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=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,38fc011071df5a27 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-09-12 10:43:36 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!newshub.sdsu.edu!elnk-nf2-pas!newsfeed.earthlink.net!wn14feed!worldnet.att.net!204.127.198.203!attbi_feed3!attbi.com!sccrnsc04.POSTED!not-for-mail Message-ID: <3F6205B8.3070402@attbi.com> From: "Robert I. Eachus" User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.0.2) Gecko/20021120 Netscape/7.01 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: How to get a =?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BBConventional_Ada_Library=AB?= =?ISO-8859-1?Q?_=28Was=3A_Ideas_for_Ada_200X=29?= References: <6a90b886.0305262344.1d558079@posting.google.com> <3ED4A94C.2020501@noplace.com> <3ED6A852.75AC0133@adaworks.com> <3ED74ED3.4020505@noplace.com> <3ED7C8C5.3070902@cogeco.ca> <3ED826BB.9010509@noplace.com> <3F61BA28.3060507@crs4.it> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.34.139.183 X-Complaints-To: abuse@comcast.net X-Trace: sccrnsc04 1063388614 24.34.139.183 (Fri, 12 Sep 2003 17:43:34 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2003 17:43:34 GMT Organization: Comcast Online Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2003 17:43:34 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:42425 Date: 2003-09-12T17:43:34+00:00 List-Id: Jacob Sparre Andersen wrote: >> Well, I won't say it *can't* work - just that it has been tried in a >> few different ways and guess what? We don't have a Conventional Ada >> Library. >> >> If the thing has zero interest from the vendors it will become Just >> Another Ada Library like the half-dozen or so that are already out there. You are fighting the wrong battle here. Back in 1984 there was a session at SIGAda to discuss CAIS a government developed APSE (development environment) for Ada. We had a very lively discussion for about an hour, and I then decided to see if I could cut through the all the cross-currents and come up with a single position statement. I started out by saying that I had spend three weeks studing the CAIS documentation, and I still wasn't sure I knew enough to use it as a development platform. So I asked those people present who had use the CAIS prototype how much study by programmers was required to use it. No answer. Does anyone feel that a month per programmer is an overstatement. This time I got a lot of heads shaking no. Is there anyone here who has spent less time? No answer. Okay, I then asked people present who had developed fairly significant Ada projects that had been ported to a different environment, how long the ports had taken. "About three weeks." What if you had to do more ports? "Much easier." Now I asked the one group that had ported CAIS to a new environment how long that had taken. "About three months." That was basically the end of the meeting. We wrote up a statement saying that the complexity of the CAIS environment was such that we didn't feel that using it for development would ever pay off. Why bring this up? I think this is currently where we are with Ada container libraries. A SIMPLE Ada container library will get used. But it is much easier for the developers to "improve" the libraries by adding new container types and modes than it is for the potential users to learn how to use the library. I figure that about five to seven pages of technical documentation--including examples--is what Ada programmers are willing to spend on a container library before walking away and reinventing the wheel. This doesn't say that the library can't have all those bells and whistles. Just that the standard subset has got to be that easy to learn. -- Robert I. Eachus "As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure." -- Jacques Chirac, President of France "As far as France is concerned, you're right." -- Rush Limbaugh