Re: Do we need "Mission-Critical" software? Was: What to Do?

[David Gillon <david.gillon@baesystems.com>]

n_brunot@my-deja.com wrote:
> 
> In article <93e33l$tfu$1@nnrp1.deja.com>,
>   Robert Dewar <robert_dewar@my-deja.com> wrote:
> > But there are many languages around, hundreds of them, and
> > Ada is far MORE popular than many of them (what's the last
> > time you saw a new project started in Jovial).
> 
> I read a couple a times the word 'jovial' and thought it was a joke :-)
> I guess you could be ready to invent your own language, used only by
> you, to make proof that there are languages less popular than Ada ...
> Easy way to prove almost any absurd assertion :-)

But in this case JOVIAL J73 was a major language used for a similar
problem domain to Ada. It was the primary language used for programming
USAF avionics projects and probably the most prominent of the languages
on the embedded side that DoD hoped to replace with the introduction of
Ada 83. Robert is perfectly correct in pointing out that no one starts
projects in JOVIAL any more, yet it was still a significant development
language within the last decade and products of that development are
still in their production phase (the Boeing C-17 airlifter for
instance). Ask around and you'll likely find most of the regulars here
worked on JOVIAL projects pre-Ada.

-- 


David Gillon
Process Control Team
Eurofighter FCS
Avionic Systems
BAE SYSTEMS Avionics
Rochester, Kent, UK