* SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
@ 2005-12-22 16:25 Robert Love
2005-12-22 17:12 ` Björn Persson
` (4 more replies)
0 siblings, 5 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: Robert Love @ 2005-12-22 16:25 UTC (permalink / raw)
Let me quote from the December 19th "Space News" article entitled
Pentagon Scales Back SBIRS Program. For those who don't know, SBIRS is
a multi satellite program to detect missile launches via infra red
sensors. It is way behind and billions over budget, mostly due to the
sensor and bad initial design.
Air Force Sectretary Michael Wynne is quoted as saying:
One of the biggest problems with SBIRS lies with its opearting
software, which is based on a programming langauge called Ada that was
developed in the 1970's, Wynne said.
"Ada is a program that is not popular any longer," Wynne said. "It
is a software design that was literally invented around the time DOS was
invented. DOS is no longer even being talked about nor should Ada be,
but we still have Ada-based programmers trying to do it."
The Air Force hopes to use a more modern language like C+ (yes, they
used a single +) for SBIRS follow-on system, Air Force Undersecretary
Ronald Sega told reporters in a Dec. 15 briefing at the Pentagon.
Lord, there is so much wrong here. Where to start. Is it even worth it
to try and educate the Air Force? I suppose I'll try and write one of
these bozos once I calm down but I would say this is a huge slam against
our favorite language.
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 16:25 SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance Robert Love
@ 2005-12-22 17:12 ` Björn Persson
2005-12-22 18:48 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
` (3 subsequent siblings)
4 siblings, 0 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: Björn Persson @ 2005-12-22 17:12 UTC (permalink / raw)
Michael Wynne must have been misquoted. He clearly didn't talk about Ada
but about that obscure language called ADA that we sometimes hear about. ;-)
--
Bjï¿œrn Persson PGP key A88682FD
omb jor ers @sv ge.
r o.b n.p son eri nu
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 16:25 SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance Robert Love
2005-12-22 17:12 ` Björn Persson
@ 2005-12-22 18:48 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
2005-12-22 21:25 ` Robert Love
2005-12-22 22:16 ` tmoran
` (2 subsequent siblings)
4 siblings, 1 reply; 20+ messages in thread
From: Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-12-22 18:48 UTC (permalink / raw)
Robert Love wrote:
> Lord, there is so much wrong here. Where to start. Is it even worth it
> to try and educate the Air Force? I suppose I'll try and write one of
> these bozos once I calm down but I would say this is a huge slam against
> our favorite language.
If we all knew how to contact these bozos, we could all write them. That might
be more impressive than just a message from you.
--
Jeff Carter
"Go and boil your bottoms."
Monty Python & the Holy Grail
01
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 18:48 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
@ 2005-12-22 21:25 ` Robert Love
2005-12-23 0:12 ` adaworks
0 siblings, 1 reply; 20+ messages in thread
From: Robert Love @ 2005-12-22 21:25 UTC (permalink / raw)
In <hyCqf.5074$mj1.1275@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net> Jeffrey R.
Carter wrote:
> Robert Love wrote:
>
>> Lord, there is so much wrong here. Where to start. Is it even worth
>> it to try and educate the Air Force? I suppose I'll try and write
>> one of these bozos once I calm down but I would say this is a huge
>> slam against our favorite language.
>
> If we all knew how to contact these bozos, we could all write them.
> That might be more impressive than just a message from you.
And I'm just a bozo to the Air Force brass. I wonder if we have a
senior statesman who could get their attention. Richard Rheile? Tucker
Taft? Damn, do any Congressional Medal of Honor winners program in Ada?
I did write a sincere, polite letter (postal, not e-mail) to the
Secretary but I don't expect it will get past his layer of filters. I
tried to refute his points and stressed the need for good design and
software development processe. I concluded that he should have the AF
Academy software experts or other independent group investigate the real
reason why the software was a failure.
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 21:25 ` Robert Love
@ 2005-12-23 0:12 ` adaworks
2005-12-23 17:01 ` Robert Love
2005-12-24 1:12 ` Steve Whalen
0 siblings, 2 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: adaworks @ 2005-12-23 0:12 UTC (permalink / raw)
Since my name (creatively spelled, but I think Robert meant me) came up in the
discussion below, I will research the matter and see if I can get an email off
to the
right people from my DoD account.
I'll probably get myself in trouble, but it won't be the first time.
As to the term "bozo," none of the USAF people involved deserve this
appellation. They
are simply reacting to the ignorance about Ada that seems to prevail throughout
the
larger software community. My experience with the USAF decision-makers is that
they are doing their best to make responsible decisions on behalf of the
National
Defense. They are being misinformed by contractors whose self-interest
sometimes
preempts what ought to be their better judgement.
I must say that I have heard high-ranking DoD people denigrate Ada based on
their
own experience. One Admiral spoke to a group about how hard it was to teach
people Ada in his command. He talked of the credentials of the person hired to
do the teaching and noted that, "even this person, with many years of experience
in computer science," could not make Ada clear to the students.
There are some unique differences in Ada from other languages. Unless we make
those
differences clear the students will be discouraged from using it. Too often
the language
is taught by people who do themselves understand it. To be fair, the same is
true of much
of what passes for C++ instruction. The difference is that C++ looks like C
and it gets
a lot of good press. This, in spite of its being one of the most error-prone
languages ever
to be used by anyone.
I'll do what I can.
Richard Riehle
(note the correct spelling of my name)
"Robert Love" <rblove@airmail.net> wrote in message
news:20051222152554655-0600@news.airmail.net...
> In <hyCqf.5074$mj1.1275@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net> Jeffrey R.
> Carter wrote:
> > Robert Love wrote:
> >
> >> Lord, there is so much wrong here. Where to start. Is it even worth
> >> it to try and educate the Air Force? I suppose I'll try and write
> >> one of these bozos once I calm down but I would say this is a huge
> >> slam against our favorite language.
> >
> > If we all knew how to contact these bozos, we could all write them.
> > That might be more impressive than just a message from you.
>
> And I'm just a bozo to the Air Force brass. I wonder if we have a
> senior statesman who could get their attention. Richard Rheile? Tucker
> Taft? Damn, do any Congressional Medal of Honor winners program in Ada?
>
> I did write a sincere, polite letter (postal, not e-mail) to the
> Secretary but I don't expect it will get past his layer of filters. I
> tried to refute his points and stressed the need for good design and
> software development processe. I concluded that he should have the AF
> Academy software experts or other independent group investigate the real
> reason why the software was a failure.
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-23 0:12 ` adaworks
@ 2005-12-23 17:01 ` Robert Love
[not found] ` <eneoq1p0jo46iktlreebnpihas50cbr75l@4ax.com>
2005-12-24 1:12 ` Steve Whalen
1 sibling, 1 reply; 20+ messages in thread
From: Robert Love @ 2005-12-23 17:01 UTC (permalink / raw)
In <NhHqf.36784$dO2.21414@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net> wrote:
> Since my name (creatively spelled, but I think Robert meant me) came
> up in the discussion below, I will research the matter and see if I
> can get an email off to the right people from my DoD account.
Yes, it was your name I was mangling.
>
> I'll probably get myself in trouble, but it won't be the first time.
>
> As to the term "bozo," none of the USAF people involved deserve this
> appellation. They
> are simply reacting to the ignorance about Ada that seems to prevail
> throughout the larger software community. My experience with the
> USAF decision-makers is that they are doing their best to make
> responsible decisions on behalf of the National Defense. They are
> being misinformed by contractors whose self-interest sometimes
> preempts what ought to be their better judgement.
At the level of the Secretary and Undersecretary I expect them to be far
removed from direct knowledge of the progject but somebody dropped the
ball. I expect it is in the USAF Project office. Those managers have
an oversight responsilbity and since it involves billions of tax payer
dollars and national defense it is a task that should not just rely on
the contractors information. Did this project have a V&V contractor?
I'll have to look.
I do note that Secretary Wynne has previously worked for LockMart, the
prime contractor for SBIRS. It may be that he is too cosy with his old
employers but I doubt it.
It should be noted that the USAF has several big ticket satellite
programs all well over budget and years behind schedule. T-Sat, Space
Based Radar and others join SBIRS as projects in trouble. Most of them
are due to sensor problems and general poor management. Some should be
more like R&D programs that operational projects.
Since the Secretary has brought up software as an issue on this
satellite I want to know what was the real cause of the problem. I
can't believe Ada is a cause in its own right. Was it compiler/tool
problems? Was it a bad software architecture? Was there a valid set of
requirements that were stable?
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-23 0:12 ` adaworks
2005-12-23 17:01 ` Robert Love
@ 2005-12-24 1:12 ` Steve Whalen
2005-12-24 9:25 ` Larry Kilgallen
1 sibling, 1 reply; 20+ messages in thread
From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-12-24 1:12 UTC (permalink / raw)
I'd like to respectfully suggest to those who are going to try to set
this record straight that you include these people in your
correspondence:
Senator John Warner of Virginia
Senator Carl Levin of Michigan
Senator John McCain of Arizona
Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut
All of the above Senators are members of the Senate Armed Services
Committee which has "oversight" of the U.S. military, and their web
sites can be found at: http://armed-services.senate.gov/
Since our Senators serve 6 year terms, they are somewhat more
insulated from the immediate pressures of daily politics and vendor
pressures (but only compared our House of Representatives <g>)....
They are the people who can get such misrepresentations as were made
by the Air Force civilian leadership investigated and corrected.
One thing that might be helpful to include in any correspondence to
anyone in a position to help, would be a list of questions they could
ask which would help them to see that the Air Force's civilian
leadership's statements are on their face, incredibly nonsensical to
anyone who knows anything about programming or managing large
projects.
Questions like:
Were the specifications from which the Ada programming was to be done
complete before coding began?
Has anyone independent of the vendor or project management made an
assessment of why the project has gone so wrong?
How is it than many of the largest and most complex project have been
successfully programmed in Ada?
etc.
Steve
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-24 1:12 ` Steve Whalen
@ 2005-12-24 9:25 ` Larry Kilgallen
0 siblings, 0 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-12-24 9:25 UTC (permalink / raw)
In article <1135386734.859963.112280@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>, "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes:
> One thing that might be helpful to include in any correspondence to
> anyone in a position to help, would be a list of questions they could
> ask which would help them to see that the Air Force's civilian
> leadership's statements are on their face, incredibly nonsensical to
> anyone who knows anything about programming or managing large
> projects.
>
> Questions like:
>
> Were the specifications from which the Ada programming was to be done
> complete before coding began?
>
> Has anyone independent of the vendor or project management made an
> assessment of why the project has gone so wrong?
>
> How is it than many of the largest and most complex project have been
> successfully programmed in Ada?
How is it that the European space agency doesn't have these problems ?
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 16:25 SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance Robert Love
2005-12-22 17:12 ` Björn Persson
2005-12-22 18:48 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
@ 2005-12-22 22:16 ` tmoran
2005-12-23 21:08 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
2005-12-22 22:26 ` Gene
2005-12-23 1:23 ` David Emery
4 siblings, 1 reply; 20+ messages in thread
From: tmoran @ 2005-12-22 22:16 UTC (permalink / raw)
>Let me quote from the December 19th "Space News" article entitled
>...
>is a software design that was literally invented around the time DOS was
>invented. DOS is no longer even being talked about nor should Ada be,
>...
> The Air Force hopes to use a more modern language like C+ (yes, they
Of course "The C Programming Language" was published 5 years before the
Ada 83 RM, and Ada 95, like C++, is about 10 years old. Perhaps for this
real-time, satellite based anti-missile system he means Microsoft's .NET
language, C#. Does "Space News" print letters to the editor with factual
corrections? Pointing out the ignorance of someone in authority is always
amusing.
But could it possibly be that this fellow just wants to give a new
contract to some big contributor, er, company to postpone the demise of
SBIRS till after he has moved elsewhere?
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 22:16 ` tmoran
@ 2005-12-23 21:08 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
0 siblings, 0 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-12-23 21:08 UTC (permalink / raw)
tmoran@acm.org wrote:
> Of course "The C Programming Language" was published 5 years before the
> Ada 83 RM, and Ada 95, like C++, is about 10 years old. Perhaps for this
> real-time, satellite based anti-missile system he means Microsoft's .NET
> language, C#. Does "Space News" print letters to the editor with factual
> corrections? Pointing out the ignorance of someone in authority is always
> amusing.
Let's be accurate. C dates to 1970. Ada dates to 1980 (MIL-STD-1815 is dated
1980 Dec 10). C++ dates to 1982 (I'd argue that since backwards compatibility
with C was an important design criterion, it dates to 1970 :). The dates of the
standards or publications are meaningless in determining the "modernity" of a
language, except for Ada.
--
Jeff Carter
"Go and boil your bottoms."
Monty Python & the Holy Grail
01
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 16:25 SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance Robert Love
` (2 preceding siblings ...)
2005-12-22 22:16 ` tmoran
@ 2005-12-22 22:26 ` Gene
2005-12-23 17:05 ` Robert Love
2005-12-23 1:23 ` David Emery
4 siblings, 1 reply; 20+ messages in thread
From: Gene @ 2005-12-22 22:26 UTC (permalink / raw)
Please don't tar the Air Force. E.g. some of the strongest Ada
proponents in the world work and the US Air Force Academy. They are
the authors of AdaGIDE the .NET port, and other excellent work. Many,
many Air Force personnel are smart on Ada. I'm sure they'd be appalled
by the above.
Sorry I can't say the same for political appointees over whom serving
Air Force military personnel have no influence. In fact, the
Constitution dictates rather the reverse...
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 22:26 ` Gene
@ 2005-12-23 17:05 ` Robert Love
0 siblings, 0 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: Robert Love @ 2005-12-23 17:05 UTC (permalink / raw)
In <1135290419.885448.129100@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com> Gene wrote:
> Please don't tar the Air Force. E.g. some of the strongest Ada
> proponents in the world work and the US Air Force Academy. They are
> the authors of AdaGIDE the .NET port, and other excellent work. Many,
> many Air Force personnel are smart on Ada. I'm sure they'd be
> appalled by the above.
I don't believe it will have any effect but when I wrote the Secretary I
suggested that the AF Academy's experts conduct an investigation of why
the software was a failure. I'm sure it is outside the role of the
Academy and my letter will be lost in a sea of assitants but I do know
that the Academy is warm on Ada.
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
* Re: SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance
2005-12-22 16:25 SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance Robert Love
` (3 preceding siblings ...)
2005-12-22 22:26 ` Gene
@ 2005-12-23 1:23 ` David Emery
4 siblings, 0 replies; 20+ messages in thread
From: David Emery @ 2005-12-23 1:23 UTC (permalink / raw)
Oh well, those of us who use Unix derivatives, a system much older than DOS, really belong to the pre-history of computing, I guess..
dave (MacOS X.4, Mach Kernel with Apple's GUI...)
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 20+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~2006-01-04 6:35 UTC | newest]
Thread overview: 20+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2005-12-22 16:25 SBIRS, Ada and Ignorance Robert Love
2005-12-22 17:12 ` Björn Persson
2005-12-22 18:48 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
2005-12-22 21:25 ` Robert Love
2005-12-23 0:12 ` adaworks
2005-12-23 17:01 ` Robert Love
[not found] ` <eneoq1p0jo46iktlreebnpihas50cbr75l@4ax.com>
2005-12-24 18:49 ` Joseph Vlietstra
2005-12-27 17:12 ` Marco
2005-12-28 17:23 ` Joseph Vlietstra
2006-01-04 6:35 ` Robert Klungle
2005-12-29 2:26 ` Robert Love
2005-12-29 21:47 ` David Emery
2006-01-04 6:33 ` Robert Klungle
2005-12-24 1:12 ` Steve Whalen
2005-12-24 9:25 ` Larry Kilgallen
2005-12-22 22:16 ` tmoran
2005-12-23 21:08 ` Jeffrey R. Carter
2005-12-22 22:26 ` Gene
2005-12-23 17:05 ` Robert Love
2005-12-23 1:23 ` David Emery
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