From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00, REPLYTO_WITHOUT_TO_CC autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,630c12e823d1bdf4 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-01-15 15:51:30 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!arclight.uoregon.edu!wn14feed!worldnet.att.net!207.217.77.102!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!stamper.news.atl.earthlink.net!harp.news.atl.earthlink.net!not-for-mail From: Richard Riehle Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Ada Compiler Pricing (was Re: Hijacking a Thread was RE: New Ada compiler for .NET) Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2003 16:00:31 -0800 Organization: AdaWorks Software Engineering Message-ID: <3E25F61F.4600B9F8@adaworks.com> References: <3E259DAD.7B21B061@adaworks.com> Reply-To: richard@adaworks.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 41.b2.60.6c Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Server-Date: 15 Jan 2003 23:51:30 GMT X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.7 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:33057 Date: 2003-01-15T23:51:30+00:00 List-Id: "John R. Strohm" wrote: > Just out of curiosity, did the Xerox executives in question give any kind of > explanation WHY they outlawed Ada? As nearly as anyone could determine, they had no reason other than that they decided to standardize on C. > One would think that, if the project manager did a decent job of detailing > the actual cost and schedule savings on the Ada project, that it would get > the attention of the beancounters. The project manager was giving a lot of success story seminars at conferences, especially Tri-Ada conferences. However, his was the only development group that had enjoyed success with Ada. Everyone else was using other languages, including, if I recall correctly, Mesa. It looks, from the outside, like another example of the kind of stupidity about computing once typical of people at the executive level of Xerox. It is hard to know if they have gotten any better. They certainly never learned any lessons from PARC -- although the rest of the world did. Richard Riehle