Re: naval systems

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

tony gair wrote:

> I was present on the project  testing phase of the 777 ada fly by wire
> system, and my understanding of Boeings choice for Ada was the following
> 
> 1) The systems functions and procedures needed testing at a component level,
> Most Ada programmers I've met have experience of rigourous testing.
> 
> 2) The contract for the fly by wire system was completed by Marconi Avionics
> in Elstree, UK, who are mainly Ada programmers and normally do Big Guns
> projects. This probably decided the project language. The ready availability
> of design, and test tools used on Big Guns projects was possibly also a
> deciding factor.

This is almost completely inaccurate. The only thing you have right is
that the contract was to MAv/GMAv, but even here it was in fact at
Rochester. On the initial prototype development two out of three teams
were non-Ada and the engineers reflected that. The decision to focus on
Ada across the entire aircraft, not simply the FCS, was Boeing's. Their
decision to go for single design/common code on the production FCS was
driven by certain decisions out of the FAA and came very late in the
day. MAv were only the sub-contractor on the FCS, and couldn't, for
instance, drive the choice of language on the AIMS which was being
written by Honeywell, or on any of the other systems. For the Boeing
perspective on their adoption of Ada for 777 there's a rather good
article in the Crosstalk archives.

> Would you fly on this aircraft?

In an instant. And I was on the project from before formal launch of the
777 to entry into service so I know precisely what went on during
development.

-- 

David Gillon