Re: Fantastic Ada promotional piece from Rational (long)

[mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman)]

In article <JGOODSEN.94Sep7184017@trinidad.radsoft.com>,
John Goodsen <jgoodsen@trinidad.radsoft.com> wrote:
>In article <34al0m$89d@felix.seas.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes:

[this is an exceedingly long piece to respond to, so please excuse my
quoting only short snippets without writing [snip] each time. I am
cutting more than I'm leaving.]
>
>Show me one successful businessman who makes the investment to start a company
>because they "believe" in something.  Hardly a wise business decision.  

Hmmm. Are you _really_ saying that it is poor business practice to
actually believe that your product is good for something? 

>It
>is completely legitimate for a company to enter a market with a plan to cash
>in on their presence in the market.  Why do you and Greg continue to blast
>companies for their decisions to follow a market rather than try to create
>a market.  

Because almost every business sector I can think of, including the
software sector, has created its own market. The public is told it
needs product XYZ via advertising, and either the need is self-evident
or the public comes to agree with the need because it's been advertised to.

Sure, there are some cynical businesspeople who sell stuff they don;t 
believe in. But I am idealistic enough to think that most of them
have at least _some_ commitment to the worth of their product.

I daresay even the government is not immune. Do you think that every
DoD decision to purchase something was not influenced in some way by
its contractors? C'mon. You don't really believe that.

>If someone came to you and said, "Mike, I need 2 million to start
>this company who's goal is to build cool Ada things because we believe that
>Ada is the best language to use, can you invest?"  If you had a couple mil in
>your back pocket, can you honestly tell me that the wisest decision is to
>try to push a market into existence by investing into it?  Markets develop
>out of demand from consumers, not out of pushing by vendors who want to sell
>products.  If I've got something to sell you but you don't want to buy it,
>then am I the bad guy because you don't buy it?  I think not.

Gimme a break, John. American commerce is based on advertising and markets
advertising creates. Only government contractor types would pretend that
"the customer" simply dictates and industry magically produces.

>I'm getting kind of tired of hearing from people who have no
>experience starting and running a business blast (directly or
>indirectly) those who at least have the balls to give it a shot.

So kill the notes, John. It's a free country.

>Your
>suggestions of giving free handouts to universities and Greg's suggestions
>that companies who make money in the Ada market are hypocrites when
>they pursue business in other markets are equally ludicrous.

I'd like to know where you got the idea I was looking for free handouts
to universities. Did I ever say that?

There is "free beer" and "free speech", as Richard Stallman would put it.
As you pointed out so eloquently below, the free software in the C/C++
world has had a large positive effect there. As an academic, I am far
more interested in the "free speech" aspect - source code so researchers
can hack on it - than in the "free beer" aspect. 

One reason interest in Ada as a _research subject_ dried up is that no 
compilers and other tools were available to hack on. Obviously vendors 
should not be giving their sources to universities, but I am puzzled 
by the screams about GNAT, that show me clearly that the vendors simply 
don't understand how important the "free speech" aspect is.

Obviously they forget how Berkeley Unix, X, Mach, and Lord knows
how many other things, really got their push when Uncle Sam (ARPA,
in most cases) funded the development of software that was free
in both senses, but most importantly in the "free speech" sense.

My advice has been solicited - sometimes under nondisclosure, sometimes 
on a handshake - by a number of vendors recently. NEVER have I argued for 
"free beer." I am not asking - nor have I EVER asked - for handouts.
I've asked for license arrangements whereby vendor costs are recovered,
but we are not soaked as a profit stream, nor charged for support we
never use. In most cases my advice was taken. In some cases, vendors
decided on "free beer" software against my advice.

Indeed, I recall that you and I spoke at length about this very thing. 
('Course in your case, nothing ever came of it.)

>I for one would raise hell if I invested in a company and they decided
>to ignore potentials for making money in non-Ada markets.  I'd like
>to think you are not so crazy that you like your investors blowing
>your money down a tube either.

I think I said I am not opposed to diversification. I think you're being
rather incoherent, trying to blast me and Greg in the same note. Let's
try to sort out who's who, shall we?

>It's the DoD that has killed Ada through failed policies and thereby
>giving Ada a bad name to those who might think of using the language
>in a non-DoD project.  Not small businesses.  Cut the liberal, "make
>me feel good" business-bashing, crap and stay focused on the real
>problem that Greg exposes daily.

Ada is far too good an invention to be left to the DoD. That is EXACTLY
why we've been arguing for 10 years that the Ada market needs to be built
from the grass roots. You and the other "top-downers" have not been so
terribly successful doing it that way; why not at least listen to others
with alternative views?

>Come on, Mike.  Pascal was taught to damn near every college student
>back when Turbo Pascal came out.  No vendor intervention was required.
>No one even heard what Ada was.  Not what I'd call a level playing field
>by any stretch of the imagination.

You are half right. Pascal started with free software, and propagated
rather rapidly after Ken Bowles and his colleagues at UCSD developed
UCSD Pascal. And the original VAX Pascal compiler was developed by
a university group (University of Washington) which, as far as I know,
_still_ collects royalties from DEC on it. Now _there's_ a partnership.

Borland pushed Turbo Pascal _very hard_ to the educational "market".
Their per-copy student price was a fraction of their retail. And their
site licenses were attractively priced as well. Borland could not have 
been making money on it; it as a "loss leader" for them, I'm sure.
And Borland NEVER charged for bogus "support". If you wanted the
new version you could buy it.

Yes, Borland is in trouble now, but I doubt their mid-80's educational
licenses have anything to do with that.

>Well, it seems you don't always think in the pure economics of issues
>which is where business is rooted.  You are right, though.  The Turbo
>Pascal example has some merit, but you fail to analyze it properly.
>Why did turbo pascal take off so fast?  Because college students were
>learning it and using it on projects.  If you think that Borland created
>the Pascal market, you are way off base.

Not really. Turbo Pascal created a HUGE Turbo Pascal market. Have you
ever looked to see how many TP texts there still are? Go to an
education-oriented show like SIGCSE (help in the SIGAda booth, John)
and look at the texts. Borland managed to make TP _the_ standard
university compiler. It's waning now, but it was so for years.

>Meanwhile, we have (or had) the same potential for Ada.  But because,
>American universities have failed to promote Ada to the same level that
>Pascal was promoted, it now becomes a small business failure because they
>didn't give enough money and free software to people.  

You just don't get it. Borland _really did_ create that TP juggernaut
in the universities. I was there, man, and you were not. Borland did
not give their stuff away; they just saw the futility of trying to
gouge us; we have the choice to walk away from ripoffs, and we voted
with our feet.

>Forcing Ada technology down everyone's throat isn't going to create the
>market that we'd like to see.

You are so right, John, but ot in the sense that you meant it. DoD can
jump up and down and throw tantrums, but hasn't the power to enforce
its own mandate. Too many business people out there making independent
decisions. The only hope for Ada - if anyone cares - is bottom-up;
top-down is clearly not working.

>Borland has the same policy.  Sounds like good business to me, so maybe
>it's not to far off to classify you and your peers as the "education market",
>because I don't hear a lot of business sense coming out of your keyboard yet.

Borland's policy is "use this version or buy the next version." I have
no problem with that. I'm getting aded value. I am NOT getting added
value when an Ada company says "sure, we'll sell you our compiler,
as long as you keep paying that mandatory support fee." 

NOT! I refuse to pay for something I never use. The compiler vendors have 
finally come to understand that, as you will see if you trouble yourself
to look at their current academic policies.

>If Ada is so great, why to people have to be "hooked" through commercial business
>support.  Again, I mention the history of Pascal.  That language
>became a defacto standard teaching language because it was identified
>and accepted as the norm.  Commercial businesses had little to do
>with the incorporation of Pascal into so many CS programs.  How come
>Ada can't experience the same defacto standardization unless businesses
>fork out free software, support and pump money into promotional campaigns?

Actually, John, Ada is coming along quite well in the universities,
finally. C++ is increasingly seen as falling short of the Holy Grail.
No other part of the Ada market can show market share increasing as
rapidly as it has in the universities over 5 years. But I don't think
you're really interested in facts. If you are, we'll chat privately.

>You have yet to make this connection between the 2 languages.

See above.

>I suppose that it was the responsibility of Ada compiler vendors
>to sniff out every student and make sure that they weren't bitten
>by the C/C++ virus?  Meanwhile, instructors and students alike
>remain ignorant of new languages like Ada.  Are you saying that the
>last 10 years of failure to get Ada in as a defacto standard programming
>language in CS curriculums is the fault of Ada vendors?  come on.

I'm indeed saying that the vendors played a much more important role
in inhibiting Ada's catching fire than they understand or will ever admit.
(Publicly at least - privately, I hear enough support for my crazy ideas
to give me some hope.)

>Allow me to paraphrase this:
>
>     "Ada vendors have failed expand the Ada market faster than the C++
>      market has expanded, and now that they have "blown it", they
>      are making the wise business decision to move into the C++ market
>      as well."

Not bad. I'll go with it.

>          Business is about making money, not creating markets
>          based upon technological beliefs.

Half right. Business is indeed about creating markets. Ask Kellogg.

>   What is it about this group of companies that puts them so often in
>   a "we should have done X" mode? Can they get it right? Maybe they 
>   should open their ears to a few more fuzzy-headed academics, even if
>   we haven't got business degrees.
>
>Sorry Mike, but again, if you ask many Ada vendors what they would have
>done differently, they will tell you that the biggest mistake they made
>was believing the government when they said that Ada would be mandated
>across DoD projects and then never followed through, after millions of
>dollars in private funds were spent by vendors in preparation to make
>this market roll...  Very few Ada vendors that I know will say that 
>the biggest mistake they made was *NOT* investing enough in the Ada 
>market.  They invested.  A lot of them heavily.  Uncle Sam did the screwing.

We are in violent agreement here. Which brings us exactly full circle.
As opposed to most of U.S. industry, which invents products nobody knew
they needed, then sells them like hell (and this includes most of the
software industry as well), this group had no belief whatsoever in
the essential merits of their product. 

I am tempted to characterize this as the "beltway bandit" approach to 
business: Uncle Sam cooks up an idea, companies line up to sell that 
product to the government, though they don't believe in it enough to 
go out and create a non-government market at the same time. Then, when
government loses interest, or discovers that this product is not the
cure for all their problems, these companies scream bloody murder that
they were screwed. Sure they were screwed; they were stupid. 

I hate to say it, but we told them so, ten years ago. Nobody was listening.
I can recall giving a talk to the local SIGAda group in 1986 (!) that 
predicted exactly this outcome.

>So what's your point on this?  I think you make mine nicely :-)

It's nice we agree on something.

>Don't tell me that C++ was handed on a platter to anyone from a
>vendor.  Nearly every piece of netware I pull down was developed
>with the gcc/g++ compilers.  Free compilers.  No vendor intervention
>was required there.  

C++ started with AT&T. Hardly a charitable organization. Indeed, they
gave it away (err, licensed it for $200.) to universities. I know;
I filled out our first license agreement for it. Just like I filled out
our first agreements for AT&T Unix and Berkeley Unix. Who do you suppose
funded Berkeley? Uncle Sam. ARPA.

Who do you think is funding FSF to develop all that stuff? The Red Cross? 
Do you seriously think it's _all_ volunteers? I'd be willing to bet that 
you'd find good ol' American industry on their list of sponsors.

And I predict that similar things will happen with GNAT.

>So why is it so necessary for vendors to give
>away their wares and tools to universities in order for Ada to succeed.
>The answer is that it is not necessary.  It's just a nice sounding
>panacea and if the vendors start giving aware more compilers and mentioning
>Ada in their ads more, then they get to feel good about working on
>the problem - regardless if it will amount to any level of success in
>addressing the problem.

Well, you are lumping together the red herring of giveaways - which I 
never asked for - and advertising, which I damn well did ask for.
You're making a mistake lumping me with Greg, too. We may both
be irritating you, but we are not the same.

>This is the same argument that people use to justify social welfare
>programs.  "Those with money need to fund programs that the rest of
>us believe in".  Government beauracracies might work this way.  Businesses
>die this way.

Sheesh - why not go on a long political tirade, John?

>I think you're right on with this one.  But, is it the vendor's fault
>that Ada leaves a sour taste in peoples mouths?  Is it the vendor's
>responsibility to bastardize an advertisement with sometime that will
>leave that sour taste.  Vendors are in business to make money.  Period.
>Injecting a sour taste into the reader of an advertisement is hardly
>a wise use of the advertising dollar.  The deeper problem is "Why does Ada
>leave the impression it does with people?"   

As I said many times, I would be happy to see some REAL evidence that
Ada has tainted a company in this way. You can post it here, or you
can e-mail me, and I'll shut up. Till then, I persist in believing
that it's a myth, arising mostly from vendors' low _self_image_.
I think they realize that most of the Ada stuff out there sucks
compared to the competition. They are not mentioning Ada in their
ads because they can't deliver. 

Anyone want to counter this? I have no facts either way, and have
clearly labeled this as a _belief_, an _opinion_. I would be delighted
to have my opinion changed, but tirades about liberalism won't get
you to first base with me.

>I think you hit the nail on the head.  Why muff an ad that is focused
>towards C++ developers by mentioning Ada and leave a bad taste in
>their mouth?  If I were placing C++ product ads right now, I'd be
>taking the same approach.

Let's see some hard evidence on this, John.

Mike Feldman
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael B. Feldman -  chair, SIGAda Education Working Group
Professor, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
The George Washington University -  Washington, DC 20052 USA
202-994-5253 (voice) - 202-994-0227 (fax) - mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Internet)
"Pork is all that stuff the government gives the other guys."
------------------------------------------------------------------------