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From: "Steve Doiel" <nospam_steved@pacifier.com>
Subject: Re: how to make Ada more popular?
Date: 1999/01/22
Message-ID: <36a938da.0@news.pacifier.com>#1/1
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Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1999-01-22T00:00:00+00:00
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bill_1@nospam.com wrote in message <787hk5$q6t@drn.newsguy.com>...
>
>lets face it. Ada is not used much in commerical sector.
>
>What can be done to improve the situation?


First: I am an Ada advocate (please don't misinterpret my comments)

How about a dose of reality in development tools!

What Ada needs to become more popular is a resonably priced PC based
Ada development system that includes all the tools needed to do development
in Ada and all of the included tools work.

I have yet to see an Ada development system for PC's running Windows or
Windows NT where the debugger just plain works.  I have used GNAT and
ObjectAda.  Both of these systems have shown tremendous improvement
in the last year and a half (although I haven't seen 3.11p yet) but still I
cannot reliably look at every variable.  This is something that is taken for
granted in most other PC development environments.

Does an Ada development system for Windows NT exist that lets me do
all of my development in Ada?  When I have to read samples of C/C++ code
in order to make Windows API calls, and spend a considerable amount of
time fiddling with using the "bindings", I don't feel like I'm programming
in
Ada.  It is these times that I think about how life would be easier if I
were
programming in C/C++.  When I try to convince someone that Ada is a
good choice, this is a problem area.  We need an up to date binding that
gives the user the impression Ada is natural with the Windows API.

As the tools mature I think there will be a natural increase in use of Ada.
It
is a better language for development.  But if you've done any serious
development on NT in Ada and haven't experieced some pains with the
enviroment either with debugging or bindings, your in the minority.

SteveD