From: dewar@cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)
Subject: Re: Array mappings
Date: 19 Dec 1994 09:27:32 -0500
Date: 1994-12-19T09:27:32-05:00 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <3d458k$i26@gnat.cs.nyu.edu> (raw)
In-Reply-To: 1994Dec19.015302@hobbit
Following up on Mark's comments, I feel that the COBOL market is in practice
a much better opportunity for Ada 95 than the Fortran market.
I have three reasons for thinking this:
1. It is a much bigger market, and is now in the business of climbing off
mainframes, so systems are being rethought anyway.
2. The COBOL world has always been much more forward thinking when it
comes to language. This is the land of 4GL's, and it is interesting
for instance to note the interest in Smalltalk. People are by no means
wedded to COBOL, and they are looking around.
3. For a Fortran user, Ada 95 and C++ look somewhat similar. Sure we can
argue the usual "Ada is better because xxx" line where xxx has to do
with reliability etc. etc. but in terms of raw functionality, C++ and
Ada 95 look rather similar (and both are weaker than Fortran 90 when
it comes to manipulating multi-dimensional arrays).
When I say weaker here, I am talking about for example the slicing
features of F90. Of course I still think that F90 users would be
ahead in using Ada 95, because they would gain so much from the
improved abstraction features, but as I said this is a sell based
on somewhat abstract issues :-)
On the other hand, C++ does NOT look good to COBOL folks. It signally
lacks facilities for decimal arithmetic, which cannot be smoothly
integrated (consider handling of literals for example) into C++.
On the other hand, Ada 95 has gone out of its way to be COBOL
friendly, and even includes editing modeled directly on COBOL pictures.
C
next prev parent reply other threads:[~1994-12-19 14:27 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 32+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
1994-12-06 13:06 Why don't large companies use Ada? Paige Vinall
1994-12-07 14:15 ` Norman H. Cohen
1994-12-10 20:55 ` Array mappings Michael Feldman
1994-12-13 15:01 ` Norman H. Cohen
1994-12-16 18:55 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-17 0:43 ` Keith Thompson
1994-12-17 17:17 ` Reaching traditional engineering, was: " Michael Feldman
1994-12-18 1:34 ` Robert Dewar
1994-12-19 2:11 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-21 16:17 ` Kevin Weise
1994-12-21 13:29 ` David Emery
1994-12-22 2:40 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-22 10:20 ` Reaching traditional engineering Introspect Technologies
1994-12-22 20:49 ` Richard Riehle
1994-12-23 9:09 ` Peter Hermann
1994-12-27 3:37 ` Reaching traditional engineering, was: Array mappings Richard G. Hash
1994-12-17 20:42 ` Rolf Ebert
1994-12-19 2:19 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-19 3:46 ` Robert Dewar
1994-12-19 5:53 ` Mark S. Hathaway
1994-12-19 14:27 ` Robert Dewar [this message]
1994-12-22 17:08 ` Richard G. Hash
1995-01-03 3:26 ` Fred McCall
1994-12-17 17:41 ` Robert Dewar
1994-12-18 0:03 ` Dik T. Winter
1994-12-19 2:08 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-19 2:01 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-19 3:41 ` Robert Dewar
1994-12-20 3:23 ` Michael Feldman
1994-12-20 14:09 ` Robert Dewar
1994-12-19 19:10 ` Matt Kennel
1994-12-09 2:31 ` Why don't large companies use Ada? Michael Feldman
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