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Date: 25 Jan 93 04:20:40 GMT
From: seas.gwu.edu!mfeldman@uunet.uu.net  (Michael Feldman)
Subject: Re: Why and how do organizations select the OO
Message-ID: <1993Jan25.042040.11659@seas.gwu.edu>
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

In article <24691@alice.att.com> bs@alice.att.com (Bjarne Stroustrup) writes:
>
>I realize you probably can't name names, but it would be nice if you could
>for two reasons. Firstly because charaltans ought to be exposed, secondly
>because someone could misinterpret your statement into something condemning
>lange groups of ``OO-experts'' as windbags who don't deliver. (there are
>no shortage of windbags and self-proclaimed ``experts,'' but no one field
>has a monopoly on them).

You're right, Bjarne - I can't name names. I won't tar an individual with
an ad hominem public attack, especially if I have no independent basis for
it. I did not observe this consultant in action, nor see his work in this
case. His client was frustrated but I can't really assess the reason for
the frustration. And naturally no field has a monopoly on windbags.

As is often my style, I chose a couple of anecdotes to comment on a  
more general situation, and to provoke reactions like yours :-)

The point was not to tar OO experts as windbags, but to comment on the
state of things. The customer in this case is thrashing around, has
little knowledge of what's happening in the field, and is making purely
political/religious statements. My distress came from the fact that
the organization didn't seem really interested in finding out more
or get really educated. They were - as is so often the case -  arguing
from nontechnical starting points. There are pro-OO and anti-OO factions
in the group, neither being especially scientific. There is also a 
faction that believes the Ada mandate should be followed in their case,
and a faction that is working harder to evade the mandate that they
would need to work to follow it.

Their state of knowledge of OO truly seemed to be "It's that stuff that
C++ has and Ada doesn't." Some in the group were quite surprised to
discover (from me) that Ada supports information hiding and private types.
Their eyes glazed over when I got to the intricacies of inheritance.
Somebody told them that OO was the way to go, but apparently did not
explain just what that was supposed to mean. Somebody else told them
that Ada absolutely, positively, could not be used for what they had
in mind. They couldn't explain why, either, just that they'd read it
somewhere (Government Computer News, maybe?).

I wouldn't be surprised if there were more such groups out there.
Your tax money at work, folks.

Mike Feldman