Re: Why Ada is not the Commercial Lang of Choice

[munck@mindspring.com (Robert Munck)]

On Sun, 13 Jul 1997 12:17:07 -0500, Ken Mays
<kenneth.l.mays@cpmx.saic.com> wrote:

>Its not so much as what language is better than any other language, its
>what is the appropriate tool for the task. Ada95 works well with
>embedded software projects. 

and graphics applications,
and financial/business programs,
and scientific (heavy arithmetic) programs,
and word processing,
and operating systems, and etc. etc.

All of which I've done in both Ada and in the common-knowledge
"appropriate" language for that genera (assembler, FORTRAN,
COBOL, SNOBOL, Pascal/Modula, PL/S, etc).

>C/C++ works well with Unix programming and other types of work.

UNIX gives you so many problems with platform incompatability,
unexpected side-effects from upgrades to the OS, compilers,
and other programs, and general inconsistencies that you don't
notice how expensive C/C++ make it is to debug, maintain, and
upgrade your source code.

> Java works well for cross platform/Internet work.

But why bother, when you can use the Intermetrics Ada 95 to
Java Virtual Machine to write code that runs in all the same
conditions and doesn't have the problems of Java's C legacy?


>C++ is the commercial langauge of choice. 

for those who haven't really made an informed choice, and
for those who are doing coding rather than software engineering,
and for those who are trading a quick-and-dirty release ASAP for
horrible maintenance and upgrade headaches in the future. 
This may be the reason for the "flash-in-the-pan" nature of
so many start-ups in our business; they get an initial product
out fast in C++, but can't upgrade, add new programmers to the 
project, or even reduce the bug count because the code is
unreadable.

(Btw, I liked COBOL when I was working on a large financial
system in it, but couldn't stand to go back to it after I'd done
a similar project in Ada.)

Bob Munck
Mill Creek Systems LC