Re: Ada is getting more popular!

[Georg Bauhaus <rm-host.bauhaus@maps.futureapps.de>]

On 10/28/10 11:19 PM, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Thu, 28 Oct 2010 22:33:37 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> You cannot be in control of everything. You have to outsource.

(I'd guess that in the Ada business, outsourcing need is felt
to be less pressing, if billion dollar organizations have deep
pockets and/or "national interest"?)

>  The problem is that vendors have too
> much power over customers. The only solution I see, is a law enforcing
> liability to sold software. Open or free source will never solve it.

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           Public Open Standards !
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Standards (of the kind without patents on trivial algorithms
subverting them) are an effective tool in the hands of
customers preferring not to depend on a single solution.
Standards leave a choice.

Standard protocols, standard languages, standard file formats:
if these are enforced in a market, they prevent entrepreneurial
attempts at controlling the customers.  If a producer wants
to offer something in the market, it has to meet certain standards.

For example, one market rule might require that it be possible
to exchange basic text data between any smart phone and any
content management system to be used by larger organizations.

Or that it be possible to translate a standard Ada program with
any Ada compiler.  Then software makers will be able  to  choose
a compiler, not be forced to use a specific one and depend on
the whim of its producer.  Then compiler makers will know there
is a larger group of prospective customers all wanting the same
standard Ada as a basis.


Georg