Re: Ada used in General Aviation (GA) applications?

[Marin David Condic <nobody@noplace.com>]

Try searching the web for "Single Board Computers" and see what pops up. 
Look at what the vendors of those boards provide as development kits. 
Make a list of *everything* they give you when you buy a development 
kit. (Often an RTOS and all the things you cite below) If a developer 
shooting to use that board doesn't see an Ada compiler in that toolset, 
then Ada won't get used.

MDC



Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> 
> Right, but I am not talking about naked boards. Little could be done
> there, here I agree with you. I am talking about
> 
> 1) the next layer. Many our customers need a board + multitasking +
> TCP/IP stack + USB + field bus. They also want it portable [that
> becomes a real issue for many customers.] Isn't it what Ada is for? 
> 
> 2) the whole tool chain. You don't get it with a board.
> 
> 
>>How is some alternative vendor
>>going to come in there with an Ada compiler and convince the developer
>>he needs to use theirs (without all the supporting goodies) and it will 
>>only cost him $20,000 a year in annual support contracts?
> 
> 
> This is approximately what a C based tool chain costs.
> 
> 
>>It won't fly unless the compiler is right there with the rest of the
>>development kit and doesn't cost a fortune to get.
> 
> 
> Right
> 
> 
>>>No. It would take too long. I am afraid that Ada is missing the
>>>embedded programming market which in the foreseeable future will
>>>become no less important than the conventional one.
>>
> 
>>It wouldn't take too long if Ada focused in on a branch of software
>>systems to which its existing strengths play and whos practitioners are 
>>not already Ada-haters. The embedded market already hates Ada with the 
>>white hot intensity of a thousand suns for a variety of historical 
>>reasons. In language surveys "Ada" ranks behind "Other" in languages 
>>used to program embedded systems.
> 
> 
> I am afraid, that's in the past. Nowadays many are just unaware that
> Ada exists.
> 
> 
>>I'd *love* to see Ada get some nice 
>>share of the embedded market, but I think it is lost for the time being 
>>because it is too expensive in which to play and has too much historic 
>>resistance to overcome.
> 
> 
> But the point is that embedded rapidly grows. I do not propose to go
> after the present customers. No, we should go after the new ones.
> Those who know nothing about Ada. They would readily switch to any
> language other than C. And they will, unfortunately, to C++, C#, Java,
> but not to Ada!
> 
> 
>>If Ada went for something related - like communications or math or 
>>related fields - and tried to target that audience, they might be more 
>>receptive. That and they don't demand as much support gagetry just in 
>>order to be a player. So you can get in there easier and start building 
>>a market and because it might have a connection to the embedded world, 
>>it lets you gradually start to try to get into that arena.
> 
> 
> --
> Regards,
> Dmitry Kazakov
> www.dmitry-kazakov.de


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Marin David Condic
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