WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Keith E. Nicewarner]

I've seen several discussions spew forth from similar postings, but
I haven't yet seen anyone answer the question ...

	Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?

I don't care about how it could be done or whether it's a good idea.
Has someone already done this or do I have to write one myself?

(Have I sufficiently hidden my frustration?  ;-) )

Thanks.
Keith Nicewarner.

-- 
Dr. Keith E. Nicewarner                       |  Lockheed Sanders Inc.
Principal Systems Engineer                    |  PO Box 868, MER15-2802
Information Systems Division                  |  Nashua, NH 03061-0868
Email: knicewar@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com   |  Voice: (603) 885-5965

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Ian Ward]

In article 3074@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com, "Keith E. Nicewarner" <knicewar@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com> () writes:
>I've seen several discussions spew forth from similar postings, but
>I haven't yet seen anyone answer the question ...
>
:	Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?
>
:I don't care about how it could be done or whether it's a good idea.
>Has someone already done this or do I have to write one myself?
>
>(Have I sufficiently hidden my frustration?  ;-) )
>
>Thanks.
>Keith Nicewarner.
>
>-- 
>Dr. Keith E. Nicewarner                       |  Lockheed Sanders Inc.
>Principal Systems Engineer                    |  PO Box 868, MER15-2802

As I previously posted, I am pretty sure there is not one in existence.
I feel sure, and hope, that due to the nature of usenet, someone would
have informed me, had they thought differently.

(Have I sufficiently hidden my frustration, that a principle systems
engineer, anywhere, would do things without _caring_ if, or not, it
is a good idea. ;-)

Best regards,
Ian.
---

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Frank Manning]

I also asked this question. At least two people have answered that
these things have existed (You Know Who You Are), but nobody has
actually answered where or if you could find one today.

This being Usenet, people prefer to pontificate rather than answer
actual questions. Not that I should complain :-)

-- Frank Manning

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Larry Kilgallen]

In article <325963A3.3074@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com>, "Keith E. Nicewarner" <knicewar@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com> writes:
> I've seen several discussions spew forth from similar postings, but
> I haven't yet seen anyone answer the question ...
> 
> 	Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?
> 
> I don't care about how it could be done or whether it's a good idea.
> Has someone already done this or do I have to write one myself?

I believe that the discussions you have seen prove that nobody
has a creation that they would be willing to stand behind as
meeting a description that broad.

If the one you write yourself make particular assumptions for
your own needs, such as only supporting tasking for a particular
target environment (e.g., Unix), then presumably a similar query
in the future would draw silence from you as well.

Perhaps you want to scale back a bit on your expectations and
describe some _subset_ of Ada which you want to translate. Of
course it is possible that you still would not get any takers.

Larry Kilgallen

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Larry Kilgallen]

In article <53g735$9u6@btmpjg.god.bel.alcatel.be>, wardi@rsd.bel.alcatel.be (Ian Ward) writes:
> In article 3074@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com, "Keith E. Nicewarner" <knicewar@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com> () writes:

> :I don't care about how it could be done or whether it's a good idea.
>>Has someone already done this or do I have to write one myself?
>>
>>(Have I sufficiently hidden my frustration?  ;-) )
>>
>>Thanks.
>>Keith Nicewarner.
>>
>>-- 
>>Dr. Keith E. Nicewarner                       |  Lockheed Sanders Inc.
>>Principal Systems Engineer                    |  PO Box 868, MER15-2802
> 
> As I previously posted, I am pretty sure there is not one in existence.
> I feel sure, and hope, that due to the nature of usenet, someone would
> have informed me, had they thought differently.
> 
> (Have I sufficiently hidden my frustration, that a principle systems
> engineer, anywhere, would do things without _caring_ if, or not, it
> is a good idea. ;-)

Certainly a Principle Systems Engineer would never do such a thing.

But maybe a Principal Systems Engineer would make such an inquiry
in response to a management directive to check on availability.

Whatever virtues newsgroups might have, proving non-existence
is not one of them.

Larry Kilgallen

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Robert Dewar]

Keith asked

"I've seen several discussions spew forth from similar postings, but
I haven't yet seen anyone answer the question ...

        Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?

I don't care about how it could be done or whether it's a good idea.
Has someone already done this or do I have to write one myself?"



This question has been answered many times on CLA, if you read CLA it is
hard to believe you have missed these answers, but here goes again once
more with the answer.

NO!

If you want to write one yourself, go ahead, you will need a full Ada
front end to do it of course, and you could consider adapting the GNAT
front end for this purpose. Be warned that if you are talking about
a 100% translation, you are talking a project that will take person
years of effort for someone who knows both languages and the GNAT front
end well.

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Frank Manning]

Keith asked:

>> Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?

Robert answers:

> This question has been answered many times on CLA, if you read CLA it is
> hard to believe you have missed these answers, but here goes again once
> more with the answer.
>
> NO!

To quote from the guy in Cool Hand Luke, what we have here is a failure
to communicate.

Erik Magnuson writes:

> In a former life, I used to use such a beast daily [...]

B|rje Norden or Robert Dewar said (diffcult to tell in
<dewar.844515554@schonberg>:

> It is a possible path to an interesting level of portability for the
> Ada compiler, which is why it has been used for at least one Ada
> compiler in the past.

I assume that "No" really means "Yes, they've existed in the past, but
no, they're not available today."

-- Frank Manning

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Jon S Anthony]

In article <53im9c$10jc@news.ccit.arizona.edu> frank@bigdog.engr.arizona.edu (Frank Manning) writes:

> Keith asked:
> 
> >> Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?
> 
> Robert answers:
> 
> > This question has been answered many times on CLA, if you read CLA it is
> > hard to believe you have missed these answers, but here goes again once
> > more with the answer.
> >
> > NO!
> 
> To quote from the guy in Cool Hand Luke, what we have here is a failure
> to communicate.

Yeah, but one wonders why...


> Erik Magnuson writes:
> 
> > In a former life, I used to use such a beast daily [...]
> 
> B|rje Norden or Robert Dewar said (diffcult to tell in
> <dewar.844515554@schonberg>:
> 
> > It is a possible path to an interesting level of portability for the
> > Ada compiler, which is why it has been used for at least one Ada
> > compiler in the past.
> 
> I assume that "No" really means "Yes, they've existed in the past, but
> no, they're not available today."

No, "NO!" means just that - no.  The bit you reference here concerns
an Ada _compiler_ which happened to use C as a backend target (for
"portability" and whatever...)  While a compiler is a translator, the
original question seems to really be one concerning a translator which
would produce _human_ readable/maintainable code for all future
reference.  That is, you use it once and toss the source and start
manually maintaining the output.  This sort of thing is _very_
different and is the source of all the "NO"s...

/Jon
-- 
Jon Anthony
Organon Motives, Inc.
Belmont, MA 02178
617.484.3383
jsa@organon.com

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Frank Manning]

In article <JSA.96Oct11153945@alexandria> jsa@alexandria
(Jon S Anthony) writes:

> No, "NO!" means just that - no.  The bit you reference here concerns
> an Ada _compiler_ which happened to use C as a backend target (for
> "portability" and whatever...)  While a compiler is a translator, the
> original question seems to really be one concerning a translator which
> would produce _human_ readable/maintainable code for all future
> reference.  That is, you use it once and toss the source and start
> manually maintaining the output.  This sort of thing is _very_
> different and is the source of all the "NO"s...

Well, perhaps that was the intent of the original question, but I
had also brought up an old thread (Oct 95) about the merits of an
8051 Ada compiler. I wondered about using one of these C-backend-
compilers for that purpose, which would not require human readable
output. In other words, the idea is to write and maintain Ada code,
not do a one-time translation and maintain the C code.

I got plenty of opinion about what a dumb idea this is, but nobody
told me where I can get one of these compilers -- dumb or not.

Perhaps if I went into more detail about what I want. The application
would be classified as academic fiddling, I suppose. I have a Blue
Earth Micro-440 with a built-in Basic interpreter and low-level
assembler. I've written short programs in a mixture of Basic and
assembler, and I'd prefer to write in a compiled language that's
somewhat safer than C.

I recognize that a C-backend-compiler would be difficult to optimize,
as Erik Magnuson points out. However, compared to a Basic interpreter,
I could still get at least an order of magnitude better performance
with NO optimization AT ALL.

On the other hand, maybe I should just go with C. Less trouble in the
long run.

-- Frank Manning

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Robert Dewar]

Frank said

"I got plenty of opinion about what a dumb idea this is, but nobody
told me where I can get one of these compilers -- dumb or not."

These are commercial compilers so you will have to contact the 
appropriate manufacturers. Seems to me that Dan Eilers has a C
generating compiler.

Note that another path to an Ada compiler for the 8051 is to use GNAT.
Is there already a GCC port for this chip? If not, buidling one would
not be that har.

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[David Weller]

In article <53im9c$10jc@news.ccit.arizona.edu>,
Frank Manning <frank@bigdog.engr.arizona.edu> wrote:
>Keith asked:
>
>I assume that "No" really means "Yes, they've existed in the past, but
>no, they're not available today."
>

Right.  There _was_ a Mac-based translator that worked (mostly poorly)
with a subset of Ada _83_.  There is no such critter for Ada 95, and
probably never will be -- even if it's attempted :-)

-- 
    Visit the Ada 95 Booch Components Homepage: www.ocsystems.com/booch
           This is not your father's Ada -- lglwww.epfl.ch/Ada

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Corey Minyard]

dewar@merv.cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar) writes:

> 
> Frank said
> 
> "I got plenty of opinion about what a dumb idea this is, but nobody
> told me where I can get one of these compilers -- dumb or not."
> 

I would not consider this a bad idea.  The idea of using "C" as a
low-level language (much like most compilers use assembly as a low
level language) woud probably work well (much like Cfront).  Of
course, it opens up a few new abuses (such as hacking the output of
the compiler), but those really aren't big issues.

> 
> Note that another path to an Ada compiler for the 8051 is to use GNAT.
> Is there already a GCC port for this chip? If not, buidling one would
> not be that har.
> 

Spoken by one who has probably never ported GCC to a new architecture :-).
Believe me, I've done it for the TMS320C40 DSP and it is not easy.  It
looks easy on the surface, but you really have to understand what the
compiler is doing on the inside to write good machine descriptions.
You end up spending a lot of time looking through the code wondering
"Why is this expression doing what it is doing?"  I doubt that GCC
would produce very good code for the 8051 processor, either, because
it is targeted more towards 32-bit or better machines.  That's just a
gut feeling, though, I can't think of anything specific that would
make this true, so you can take that for what it is worth :-).

With that said, porting the Ada libraries to the 8051 might even be
harder.  You have all that tasking stuff and all the machine-specific
stuff to do.  Maybe it's not that bad, I'm speaking outside of
experience here.

Plus, if you if needed floating point, you would have to write all
those floating point routines.  Yuck.

-- 
Corey Minyard               Internet:  minyard@metronet.com
  Work: minyard@nortel.ca       UUCP:  minyard@wf-rch.cirr.com
-- 
Corey Minyard               Internet:  minyard@metronet.com
  Work: minyard@nortel.ca       UUCP:  minyard@wf-rch.cirr.com

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[Bev Lightfoot]

"Keith E. Nicewarner" <knicewar@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com> wrote:

>I've seen several discussions spew forth from similar postings, but
>I haven't yet seen anyone answer the question ...

>	Is there an Ada-To-C translator and where can I find it?

>I don't care about how it could be done or whether it's a good idea.
>Has someone already done this or do I have to write one myself?

>(Have I sufficiently hidden my frustration?  ;-) )

>Thanks.
>Keith Nicewarner.

>-- 
>Dr. Keith E. Nicewarner                       |  Lockheed Sanders Inc.
>Principal Systems Engineer                    |  PO Box 868, MER15-2802
>Information Systems Division                  |  Nashua, NH 03061-0868
>Email: knicewar@rapnet.sanders.lockheed.com   |  Voice: (603) 885-5965



A former employee of ours has written a preliminary ADA to C
translator.  You might want to contact him for more details:

Jeff Skinner, 3596 Pleasant Hollow Dr, Memphis, TN 38115

Good luck!



Cobalt Blue, Inc.
555 Sun Valley Drive, Ste K-4
Roswell, GA 30076, USA
(770) 518-1116	Fax (770) 640-1182
Web: http://www.cobalt-blue.com

Re: WANTED: Ada-to-C Translator

[sarner-ba-md]

 
 
>>I assume that "No" really means "Yes, they've existed in the past, but
>>no, they're not available today."
 

Try looking at www.inmet.com/~mg/c2ada/c2ada.html