Re: Improving Ada's image - Was: 7E7 Flight Controls Electronics

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

Warren W. Gay VE3WWG wrote:
 >
 >
 > Today's slashdot points out yet another exploit in Linux.
 >
 >
 > http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/04/1212228&mode=thread&tid=1-
 > 26&tid=95
 >
 >
 > We like to deride Windows, but Linux, *NIX in general all suffer from
 >  the same problem. Some of these are no doubt due to design issues
 > (which Ada may or may not help with). But surely, one has to
 > wonder/hope if/that some other fundamental change (language) can
 > offer an improvement. I think many are simply saying that they
 > believe it to be so.

Developing an operating system - any operating system - is inherently
complex and extremely difficult to get right. Most of the flaws are
*not* going to come from array bounds or integer range check problems.
They come from logic problems or timing problems. I know from experience
that an asynchronous world is extremely difficult to live in and get
right. The logic an OS goes through to schedule multiple processes and
handle shared I/O, etc., are all just inherently hard to get right.
Coding up an OS in Ada might eliminate some flaws - but they are far
from the worst flaws that an OS can have.



 >
 > If one can see major improvements on the projects that Ada is used
 > for, then by extension one has to expect a similar level of
 > improvement for an operating system.
 >
I think if someone did an OS in Ada they would get some benefits in
terms of productivity and error reduction. But those are typically
developmental issues - someone can still do it in C and get an
equivalent job done, just with added effort. Ada isn't going to
automagically make all the problems of getting an OS into stable, secure
operation go away - but I'm willing to be proven wrong by demonstration. ;-)



 > But everyone's point is well taken: where is the Ada OS? We have no
 > implementation to point to for a comparison.

Yup. Its time to shut up about how superior Ada is and how everyone who
isn't using it is a bonehead for selecting inferior technology. If
that's true, then the time has come to go out and start proving it by
developing real world applications that out-compete their rivals because
of that superior Ada technology. And that goes double for any sort of
Ada OS.

All the necessary tools exist. There's a free compiler, IDE, debugger, 
GUI builder, etc., needed to go write apps in Ada. (I wish they were 
better integrated, standardized and came with a library, but if we keep 
waiting for perfection, we'll never be ready.) We can't say "it would be 
better done in Ada..." now without asking ourselves why we aren't doing 
it. We will look like fools or cranks to the rest of the world if we 
keep pissing on their real-world, in-existence apps unless we can 
actually come up with something that is *better* to put next to it and 
say "See?!?! The one I built in *Ada* actually *is* better!!!" I can't 
download and run conceptual vaporware that is only theoretically better. ;-)

MDC


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Marin David Condic
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