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,e6a2e4a4c0d7d8a6 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 101deb,3488d9e5d292649f X-Google-Attributes: gid101deb,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-02-20 11:03:05 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!sn-xit-02!sn-xit-06!sn-xit-08!supernews.com!news.airnews.net!cabal12.airnews.net!usenet From: "John R. Strohm" Newsgroups: comp.lang.pl1,comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: status of PL/I as a viable language Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2003 12:44:42 -0600 Organization: Airnews.net! at Internet America Message-ID: <42EA55F4BE83950E.F1DA277C2FDC157B.C804C1C52FE95D65@lp.airnews.net> X-Orig-Message-ID: References: <3E51908E.9CCA3412@adaworks.com> <8Gh4a.7455$_c6.743959@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net> <3E51ABCE.5491B9A2@adaworks.com> <3E5273DE.2050206@cox.net> <3E531E6F.BDFB2599@adaworks.com> <3E546C45.4010406@cox.net> <3E54F926.441D5BB5@adaworks.com> <1045763933.848350@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> Abuse-Reports-To: abuse at airmail.net to report improper postings NNTP-Proxy-Relay: library2.airnews.net NNTP-Posting-Time: Thu Feb 20 13:02:20 2003 NNTP-Posting-Host: !be>S1k-W$W8MkT (Encoded at Airnews!) X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4522.1200 Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.pl1:4365 comp.lang.ada:34291 Date: 2003-02-20T12:44:42-06:00 List-Id: "Hyman Rosen" wrote in message news:1045763933.848350@master.nyc.kbcfp.com... > Richard Riehle wrote: > > Ada is designed to maximize the amount of error checking possible > > as early in the development process as possible. > > The problem is that those errors which are caught are gross errors > of coding - buffer overruns, null pointer accesses, arithmetic > overflow, etc. But serious errors in complex software aren't caused > (only) by these sorts of errors. So what's your point? Are you trying to say you DON'T want to catch those "gross errors of coding - buffer overruns, null pointer accesses, arithmetic overflow, etc."? Any one of those "gross errors of coding" can and will crash an embedded system, or, worse, cause it to fail in a bad way. It was an overflowed counter that caused a Patriot battery not to engage an incoming Scud, resulting in the deaths of several U.S. servicemen. The list of Microsoft buffer overruns that have been exploited by virus authors is probably a LOT longer than your johnson. I saw a lot of VAX access violations on two different TI products, years ago. All of those errors CAN AND DO escape the development process, and they CAN AND DO cause headaches for end users. The last bug I found and fixed at my last employer was a null pointer access. That company has an internal coding policy that pointers will ALWAYS be tested for null before being dereferenced. They have mandatory code walkthroughs. This one still got through and crashed the box. It took about an hour just to SET UP the test to see the box crash, and I had to do the test several times before I tracked down the error. That was test time I could have used doing something USEFUL, if the error had been caught earlier.