Re: Point a beginner in the right direction? Cheap bare-board to run with a RTOS for running ADA

[mjsilva@scriptoriumdesigns.com]

On Tuesday, July 9, 2013 1:10:19 PM UTC-7, Randy Brukardt wrote:
> <mjsilva@scriptoriumdesigns.com> wrote in message 
> 
> news:81c8e4a2-f0bb-4559-b2b7-0eba08ddca99@googlegroups.com...
> 
> On Tuesday, July 9, 2013 12:51:39 AM UTC-7, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> 
> ...
> 
> > No technology ever dies, it becomes niche. Ada's advantage in the niche is
> 
> >
> 
> > minimal. Its advantage on mainstream SBCs is potentially huge.
> 
> 
> 
> >But the difference is that nobody is arguing that Ada is not suitable for 
> 
> >SBCs.  However,
> 
> > you are dismissing Ada on microcontrollers, of which tens of billions are 
> 
> > sold each year
> 
> > (big niche!).  You are making this an either/or question, which it most 
> 
> > certainly is not.  How
> 
> > is it that you have been appointed to determine where Ada can be 
> 
> > beneficial, and where
> 
> > it cannot?
> 
> 
> 
> He hasn't, he's just telling the truth. On tiny systems

What is tiny?  128k of program memory?  256k?  512k?  1MByte?

> 90% of Ada's 
> 
> advantages are negated;

What is the absolute minimum system that can run "100% Ada"?

> you're talking about systems with no exceptions, 
> 
> extremely limited tasking (Ravenscar is far too limited to be usable outside 
> 
> of the hands of experts with lots of time to spend on analysis), very 
> 
> limited numerics (usually integers only)

Why integers only?  Surely Ada compilers don't use OS services for floating or fixed point.

>and that by their very nature have 
> 
> to be small (so the benefit of Ada's program structuring features like 
> 
> private types and child packages are hardly noticable, except in a negative 
> 
> way as they often will slightly increase code size).
> 
> 
> 
> Such a language is completely different than the Ada I know, and it's 
> 
> dubious to call it Ada at all. Moreover, the advantages it still has are 
> 
> impossible to explain to someone that is using some other high-level 
> 
> language -- most of the code written would end up as C-in-Ada-syntax and the 
> 
> programmers would never find out why that is bad (because it wouldn't matter 
> 
> on those systems).
> 
> 
> 
> The truth is, you don't *need* Ada to program such systems, and on such 
> 
> systems it's "just another programming language", especially from the 
> 
> perspective of the average programmer (as opposed to the Ada true believer). 
> 
> It wouldn't cause the sort of correctness improvements that you see when 
> 
> using Ada on larger systems, so it hard to see why people would pay extra 
> 
> for it. And if no one wants to pay for it, it isn't going to exist (almost 
> 
> all great Open Source software has its roots in for-pay companys).

And yet somebody paid for Ada on AVR, a much smaller processor than what is being discussed here.

So again I ask you and Dmitry, what is the smallest possible system that can run "100% Ada"?