Re: Porting Ada to C (Stealth development)

[Larry Hazel <lhhazel@otelco.net>]

Dale Pontius wrote:
> 
> In article <3C47375B.8060604@worldnet.att.net>,
>         Jim Rogers <jimmaureenrogers@worldnet.att.net> writes:
> > Dale Pontius wrote:
> >
> >> I am taking up some new work, and would like to do it in Ada. However
> >> there is a strong 'Do it in C so others can pick it up' bias, which I
> >> guess makes some sense. So I'd like to do my development in Ada, and
> >
> >
> > Actually, it makes no sense, but opening that can or worms begins the
> > language war. If a person is a competent C programmer he or she should
> > be able to learn a new language with minimal effort. My own experience
> > is that it was easier to learn Ada, knowing C first, than it was to
> > read and understand a lot of C programs.
> >
> Doesn't matter. This is a rather conservative area, and "C is the way
> to program, though perhaps C++ or Java would be OK." Note that this is
> also not a programming area, it's silicon design. Sometimes you have
> to turn part-time programmer to get the silicon out. This is one of
> those.
> 
> ...
> >> have the occasional conversion to C to play well with others. This
> >> probably needs to be free, as well, since it wouldn't cost money if
> >> if I just started the project in C. (Can't justify) I did a quick scan
> >> at www.adahome.org without luck. I'll also need to link in C libs, but
> >> that should be straightforward and in the documentation.
> >
> > When you say "play well with others", do you mean that others will
> > take over the maintenance of the C pieces, or simply that others will
> > want to call the Ada libraries from C? These are really two different
> > issues, and should be handled separately.
> >
> One perpetual concern is, "How does this stuff get maintained when
> XXXX moves on?" For that reason, they want a mainstream language,
> especially considering (as mentioned above) the programmers here do
> it on the side, not as a profession.
> >
> ...
> > Is there already any history of mixed-language development for your
> > team? This includes such pieces as shell scripts, perl scripts,
> > C++ libraries, or assembler routines. My guess is that your product
> > already uses some mixture of C and other languages. This situation
> > is not currently a political problem. Try to deal with Ada in this
> > light.
> >
> Obviously yet. Mix of C, C++, ksh, perl, rexx, and I've thrown Python
> into the mix. But I suspect Ada is too far out for acceptance. I had
> a tough enough time getting VHDL in where needed, and avoiding a
> Verilog-only mandate, but only because Verilog couldn't have easily
> done that part of the job. The bulk of the HDL is still Verilog, and
> the VHDL will get translated after doing its special part.
> 
> As I mentioned on the other subthread, Ada to C, C++, or Java would
> probably be equally acceptable.
> 
> Dale Pontius
> NOT speaking for IBM

The few times I have been required to write in C, I wrote Ada anyway.  Then
commented out the ada and hand translated to C.  The only comments were the Ada
code and comments that were originally in the Ada code.

Larry