Re: Languages don't matter. A mathematical refutation

["Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de>]

On Thu, 02 Apr 2015 19:17:02 +0200, G.B. wrote:

> On 02.04.15 15:35, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>> You change the language, you get*other*  errors, no
>> statistics across to compare.
> 
> No doubt there is some overlap in expressive means
> of C and Ada.

Yes, which is not a compliment for Ada, if you understand what I mean...

> Then, after a close look at CVEs, one might consider
> testing a prediction that says:
> 
>    There will be fewer CVEs once int overflows are
>    detected!
> 
> Take a C library, write it in C-Ada, i.e. not in idiomatic Ada,
> and make sure your compiler does not by default turn off Ada.(*)
> Then see when happens when throwing data at the result.
> Does the number of vulnerabilities due to int overflows
> decrease?

It does. The problem is not whether Ada is a better language, it is. The
problem how to quantify this fact. Statistics is no help, because of the
applicability issues. There certainly exist other approaches, but none of
them would stand much of scientific rigor, alas.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de