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From: Charles Hixson <charleshixson@earthling.net>
Subject: Re: Urgent question: malloc and ada...
Date: 1998/05/01
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References: <352A79C2.15FB7483@nathan.gmd.de>
 <EACHUS.98Apr30171942@spectre.mitre.org> <1998Apr30.180141.1@eisner>
 <dewar.894029184@merv>
To: Robert Dewar <dewar@merv.cs.nyu.edu>
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Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1998-05-01T00:00:00+00:00
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Actually, if someone were to rewrite the Linux kernel in Ada, it might
be VERY useful.  Ada is supposed to catch errors MUCH more readily, and
an OS without internal errors would be extremely popular (at least with
some people [like me]).

I haven't checked the actual scope of the proposal, but if Linux were
being maintained in Ada rather than in C, there would be a large
increase in the number of interested (in Ada) people.

Robert Dewar wrote:
> 
> Larry said
> 
> <<I find it strange that even in comp.lang.ada a distinguished contributor
> would express the assumption that the operating system was written in C.
> >>
> 
> Perhaps that is because the distinguished contributor lives in the real
> world, and not a wishful-thinking world! In practice the definition
> expressed here is a useful one, since of course it is almost always
> the case that the operating system involved will have substantial
> chunks written in C (probably it won't be 100% C, there will be C++,
> and perhaps assembly .....)
> 
> It would be a nice excercise to rewrite the Linux kernel in Ada, and indeed
> the comparison of the effort involved, and the final results would make
> an interesting student research paper. This is by no means an out of scope
> effort. The core of the kernel is not a gigantic program.
> 
> But until such a thing is done, I am afraid that Larry will continue
> to find the real world strange :-)

-- 
Charles Hixson	charleshixson@earthling.net
(510) 464-7733	or chixso@mtc.dst.ca.us