History of ADA?

History of ADA?

[Uday Ivaturi]

HI everyone,
            Sorry for intruding with this un-computerish question, but I
am looking for some info on the history of ADA. I looked on the Web, the
FAQ for this Ng, but it didn't seem like they addressed that topic.
Would someone care to enlighten me on this: When was ADA created? BY
whom, Where? etc. My e-mail is arun_at_udel.edu.  I would realy
appreciate any help.

Arun

Re: History of ADA?

[Matthew Heaney]

In article <3437CB1D.23D@udel.edu>, Uday Ivaturi <uivaturi@udel.edu> wrote:


>            Sorry for intruding with this un-computerish question, but I
>am looking for some info on the history of ADA. I looked on the Web, the
>FAQ for this Ng, but it didn't seem like they addressed that topic.
>Would someone care to enlighten me on this: When was ADA created? BY
>whom, Where? etc. My e-mail is arun_at_udel.edu.  I would realy
>appreciate any help.

Ada is not an acronym - it was named after a woman, Lady Ada Lovelace, the
first programmer.  Ada the woman has a very colorful history too!

See the Ada home page 

<http://www.adahome.com>

and the Ada Information Clearinghouse

<http://sw-eng.falls-church.va.us/AdaIC>

 for the info you're looking for. 

There's a paper about the history of the language at 

<http://sw-eng.falls-church.va.us/AdaIC/pol-hist/history/histada.txt>

Also, Bill Whitacker wrote a paper which appears in the History Of
Programming Languages II.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Matthew Heaney
Software Development Consultant
<mailto:matthew_heaney@acm.org>
(818) 985-1271

language design lessons learned from Ada

[Arthur Evans Jr]

Recently Uday Ivaturi asked about the history of Ada.  Matthew Heaney
provided excellent answers to this request.

However, I have a related request: Where might anyone have recorded in a
scholarly fashion issues about language design that were learned in the
design of Ada, either Ada-83 or Ada-95?  These would be results of
interest to one involved in design of programming languages.

Art Evans

Arthur Evans Jr, PhD
Ada Consulting
evans@evans.pgh.pa.us

Re: language design lessons learned from Ada

[J Florio]

Matt's references are still the best place to start.  Look at
http://www.adahome.com/Resources/References.html

  - Jack Florio

Arthur Evans Jr wrote:

> Recently Uday Ivaturi asked about the history of Ada.  Matthew Heaney
> provided excellent answers to this request.
>
> However, I have a related request: Where might anyone have recorded in a
> scholarly fashion issues about language design that were learned in the
> design of Ada, either Ada-83 or Ada-95?  These would be results of
> interest to one involved in design of programming languages.
>
> Art Evans
>
> Arthur Evans Jr, PhD
> Ada Consulting
> evans@evans.pgh.pa.us

Re: language design lessons learned from Ada

[Henry Baker]

In article <evans-0610970901570001@ppp6.s8.pgh.net>, evans@evans.pgh.pa.us
(Arthur Evans Jr) wrote:

> Where might anyone have recorded in a
> scholarly fashion issues about language design that were learned in the
> design of Ada, either Ada-83 or Ada-95?  These would be results of
> interest to one involved in design of programming languages.

It isn't in the best possible form, but the suggestions that led up to
Ada95 are all available, at least in paper form.  Perhaps someone should
put them out on a CDROM, or at least on a web site somewhere.

Most of the lessons learned in Ada83 were quickly applied to other languages
of the era -- Modula-N, Eiffel, etc.  Even Microsoft's current 'Basic' shows
some evidence of having been exposed to Ada83.

Re: language design lessons learned from Ada

[Arthur Evans Jr]

I asked

> Where might anyone have recorded in a
> scholarly fashion issues about language design that were learned in the
> design of Ada, either Ada-83 or Ada-95?  These would be results of
> interest to one involved in design of programming languages.

and hbaker@netcom.com (Henry Baker) wrote:

> It isn't in the best possible form, but the suggestions that led up to
> Ada95 are all available, at least in paper form.  Perhaps someone should
> put them out on a CDROM, or at least on a web site somewhere.

As a member of the team that wrote the Ada-9X Requirements Document, I'm
familiar with that corpus.  The data all existed in electronic form at
SEI at one time; I expect they still do.  However, that's not what I'm
looking for.

Perhaps I didn't adequately explain my desires.  What I want is thoughts
of those who were involved in the design process, now that it's over and
there's been time to think about how it all came out.  What is good
about the design, and what could have been done better?  What have we
learned that other language designers should be aware of?

> Most of the lessons learned in Ada83 were quickly applied to other languages
> of the era -- Modula-N, Eiffel, etc.  Even Microsoft's current 'Basic' shows
> some evidence of having been exposed to Ada83.

Well, yes.  I'm looking for more explicit comments, though.

Art Evans

Re: language design lessons learned from Ada

[William Clodius]

Arthur Evans Jr wrote:
> <snip>
> Perhaps I didn't adequately explain my desires.  What I want is thoughts
> of those who were involved in the design process, now that it's over and
> there's been time to think about how it all came out.  What is good
> about the design, and what could have been done better?  What have we
> learned that other language designers should be aware of?
> <snip>

If your interest is in the design process for Ada, as opposed to the
design that resulted from the process, or the design process for other
languages, I can only think of two references:

Bill Whitacker's paper in the "History Of Programming Languages II,"
Thomas Bergin and Richard Gibson, Eds., ACM Press, ISBN: 0-201-89502-1,
and the discussion of the Ada standardization process in the special
issue of programming language standardization of Computer Standards and
Interfaces Vol 16 Nos 5/6, September 1994.

I am not familiar with any other Ada specific references not available
at http://www.adahome.com/. A starting point for general references is 

Gary T. Leavens. Introduction to the Literature On Programming Language
Design. Department of Computer Science, Iowa State University, TR
#93-01b, January 1993, revised January 1994 and February 1996.

http://www.cs.iastate.edu/~leavens/main.html

You might also try a search at various bibliographic databases

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/mleone/web/language/bibliographies.html

-- 

William B. Clodius		Phone: (505)-665-9370
Los Alamos Nat. Lab., NIS-2     FAX: (505)-667-3815
PO Box 1663, MS-C323    	Group office: (505)-667-5776
Los Alamos, NM 87545            Email: wclodius@lanl.gov

Re: History of ADA?

[William A Whitaker]

My paper on the HOLWG and the origin of Ada is at 

http://sw-eng.falls-church.va.us/AdaIC/pol-hist/history/holwg-93/

Re: language design lessons learned from Ada

[Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz]

Arthur Evans Jr wrote:
> 
> As a member of the team that wrote the Ada-9X Requirements Document, I'm
> familiar with that corpus.  The data all existed in electronic form at
> SEI at one time; I expect they still do.  However, that's not what I'm
> looking for.
> 
> Perhaps I didn't adequately explain my desires.  What I want is thoughts
> of those who were involved in the design process, now that it's over and
> there's been time to think about how it all came out.  What is good
> about the design, and what could have been done better?  What have we
> learned that other language designers should be aware of?

While I don't know of any repository of comments on Ada-95, many of the 
suggestions incorporated into Ada-95 where vigorously debated during the 
design process. The discussions of the suggestions should cast more
light 
than the suggestions themselves on the lessons learned (or not learned
:-( )
from Ada 83.

> Art Evans

-- 

                        Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz
                        Senior Software SE

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