* Investigating Ada @ 2005-10-04 23:25 Phoebe 2005-10-05 2:49 ` Matthew Heaney ` (3 more replies) 0 siblings, 4 replies; 6+ messages in thread From: Phoebe @ 2005-10-04 23:25 UTC (permalink / raw) Hi everyone, I have been looking into Ada as a new language to pick up. I tend to use C for most projects, but I enjoy learning new things. I'm already sold on the value of the language itself from a technical point of view, but my concern is that it might have a rather small userbase, especially without the Ada Mandate. I am having trouble finding recent FAQs or usage information. It's easy to come across something from like 1994, but that's over ten years ago ;) I'm going to learn it anyway, but I'm just hoping that people could comment on its popularity, and also how it has kept up against the other languages which surely must have incorporated a lot of its advantages by now. Thanks ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Investigating Ada 2005-10-04 23:25 Investigating Ada Phoebe @ 2005-10-05 2:49 ` Matthew Heaney 2005-10-05 5:48 ` Martin Dowie ` (2 subsequent siblings) 3 siblings, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread From: Matthew Heaney @ 2005-10-05 2:49 UTC (permalink / raw) "Phoebe" <no@nospam.net> writes: > I'm going to learn it anyway, but I'm just hoping that people could > comment on its popularity, and also how it has kept up against the > other languages which surely must have incorporated a lot of its > advantages by now. Thanks You can poke around at gnat.com for up-to-date information: <http://www.gnat.com/aa_lectures.php> I myself have been involved with the development of the standard container library that is being added to Ada 2005. Ada's new container library is modelled very closely on the STL, so if you know C++ then you'll be on familiar turf. (The library is included in GCC 4.) ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Investigating Ada 2005-10-04 23:25 Investigating Ada Phoebe 2005-10-05 2:49 ` Matthew Heaney @ 2005-10-05 5:48 ` Martin Dowie 2005-10-05 6:54 ` Martin Krischik 2005-10-07 4:38 ` Jim Rogers 3 siblings, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread From: Martin Dowie @ 2005-10-05 5:48 UTC (permalink / raw) Phoebe wrote: > Hi everyone, > I have been looking into Ada as a new language to pick up. I tend to use C > for most projects, but I enjoy learning new things. I'm already sold on the > value of the language itself from a technical point of view, but my concern > is that it might have a rather small userbase, especially without the Ada > Mandate. I am having trouble finding recent FAQs or usage information. It's > easy to come across something from like 1994, but that's over ten years ago > ;) > I'm going to learn it anyway, but I'm just hoping that people could comment > on its popularity, and also how it has kept up against the other languages > which surely must have incorporated a lot of its advantages by now. Thanks There is a recent users survey over at: http://www.adaic.org/news/survey-results.html Cheers -- Martin ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Investigating Ada 2005-10-04 23:25 Investigating Ada Phoebe 2005-10-05 2:49 ` Matthew Heaney 2005-10-05 5:48 ` Martin Dowie @ 2005-10-05 6:54 ` Martin Krischik 2005-10-07 4:38 ` Jim Rogers 3 siblings, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread From: Martin Krischik @ 2005-10-05 6:54 UTC (permalink / raw) Phoebe wrote: > Hi everyone, > I have been looking into Ada as a new language to pick up. I tend to use C > for most projects, but I enjoy learning new things. I'm already sold on > the value of the language itself from a technical point of view, but my > concern is that it might have a rather small userbase, especially without > the Ada Mandate. I am having trouble finding recent FAQs or usage > information. It's easy to come across something from like 1994, but that's > over ten years ago ;) Ahh yes, the old pages have a better google rating - no one knows why. Here some pages with newer dates: September 29, 2005, at 08:12 AM: http://ada.krischik.com/ 15:05, 1 October 2005 203.197.76.86: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Ada_Programming Tuesday October 4th, 2005 http://www.adaworld.com/ > I'm going to learn it anyway, but I'm just hoping that people could > comment on its popularity, and also how it has kept up against the other > languages which surely must have incorporated a lot of its advantages by > now. Thanks Now that PC become more powerfull and therefore can better handle feature rich languages Ada has a little revival. Mind you: when saying feature rich one take into account the C ISO standart is only a few pages shorter then the Ada ISO standart and C++ has a wooping 200 pages more. The former slim languages have caught up (but they have put on a lot of "backward compatibility fat" instead of "feature muskels"). Martin -- mailto://krischik@users.sourceforge.net Ada programming at: http://ada.krischik.com ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Investigating Ada 2005-10-04 23:25 Investigating Ada Phoebe ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 2005-10-05 6:54 ` Martin Krischik @ 2005-10-07 4:38 ` Jim Rogers 2005-10-08 1:49 ` adaworks 3 siblings, 1 reply; 6+ messages in thread From: Jim Rogers @ 2005-10-07 4:38 UTC (permalink / raw) "Phoebe" <no@nospam.net> wrote in news:4cE0f.1602$ir4.1138@edtnps90: > I'm going to learn it anyway, but I'm just hoping that people could > comment on its popularity, and also how it has kept up against the > other languages which surely must have incorporated a lot of its > advantages by now. Thanks Interestingly, very few languages have incorporated a lot of Ada's advantages by now. I do not know of any language with as robust and powerful capabilities in concurrency as Ada. Very few languages allow you to define your own numeric types without also requiring you to explicitly define all the operators for that type. Very few languages require complete coverage of all values in a case statement. Very few languages support run-time polymorphism without requiring the use of pointers or references. Generic programming is common in C++, but introduces a new syntax to the language. Ada's generic capabilities are implemented using standard Ada syntax. Very few languages provide the automatically defined capabilities of Ada attributes. Very few languages provide the fine degree of control over data representation provided by Ada. Jim Rogers ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
* Re: Investigating Ada 2005-10-07 4:38 ` Jim Rogers @ 2005-10-08 1:49 ` adaworks 0 siblings, 0 replies; 6+ messages in thread From: adaworks @ 2005-10-08 1:49 UTC (permalink / raw) "Jim Rogers" <jimmaureenrogers@att.net> wrote in message news:6Zm1f.116464$qY1.5654@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net... > > "Phoebe" <no@nospam.net> wrote in news:4cE0f.1602$ir4.1138@edtnps90: > > > I'm going to learn it anyway, but I'm just hoping that people could > > comment on its popularity, and also how it has kept up against the > > other languages which surely must have incorporated a lot of its > > advantages by now. Thanks > > Interestingly, very few languages have incorporated a lot of Ada's > advantages by now. > Nice list of Ada's benefits in your post. It seems that most programmers are more interested in convenience during development than they are the long-term health of a software product. The latter concern should be a management issue, but not many managers are prepared to understand the problem well enough to choose Ada. I am currently teaching a graduate seminar titled "Software Evolution." We are examining the issues related to the lifecycle of a software system, including how to plan for its continued adaptability to new user requirements, new environments, and new hardware. Sometimes this is thought of as maintenance. Planning for software evolution, which manifests itself in many forms and technical demands, is becoming more and more essential. One approach is to simply plan to rewrite the code every so often. This is currently a popular choice among those who write software in HTML, XML, scripting languages, etc. However, rewrite is not a good choice for the majority of software systems. As we examine the language alternatives, Ada comes through as a sound choice. It is becoming increasing clear that, while extensible software can be written in most contemporary languages, the very design of those languages discourages this kind of planned evolution. Java and Eiffel are fairly good. C++, as currently practiced and programmed, is horrible. I suppose C++ is not to blame, but its practitioners seemed determined to prevent anyone from understanding their code well-enough to extend it. So, as we study the problem of software evolution, Ada is clearly a good choice. Richard Riehle ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 6+ messages in thread
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