Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada

[g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu]

In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu>, mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) 
writes:

[some of Mike's stuff deleted]

> In this case, congress passed this DoD appropriation bill at the end
> of October, and Bush signed it. Here is the relevant paragraph:
> 

> As background, here is a lengthy paragraph from the explanatory language
> that came along with the conference report.
> 
> "Ada Programming Language - The Department of Defense developed Ada to
...... loop put("bla blah"); end loop;

This seems to be pure psyco-babble.  It sounds like a memo from a Dean (My dean
doesn't read this [I PRAY]!).  The statement sould say "Use it [Ada] or loose 
it [Contract]."

"Cost Effective" is a wonderful generalization to mean almost anything
including "My FORTRAN programmers will claim permanent disability and expect
workman's comp."  or "Ada is TOO BIG for my machine. [read "Ada is too complex
for my programmers."].  If I get flamed, then so be it!  I just feel that
realizing that one [relatively] portable language with some nice features that
conform to some good software engineering practices is worthy of a mandate with
appropriate considerations to current hardware and requirements constraints. 


Any good programmer can learn to use Ada in the way it was designed.  

> 
> This is what is known as "legislative history." It is not formally
> part of the law but gives insight into the mindset of the lawmakers
> (or their staff people, really). Have fun with it.
> 
> Mike Feldman

I did have fun with it, Mike.  Thanks.  

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