Re: query: Ada for SUN 3/xx running SunOS 4.0

[karam@sce.carleton.ca (Gerald Karam)]

In article <770@wsccs.UUCP> dharvey@wsccs.UUCP (David Harvey) writes:
>In article <3372@hubcap.UUCP>, billwolf@hubcap.clemson.edu (William Thomas Wolfe,2847,) writes:
>>      The Telesoft people have what looks like a wonderful product;
>>      we here at Clemson are evaluating it for our Suns running 4.0.
>> 
>>      Telesoft has an extremely good compiler interface (windows,
>>      electronic buttons for the mouse to click on, etc); their
...more...
>>   
>>      The Verdix people claimed that their product did run on SunOS 4.0; 
>>      however, Verdix seems to take user-hostility to new heights.  Their
>>      claim to be "integrated into the Unix environment" seems to carry
>>      the hidden caveat "By the way, you *do* like keyboard commands,
>>      just as cryptic as we can possibly make them?"; in view of the 
...more...
>>      the Verdix product was quickly rejected. 
>
>Not having worked with the Verdix product or having anything to do with
>the company, I don't know exactly what you mean by "user-hostility."
>But if it means that you prefer an icon interface (ala Xerox PARC) over
>a command line interface I can only conclude you prefer to use the
>machine rather than program it.

Verdix provides an environment that is command line driven and a clone
of unix.  for example, to list your ada program units, you would 
type "a.ls".  As a Unix user its great.  I just have to preface commands
with "a." and i have equivalent features in my ada environment.  its
quite clever, assuming you like unix. (you need an ada paginator/pretty?
enter a.pr, need to find out space utilization? a.du etc).

of course, this frugality of the interface is no excuse for these ease
with which i have broken the compiler, but then again i try strange but
legal things.

i felt the same interference with software development when i started 
to use a MAC.  what i can say with a couple of key strokes some regular
expressions and a pipe or two, could not be matched on the MAC.  It
makes great pictures though, and i could teach my mother how to use it
in a few minutes (apologies mom :-), but i wouldn't trade my unix
workstation for 10 macs.

gerald karam