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From: oconnordm@CRD.GE.COM (Dennis M. O'Connor)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: if UNIX then USE_C ?? (was: Reasons for drop)
Message-ID: <5476@crdgw1.crd.ge.com>
Date: 22 Feb 90 17:01:08 GMT
References: <27187@cup.portal.com> <18175@megaron.cs.arizona.edu>
Sender: news@crdgw1.crd.ge.com
Reply-To: oconnordm@CRD.GE.COM (Dennis M. O'Connor)
Organization: GE Corporate R&D Center
In-reply-to: mike@cs.arizona.edu (Mike Coffin)
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

mike@cs (Mike Coffin) writes:
] The fact that Unix seems to be taking over the
] world certainly seems to give C and C++ a *big* leg up.
] Not only are all the Unix tools built for, and based on, C,

Which is probably irrelevant, given that plenty of CASE
environments for Ada exist for UNIX ...
Saying that UNIX somehow leads to favors programming in C is like saying
that CISC architectures leads to programming in microcode.

] but the operating system itself is optimized for running C programs.

If we allow that UNIX is optimized for anything ;-), just what
are these C-specific optimizations that favor C and C++ over Ada ?

] Given that many contracts in the future will specify Unix, there will
] be a considerable tendency to also specify C or C++.

Sorry, I disagree. Operating systems provide a "virtual machine"
for the applications programs to execute on; compilers provide
a "virtual machine" for the programmer to write programs for.

An operating system that is only able to efficiently support one
language or one family of languages is an inadequate operating system :

Assumption : there is no one language that is appropriate 
( much less best ) for authoring solutions to all problems.
[e.g. try an inference engine in C or Ada, or a real-time
      embedded system in Prolog, or an interupt handler in a 4GL ]

Conclusion : an operating system incapable of adequate support
for a broad spectrum of languages does not adequately
support a broad spectrum of applications, and is not a wise
choice as a general-purpose operating system.

Does UNIX fit this description ? I don't dare venture an opinion ;-)
--
  Dennis O'Connor      OCONNORDM@CRD.GE.COM      UUNET!CRD.GE.COM!OCONNOR
  "Let's take a little off the top ... a bit off the sides ...
    trim the back a bit ... Surprise ! You've been bald-ed !"