Re: Embedded Ada Development Tools

[Richard Riehle <richard@adaworks.com>]

Ted Dennison wrote:

> Actually, I know of a couple of studies that found that novice Ada
> programmers who knew C still had more productivity and less bugs when
> they used Ada instead of C. Plus, Ada's generally considered easier to
> read and understand than C, which will be a big help once the
> replacement developer is hired.

I just took a quick tour through a new book from Microsoft Press
titled, Writing Secure Code.   It would be hilarious if it were not
so pathetic.    Over and over the authors demonstrate how to avoid
the pitfalls of writing code in C and C++.   Over and over I find
myself reacting with, "This problem simply would not occur if
they were writing in Ada."

The authors are well-intentioned and intelligent.  They even admit,
early in the book, that they are writing about C code because that
is the more widely used language even though it is clearly less
secure and less safe than many other languages.  Of course, they
never mention Ada since they probably no nothing about it.

One of my favorite monthly columns in C++ Report was called
"Obfuscated C++."    It was also a source of amusement because
the obfuscations described simply could not have happened in
Ada.   Still, these "professionals" continue to sell their  souls
to the Devil when it would be so much easier to harmonize
with the angels.

Richard Riehle