Re: Ada and QNX

[Marin David Condic <mcondic.nospam@acm.org>]

Igor Kovalenko wrote:

> Oh, yeah. I bought Ada book some years ago. So many capabilities. Couple
> hundred pages worth of docs printed in small-font. If someone manages to
> a) write a good compiler for that (portable and with runtime-efficient
> code) and b) somehow teach programmers to understand the whole damn
> thing, then yes it might resurrect. Even then, I have doubts personally.

A) There *are* good quality compilers for Ada for lots of platforms.
B) Nobody needs to know "the whole damn thing" in order to do useful work with
it. (I doubt anybody knows *all* of C, Cobol, Java, Lisp, etc. since you
seldom need *all* of a language to get a job done.)

>
> Ada is way too high and abstract to be good for system level programming
> (even C++ is too high). And yet it is not as portable and distributable

I've heard this old saw so often I just want to cry. Would you accept as
"system level programming" a jet engine control system functioning in a
hard-realtime setting where there is *no* OS except for that which you write
yourself? As in "I'm programming down at the bare metal, building my own
interrupt handlers, low-level device I/O, etc."? Chances are, you've flown in
a jet with such an engine control. Yes, it's really been done a number of
times. There are a lot more examples, but these I can testify to in court
since I developed them. Can we *please* never again hear that "Ada is no good
for systems programming"?

>
> as Java to be good for new-age applications. Plus, it smells too much
> like Pascal and that turns me down immediately. Of course, those are
> just my humble personal opinions, I know that others will disagree and I
> don't say that those opinions are absolute right.
>

You're never wrong about what you "like" or "prefer". You don't have to like
Ada. I don't have to like C. However, I'll concede that C has its place in the
world an often has either technical or business merits that make it the right
choice for some applications. I would like people to look at Ada in a serious
technical way with an eye toward trying to recognize its strengths & an honest
effort to look for where it would be useful. All too often, people begin their
inspection of Ada with an attitude of: "I *hate* Ada. Now let me learn enough
about it to find or invent reasons why hating Ada is the right answer." This
is a very human action. We all do it from time to time. But like many human
actions, it is not terribly useful or constructive.

>
> In any case I don't think that pissing into C++ pool will do any good
> for Ada. At best it might just serve you as a good way to kill time
> until a) and b) is done.
>

A and B are done. See http://www.Adapower.com/ for sources for good quality
compilers and a bibliography of good books for learning Ada. (Either *all* of
it or just the parts you need to do your job.) I personally like Bard
Crawford's book (see: www.LearnAda.com.) as a "quick" introduction to the
language for those who need to get familiar with the basic features of the
language without becoming a language lawyer. See also:
http://www.seas.gwu.edu/~mfeldman/ada95books.html#1 for more books about Ada.

MDC
--
======================================================================
Marin David Condic - Quadrus Corporation - http://www.quadruscorp.com/
Send Replies To: m c o n d i c @ q u a d r u s c o r p . c o m
Visit my web site at:  http://www.mcondic.com/

    "Giving money and power to Government is like giving whiskey
    and car keys to teenage boys."

        --   P. J. O'Rourke
======================================================================