program ran (they
said "worked"). 

In reality it comes down to the skill of the project team. As I said
previously the Ariane 5 rocket used Ada but the same crash could have
been achived with any language (but more efficiently in C :-) as the
real problem appears to have been with the project control.



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