Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada

[sampson@cod.NOSC.MIL (Charles H. Sampson)]

In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) 
quotes the U. S. Congress:
>
>"Sec. 8092. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, after June 1, 1991,
> where cost-effective, all Department of Defense software shall be written
> in the programming language Ada, in the absence of a special exemption
> by an official designated by the Secretary of Defense."

     From the English language viewpoint, this statement has too many modi-
fiers.  At least it does if you assume that they are trying to force the
use of Ada with few exception.  As written, two valid interpretations ap-
pear to be: (1) If it's not cost-effective, no special exemption is needed
to avoid Ada, and (2) Even if it's cost-effective, Ada can be avoided by
obtaining a special exemption.

     I think they meant to say that all DoD software must be written in Ada
unless it is not cost-effective; if it is claimed to not be cost-effective,
that claim must be confirmed by a special exemption from SecDef.

     To borrow Norm Cohen's question from another context, who writes these
things?  (Probable answer here: people who love run-on sentences.)

                              Charlie