Re: April 1993: Ada9X mortally wounded in non-Mandated press

[news.intercon.com!psinntp!intrepid!gary@louie.udel.edu (Gary Funck)]

In article <C5pEqK.Kxt@crdnns.crd.ge.com> hammondr@sunroof.crd.ge.com (Richard 
A Hammond) writes:
>In article <EMERY.93Apr18123355@dr_no.mitre.org> emery@dr_no.mitre.org (David 
Emery) writes:
>>If all this "marketing stuff" were as easy as Greg implies it is, then
>>there is no real reason for his reuse business to be anything less
>>than wildly successful.  
>>				dave
>
>I also agree with Greg that the Ada compiler vendor's reasoning smacks of
>self fulfilling prophecy.  "There is a small market for Ada so we have to
>charge BIG bucks per compiler" which of course ensures that the market
>stays small.  This is OK when you have the Ada mandate to fall back on,
>you know the market is small, but won't vanish entirely, so you choose
>lower volume and much higher prices, knowing you'll get those high
>prices at taxpayer's expense.
>
>If Ada wasn't mandated it would be dead now.  And it shouldn't be, it
>Rich Hammond

A case in point is Smalltalk.  No mandate, very small following.   However,
due to its own merits and the extensive marketing efforts of ParcPlace,
its customer base is growing, and Smalltalk seems to have established
a useful niche in GUI/OOP application area.  The articles quoted by
Greg support this claim.

Perhaps the same can be said for Forth, but I won't go into that black hole :-)
.
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| Gary Funck  		    gary@intrepid.com  [uunet!uupsi!intrepid!gary]
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