Re: GNAT for Debian

[David Holm <david@realityrift.com>]

On Tue, 22 Jul 2003 12:16:13 +0000 (UTC)
Preben Randhol <randhol+abuse@pvv.org> wrote:

> David Holm wrote:
> > Yes, we don't. That version is broken, the reason I left debian for
> 
> Oh, how come I'm using it now then if it doesn't work?

Someone on this list sent me a sample using timers a while ago. Works perfectly with gnat 3.14p
and 3.15p but when compiled with the version of gnat in gcc (which debian uses, 3.3 based or
whatever) it would fail with a constraint exception. There are many more things than timers
broken but I have not seen any tests for other stuff.
And there is talk of lots of code having been removed before the patch was submitted to gcc as
the real gnat did some funny stuff to the C++ part of gcc. I'm not sure if this is true or not
but I've heard it from a couple of different sources now.
As you can see from gcc's cvsweb Ada-code hasn't been updated in two months:
http://sources.redhat.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/gcc/gcc/ada/?cvsroot=gcc
But ACT's CVS is updated about every other day, often with changes made to the gcc patch (the
ada code is separate from the gcc code-changes).
There are also some alarming threads on the gcc mailinglist where it's made obvious that people
(including gcc maintainers) aren't very interested in Ada.
This is one such thread: http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2000-10/msg00003.html
I recon their consider it just another adition to their list of support languages and don't care
much more. Personally I use Ada because I know what it can do to an applications stability,
therefore I also want it to be maintained by someone who respects that, namely ACT, not GNU.

If you are interested in the real version of gnat based on gcc3 the cvs is here:
:pserver:anoncvs@libre.act-europe.fr:/anoncvs (module gnat)

The fact debian chose to use gcc-3.3 (from gnu) over building a snapshot from the cvs shows that
their ada maintainer is not overly interested in Ada (any more?). I switched from FreeBSD where
the Ada maintainer is very strict when it comes to what to add and not to add regarding
ada-stuff. I was expecting something similar from Debian since that is the way I found debian to
be a few years ago (before I knew Ada). I guess it's problematic to find good maintainers these
days though, especially when it comes to Ada. It's not exactly popular (at least in my school),
apart from one or two of the doctoral students I seem to be the only one using it.

> With Gentoo you need a fast computer and lots of disc space as you have
> to compile everything yourself. My 166MHz at home would waste about a
> month before I could do any Ada programming.

True, it is not for you then maybe. Perhaps you should take over the position as Ada maintainer
in Debian or find someone else motivated to do it. The current maintainer didn't seem motivated
to me.

//David Holm