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-Thread: a07f3367d7,4d3e59455e947c5e X-Google-Attributes: gida07f3367d7,public,usenet X-Google-NewGroupId: yes X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Received: by 10.180.100.98 with SMTP id ex2mr292939wib.4.1343909981796; Thu, 02 Aug 2012 05:19:41 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.58.35.2 with SMTP id d2mr3447059vej.0.1343909885220; Thu, 02 Aug 2012 05:18:05 -0700 (PDT) Path: n2ni4523041win.0!nntp.google.com!7no3632603wig.0!news-out.google.com!a15ni8189945qag.0!nntp.google.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border4.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!novia!feeder3.cambriumusenet.nl!feed.tweaknews.nl!85.12.40.139.MISMATCH!xlned.com!feeder7.xlned.com!multikabel.net!newsfeed10.multikabel.net!news.astraweb.com!border5.a.newsrouter.astraweb.com!goblin3!goblin.stu.neva.ru!news.matabio.net!jeffrey.matabio.net!thue.elzevir.fr!nntpfeed.proxad.net!proxad.net!feeder2-2.proxad.net!nx02.iad01.newshosting.com!newshosting.com!69.16.185.21.MISMATCH!npeer03.iad.highwinds-media.com!news.highwinds-media.com!feed-me.highwinds-media.com!postnews.google.com!q2g2000vbv.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail From: Ludovic Brenta Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Suitability of Ada as a general-purpose language Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2012 09:07:29 -0700 (PDT) Organization: http://groups.google.com Message-ID: <51d2c7fe-0081-496d-87fd-d12459652c8c@q2g2000vbv.googlegroups.com> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: 153.98.68.197 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Trace: posting.google.com 1343664450 5097 127.0.0.1 (30 Jul 2012 16:07:30 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2012 16:07:30 +0000 (UTC) Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: q2g2000vbv.googlegroups.com; posting-host=153.98.68.197; posting-account=pcLQNgkAAAD9TrXkhkIgiY6-MDtJjIlC User-Agent: G2/1.0 X-HTTP-UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1; rv:10.0.4) Gecko/20120509 Firefox/10.0.4,gzip(gfe) X-Received-Bytes: 2951 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Date: 2012-07-30T09:07:29-07:00 List-Id: Dufr wrote on comp.lang.ada: > Could you please share with me your insights regarding the pros > and cons of choosing Ada in my case? Pros of Ada relative to Pascal: - Ada is "Pascal done right". No dangling else problem. Support for modules built into the language. Strong typing taken to the extreme (type Number_Of_Apples can be declared to be incompatible with type Number_Of_Oranges). - There is only one language standard and several compilers implementing it. No dialects. (TBH, not all compilers implement Ada 2012 yet, some are Ada 2005- or Ada 95-only). But all versions of the language are 99.9% backward compatible. - The language standard ("Ada Reference Manual") is one of very, very few ISO standards that are available to the public at no cost. - Some compilers cost zero, at least one other compiler is very cheap. Most others are quite expensive but they are only intended for embedded targets. One compiler is Free Software: you can see and change the sources. No vendor lock-in. - comp.lang.ada. - the culture of Ada programmers. They chose Ada for its safety, against the prevailing lemming mentality. They usually know several other languages. They usually write good software. You can say that Ada selects the best programmers. - the bragging factor. When programming in Ada you can boast that you use the same language as TGV, nuclear power plants, satellites, rockets, airline carriers and air traffic control systems. Serious language for serious programmers. Cons of Ada relative to Pascal: - object-oriented features are implemented in a way quite unique among programming languages. You may have to re-learn OOP if you know it from another language and you may find the Ada way counter- intuitive. But it works well in practice. -- Ludovic Brenta.