Re: Programming language vote - results

["Gary L. Scott" <scottg@flash.net>]

William Dale Jr wrote:

> Jack Rudd wrote:
> >
> > Gary L. Scott wrote:
> > >
> > > Oh the horror stories about Ada just about anyone in the defense
> > > industry could tell you...(inefficiency, bloat, development
> delays,
> > > budget overruns)...I dare you to fit a Jovial application that
> already
> > > max's out a computer's capabilities in the same box using OO
> techniques
> > > in Ada...In fact, multiply memory and CPU throughput by 10 and try
> it.
> > > You will likely be forced to back off OO quite a bit, making an
> even
> > > bigger mess of maintainability/reusability...
> > >
>
> If you consider that most programmers on defense programs get no
> training on Ada, much less OO and real-time issues, it is surprizing
> that so many projects ARE SUCCESSFUL.   The advantages of Ada are not
> FREE.  Additional memory, and processor horsepower may/will be needed.
>
> If these cannot be tolorated and management ignores the risk - well,
> the
> above is what you get.

I was intending to comment on the miss-application of OO techniques
rather than the use of Ada specifically.  There was considerable
training provided in Ada, OOA, OOD, etc.  The problem was one of using
the wrong tool for the specific task at the direction of management
(largely).

>
>
> Ignorance of the domain and the forced use of obscure (MIL-STD-1750A)
> processors have also given Ada a bad name.  It is a poor workman who
> blames his tools.  ( Then again, the boss didn't give you any tools,
> did
> he? )

MIL-STD-1750A processors may be obscure, but they are widely used on
military aircraft.  If a Pentium or a Power-PC could survive the
environmental conditions that 1750 processors are required to survive
in, we'd love to use them.  As for tools, cost for tools was no object;
workstations, configuration management tools, significant training in
OOA, OOD, OOP, you name it.  But we were still producing operating
system code and applications for an underpowered processor with too
little memory.

>
>
> > > Vincent Lambercy wrote:
> > >
> > > > After two weeks, Ada and Smalltalk seems to be the best
> languages.
> > ...
> > Problems along the above lines helped get a very large defense
> > project cancelled that was near and dear to me.   I may never
> > forgive the folks who pushed OO in Ada on that project.
> >
> Again, I bet you had no training in OO with Ada nor got any OO design
> tools and expected all the great Ada "'illities" to be for FREE.
>
> > Incidentally, the Air Force has now backed off from its previous
> > position of requiring Ada on all new software projects.
> >
>
> This, I believe, is a good thing.

Backed off, but not eliminated.  We still seem to be required to use Ada
on all "new" development (usually a costly waste of time due to the
age/near obsolescence of some of these devices).  If we replace an
obsolete CPU and nothing else, the code gets redesigned in Ada.  It
seems to be written in to some "long-term" contracts.

>
>
> > Jack Rudd
> > Lockheed Martin Federal Systems
> > Boulder, CO
>
> --
> =================================================
> William L. Dale  mailto:william.dale.jr@lmco.com
>    ~~~~  Round up the usual disclaimers ~~~~
> =================================================
> "You can have one of two beliefs about miracles :
>  1.  There are no such thing as miracles.
>  2.  Everything is a miracle.
>                . . .  I prefer the later."  A.E.
> -------------------------------------------------



--
Gary L. Scott
scottg@flash.net