* Legislative Mandate for Ada @ 1990-12-13 19:10 Michael Feldman 1990-12-13 22:12 ` Charles H. Sampson ` (3 more replies) 0 siblings, 4 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-13 19:10 UTC (permalink / raw) I recently received a copy of the section of the Defense Appropriation Conference Report regarding Ada, and thought you might be interested in reading what Congress has to say. For you outside-the-Beltway folks, a conference report is the congressional document that reconciles any differences between House-passed and Senate-passed bills. Both houses vote on the conference report, and basically that's how the law is passed. In this case, congress passed this DoD appropriation bill at the end of October, and Bush signed it. Here is the relevant paragraph: "Sec. 8092. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, after June 1, 1991, where cost-effective, all Department of Defense software shall be written in the programming language Ada, in the absence of a special exemption by an official designated by the Secretary of Defense." In plain English: no gobbledegook about "embedded systems" or "mission- critical systems." The criterion is cost-effectiveness. Might be fun to chat on the net about how big a loophole "cost-effectiveness" is, or how it might be determined. As background, here is a lengthy paragraph from the explanatory language that came along with the conference report. "Ada Programming Language - The Department of Defense developed Ada to reduce the cost of development and support of software systems written in the hundreds of languages used by the DoD through the early 1980's. Beside the training economies of scale arising from a common language, Ada enables software cost reduction in several other ways: (1) its constructs have been chosen to be building blocks for disciplined software engineering; (2) its internal checking inhibits errors in large systems lying beyond the feasibility of manual checking; and (3) its separation of software module interfaces from their implementations facilitates and encourages reuse of already-built and tested program parts. While each of these advantages is important, Ada's encouragement of software engineering is fundamental. Software practitioners increasingly believe the application of engineering disciplines is the only currently-feasible avenue toward controlling unbridled software cost escalation in ever-larger and more complex systems. In march, 1987, the Deputy Secretary of Defense mandated use of Ada in DoD weapons systems and strongly recommended it for other DoD applications. This mandate has stimulated the development of commercially- available Ada compilers and support tools that are fully responsive to almost all DoD requirements. However, there are still too many other languages being used in the DoD, and thus the cost benefits of Ada are being substantially delayed. Therefore, the Committee [congressional conference committee - MBF] has included a new general provision, Section 8084 [changed later to 8092 - MBF] that enforces the DoD policy to make Ada mandatory. It will remove any doubt of full DoD transition to Ada, particularly in other than weapons systems applications. It will stimulate DoD to move forward quickly with Ada-based software engineering education and cataloguing/reuse systems. In addition, U.S. [government] and commercial users have already expanded tremendously the use of Ada and Ada-related technology. The DoD, by extending its Ada mandate, can leverage off these commercial advantages. Navy Ada is considered to be the same as Ada for the purposes of this legislation [HUH? What's Navy Ada? Anyone know?], and the term Ada is otherwise defined by ANSI/MIL-STD-1815. The Committee envisions that the Office of the Secretary of Defense will administer the general provision in a manner that prevents disruption to weapon systems that are well into development. The Committee directs that applications using or currently planning to use the Enhanced Modular Signal Processor (EMSP) be exempted from mandatory use of Ada as a matter of policy." This is what is known as "legislative history." It is not formally part of the law but gives insight into the mindset of the lawmakers (or their staff people, really). Have fun with it. Mike Feldman ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-13 19:10 Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-13 22:12 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-14 4:47 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-14 2:59 ` g_harrison ` (2 subsequent siblings) 3 siblings, 1 reply; 25+ messages in thread From: Charles H. Sampson @ 1990-12-13 22:12 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) quotes the U. S. Congress: > >"Sec. 8092. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, after June 1, 1991, > where cost-effective, all Department of Defense software shall be written > in the programming language Ada, in the absence of a special exemption > by an official designated by the Secretary of Defense." From the English language viewpoint, this statement has too many modi- fiers. At least it does if you assume that they are trying to force the use of Ada with few exception. As written, two valid interpretations ap- pear to be: (1) If it's not cost-effective, no special exemption is needed to avoid Ada, and (2) Even if it's cost-effective, Ada can be avoided by obtaining a special exemption. I think they meant to say that all DoD software must be written in Ada unless it is not cost-effective; if it is claimed to not be cost-effective, that claim must be confirmed by a special exemption from SecDef. To borrow Norm Cohen's question from another context, who writes these things? (Probable answer here: people who love run-on sentences.) Charlie ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-13 22:12 ` Charles H. Sampson @ 1990-12-14 4:47 ` Michael Feldman 0 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-14 4:47 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2577@cod.NOSC.MIL> sampson@cod.nosc.mil.UUCP (Charles H. Sampson) writes: > > I think they meant to say that all DoD software must be written in Ada >unless it is not cost-effective; if it is claimed to not be cost-effective, >that claim must be confirmed by a special exemption from SecDef. That sounds like a reasonable interpretation to me. > To borrow Norm Cohen's question from another context, who writes these >things? (Probable answer here: people who love run-on sentences.) Well, it probably was a Capitol Hill staff person, or else it was fed to such a person by someone in the Ada community. The explanatory paragraph looks like it came from the pen (word-processor?) of one of our Ada evangelists; it seems to be too literate about Ada to have been written by a run-of-the-mill Hill staffer. Reminds me of the 1987 (I think) AdaExpo in West Virginia, where the keynote speaker was Senator Robert Byrd. Some turkey wrote a speech for him that put all kinds of technical jargon in his mouth. It was both very funny and very sad to hear poor ol' Byrd trying to be smooth and articulate about generics, tasking, and operator overloading. As it happens, I know a bit about how this stuff gets written because my wife does exactly this kind of legislative drafting for the Dept. of Education (no flames please - she doesn't make policy). She is a very fussy and careful writer, and is always aghast at the rotten quality of much of the writing she sees around town. Especially disconcerting is the poor use of English in our laws. How can we (dis)obey what we can't understand? Thank you for not chopping off the head of the messenger because the message was poorly written :-) Mike Feldman ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-13 19:10 Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman 1990-12-13 22:12 ` Charles H. Sampson @ 1990-12-14 2:59 ` g_harrison 1990-12-14 16:56 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-14 20:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 3 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: g_harrison @ 1990-12-14 2:59 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu>, mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes: [some of Mike's stuff deleted] > In this case, congress passed this DoD appropriation bill at the end > of October, and Bush signed it. Here is the relevant paragraph: > > As background, here is a lengthy paragraph from the explanatory language > that came along with the conference report. > > "Ada Programming Language - The Department of Defense developed Ada to ...... loop put("bla blah"); end loop; This seems to be pure psyco-babble. It sounds like a memo from a Dean (My dean doesn't read this [I PRAY]!). The statement sould say "Use it [Ada] or loose it [Contract]." "Cost Effective" is a wonderful generalization to mean almost anything including "My FORTRAN programmers will claim permanent disability and expect workman's comp." or "Ada is TOO BIG for my machine. [read "Ada is too complex for my programmers."]. If I get flamed, then so be it! I just feel that realizing that one [relatively] portable language with some nice features that conform to some good software engineering practices is worthy of a mandate with appropriate considerations to current hardware and requirements constraints. Any good programmer can learn to use Ada in the way it was designed. > > This is what is known as "legislative history." It is not formally > part of the law but gives insight into the mindset of the lawmakers > (or their staff people, really). Have fun with it. > > Mike Feldman I did have fun with it, Mike. Thanks. ------------------------------------------------------*------o Happy--- -- George C. Harrison ------------------------------ * * ----o_o___ New--- ----- Professor of Computer Science -------------- * * * ----\ o /-Year-- ----- Norfolk State University, ----------------- *Merry* ----\ /-------- -------- Norfolk, Virginia 23504 --------------- * * * * * ----|--------- ----- INTERNET: g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu ------ *Christmas* --_|_-------- ----------These are MY views.... you may share them..*** ----------------- ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-13 19:10 Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman 1990-12-13 22:12 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-14 2:59 ` g_harrison @ 1990-12-14 16:56 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-14 17:00 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-15 17:02 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-14 20:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 3 siblings, 2 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-14 16:56 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes >"Sec. 8092. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, after June 1, 1991, > where cost-effective, all Department of Defense software shall be written > in the programming language Ada, in the absence of a special exemption > by an official designated by the Secretary of Defense." "shall be written" - does this mean new software or does it mean we have to convert the hundreds of millions of lines of Cobol to Ada? We may be able to do it blindly with a Cobol to Ada translationr and it would probably be fairly cheap (as things go) to do so. I can see the metric the bean counters are going to use to check compliance: Total KLOC - Ada KLOC --------------------- Total KLOC If the percentage doesn't approach 100 fast enough then they will mandate mindless translations. >"Ada Programming Language - The Department of Defense developed Ada to >reduce the cost of development and support of software systems written in >the hundreds of languages used by the DoD through the early 1980's. >Beside the training economies of scale arising from a common language, >Ada enables software cost reduction in several other ways: (1) its >constructs have been chosen to be building blocks for disciplined >software engineering; (2) its internal checking inhibits errors in >large systems lying beyond the feasibility of manual checking; and >(3) its separation of software module interfaces from their >implementations facilitates and encourages reuse of already-built >and tested program parts. While each of these advantages is important, >Ada's encouragement of software engineering is fundamental. Software <on and on on the benefits of Ada> If I've learned nothing else while working at the SEI, it's that most software engineering claims are purely back-of-the-envelope no-connection-to-reality sheer speculation, or in other words: never been validated on the scale being discussed. If the government would simply recognize that their programs are just national experiments, and conducted them as such, then we could gain some benefits out of all the mandated "good ideas" by using government as one big test bed. This way we could justify the high cost of government by reminding everyone that inefficiency and failure are valid and acceptable results when testing an hypothesis. * Bruce Benson + Internet - bwb@sei.cmu.edu + + * Software Engineering Institute + Compuserv - 76226,3407 + >--|> * Carnegie Mellon University + Voice - 412 268 8469 + + * Pittsburgh PA 15213-3890 + + US Air Force ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-14 16:56 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-14 17:00 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-15 17:02 ` Michael Feldman 1 sibling, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-14 17:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <9700@as0c.sei.cmu.edu> bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: >probably be fairly cheap (as things go) to do so. I can see the metric >the bean counters are going to use to check compliance: > > Total KLOC - Ada KLOC > --------------------- > Total KLOC > >If the percentage doesn't approach 100 fast enough then they will mandate >mindless translations. Sheesh, you can tell I'm in government. How about if it doesn't approach zero fast enough (Crosby always wanted metrics to trend to zero...). * Bruce Benson + Internet - bwb@sei.cmu.edu + + * Software Engineering Institute + Compuserv - 76226,3407 + >--|> * Carnegie Mellon University + Voice - 412 268 8469 + + * Pittsburgh PA 15213-3890 + + US Air Force ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-14 16:56 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-14 17:00 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-15 17:02 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-17 18:26 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson 1 sibling, 2 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-15 17:02 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <9700@as0c.sei.cmu.edu> bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: > >"shall be written" - does this mean new software or does it mean we have >to convert the hundreds of millions of lines of Cobol to Ada? We may be Well, I've been reading Ada stuff for about 10 years, and never saw even a hint that old systems were to be converted to Ada just for the hell of it. > >If the percentage doesn't approach 100 fast enough then they will mandate >mindless translations. Oh, Lord - I hope not! Seriously, I don't have a lot of inside information, but I really don't think this is what it's about. Do you have any serious info suggesting this mindlessness? (I realize that we're all cynics in this business, but fact and cynicism shouldn't be confused. Got facts?) > Mike Feldman ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-15 17:02 ` Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-17 18:26 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery 1990-12-17 20:57 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson 1 sibling, 2 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-17 18:26 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2455@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu () writes: >In article <9700@as0c.sei.cmu.edu> bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: >>If the percentage doesn't approach 100 fast enough then they will mandate >>mindless translations. >Oh, Lord - I hope not! Seriously, I don't have a lot of inside information, >but I really don't think this is what it's about. Do you have any serious >info suggesting this mindlessness? (I realize that we're all cynics in this >business, but fact and cynicism shouldn't be confused. Got facts?) Nope, just fears. I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in one of the military service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university that got federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach Ada or have their money taken away. Luckily, no one took him too seriously, but his position was such that many people have to take him seriously (and he advises other more senior people on technical issues, such as Ada). I figure he was just testing out the idea by presenting it to the group. The fact that he would seriously press the idea suggested to me that he was more focused on "getting people to use Ada" as an end unto itself rather than improving software engineering practices. * Bruce Benson + Internet - bwb@sei.cmu.edu + + * Software Engineering Institute + Compuserv - 76226,3407 + >--|> * Carnegie Mellon University + Voice - 412 268 8469 + + * Pittsburgh PA 15213-3890 + + US Air Force ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 18:26 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery 1990-12-18 11:15 ` g_harrison ` (3 more replies) 1990-12-17 20:57 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman 1 sibling, 4 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: David Emery @ 1990-12-17 20:39 UTC (permalink / raw) >From: bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) >I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in one of the military >service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university that got >federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach >Ada or have their money taken away. Actually, I think there's something to be said for this idea. Even more, I think that any DARPA or DoD-funded project should submit a waiver request to do their work in something besides Ada. Such waivers should be reasonably easy to get, but there are a lot of research projects that could be used on gov't systems, except for the fact that they're implemented in languages that create a significant maintenance/adaptability problem (e.g. C, lisp). However, unless and until Ada compilers are as affordable as C compilers (e.g. Gnu C), such a requirement will be financially untenable, since most schools are unwilling to fork out the $$ for an Ada compiler. dave ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery @ 1990-12-18 11:15 ` g_harrison 1990-12-18 14:10 ` RICK CARLE ` (2 subsequent siblings) 3 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: g_harrison @ 1990-12-18 11:15 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <EMERY.90Dec17153931@aries.linus.mitre.org>, emery@linus.mitre.org (David Emery) writes: >>From: bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) >>I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in one of the military >>service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university that got >>federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach >>Ada or have their money taken away. > > Actually, I think there's something to be said for this idea. Even > more, I think that any DARPA or DoD-funded project should submit a > waiver request to do their work in something besides Ada. Such > waivers should be reasonably easy to get, but there are a lot of > research projects that could be used on gov't systems, except for the > fact that they're implemented in languages that create a significant > maintenance/adaptability problem (e.g. C, lisp). > (The next thing we'll have is the government trying to tell us that we must teach the metric system. ;-) I disagree with the above statement. It's one thing mandating equal opportunity; it another trying to FORCE what we teach. There is still such a thing as academic freedom. Although I am the FIRST to propose using Ada as the primary procedural language in the classroom, I will not be forced to even offer one course in the language and its applications by the DoD. We do offer such a course and another course in specific Ada-like applications, but it was our choice to do this! > However, unless and until Ada compilers are as affordable as C > compilers (e.g. Gnu C), such a requirement will be financially > untenable, since most schools are unwilling to fork out the $$ for an > Ada compiler. I disagree again. Although Ada is not "free," there are relatively inexpensive compilers for PC's, and with educational discounts you can purchase a mini/mainframe compiler for about the same price as any other. George.... ------------------------------------------------------*------o Happy--- -- George C. Harrison ------------------------------ * * ----o_o___ New--- ----- Professor of Computer Science -------------- * * * ----\ o /-Year-- ----- Norfolk State University, ----------------- *Merry* ----\ /-------- -------- Norfolk, Virginia 23504 --------------- * * * * * ----|--------- ----- INTERNET: g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu ------ *Christmas* --_|_-------- ----------These are MY views.... you may share them..*** ----------------- ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery 1990-12-18 11:15 ` g_harrison @ 1990-12-18 14:10 ` RICK CARLE 1990-12-18 15:21 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-20 1:59 ` Dick Dunn 3 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: RICK CARLE @ 1990-12-18 14:10 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <EMERY.90Dec17153931@aries.linus.mitre.org>, emery@linus.mitre.org (David Emery) writes: > >From: bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) > >I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in one of the military > >service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university that got > >federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach > >Ada or have their money taken away. > ......I think that any DARPA or DoD-funded project should submit a > waiver request to do their work in something besides Ada... > However, unless and until Ada compilers are as affordable as C > compilers (e.g. Gnu C), such a requirement will be financially > untenable, since most schools are unwilling to fork out the $$ for an > Ada compiler. What's stopping the DoD from buying up a ton of AdaZ licenses and furnishing them as GFE on DoD projects (esp. research & technology projects)? If anything should ever be GFE, it's Ada. I realize that sounds crazy. But I seem to remember announcements claiming that the Army bought 2 Army-wide site licenses for PC software this year - the Procomm+ communications program and the PKZIP archiver. I think both of those programs are inexpensive shareware that probably cost between $35 and $75 a copy. AdaZ only costs $149 (this month, anyway). So I suggest the DoD should do 2 things: 1) buy a DoD-wide site license from Meridian (how could either party lose?); and 2) extend that license to provide DoD with enough extra licenses so that DoD could provide the compiler as GFE to research and technology contractors. This would provide the universities with plenty of cheap Ada and eliminate a big obstacle to college-level Ada education. And it would reward Meridian for making such a cost breakthrough on Ada compilers. [Of course the site license wouldn't have to be purchased from Meridian. It could be put up for bids.] Rick Carle ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery 1990-12-18 11:15 ` g_harrison 1990-12-18 14:10 ` RICK CARLE @ 1990-12-18 15:21 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-18 22:46 ` compilers for Ada; " Paul Stachour 1990-12-20 1:59 ` Dick Dunn 3 siblings, 1 reply; 25+ messages in thread From: Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-18 15:21 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <EMERY.90Dec17153931@aries.linus.mitre.org> emery@linus.mitre.org (David Emery) writes: >Actually, I think there's something to be said for this idea. Even >more, I think that any DARPA or DoD-funded project should submit a >waiver request to do their work in something besides Ada. Such >waivers should be reasonably easy to get, but there are a lot of >research projects that could be used on gov't systems, except for the >fact that they're implemented in languages that create a significant >maintenance/adaptability problem (e.g. C, lisp). These kind of fuzzy statements, that imply all the problems of software engineering will go away (or be *significantly* reduced) by using the current king of silver bullets (i.e. Ada), are at the heart of why we in government sometimes make such dumb decisions. We don't know that any of this is true, but we do know that the problems of software engineering are more centered on people and mangement problems than on technology problems. We focus on technology because it won't talk back. >However, unless and until Ada compilers are as affordable as C >compilers (e.g. Gnu C), such a requirement will be financially >untenable, since most schools are unwilling to fork out the $$ for an >Ada compiler. What about the rest of the supporting environment: editors, debuggers, libraries, code generators, readable books, jobs, etc.? (I had a boss who insisted that WordStar should be a fine programming editor since it can export ascii files!) Affordability of the compiler must be one of the least important issues when selecting a development environment (or a teaching environment). COBOL, FORTRAN, and now C, are still the most widely used and *supported* languages in the commerical world, and this dwarfs the government sectors need for Ada programmers. Universities like to not only educate their students, but possibly give them a skill that makes them readily employable. When Borland creates TurboAda or Microsoft does QuickAda, then the language is probably mature enough to hold its own. Until then, it remains an interesting experimental language by the government. [All the above is, of course, IMHO and does not necessarily reflect anyones thinking but my own :-)] * Bruce Benson + Internet - bwb@sei.cmu.edu + + * Software Engineering Institute + Compuserv - 76226,3407 + >--|> * Carnegie Mellon University + Voice - 412 268 8469 + + * Pittsburgh PA 15213-3890 + + US Air Force ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* compilers for Ada; Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-18 15:21 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-18 22:46 ` Paul Stachour 0 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Paul Stachour @ 1990-12-18 22:46 UTC (permalink / raw) bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: >When Borland creates TurboAda or Microsoft does QuickAda, then the language >is probably mature enough to hold its own. Until then, it remains an >interesting experimental language by the government. I have often asked myself the same question: Why is it that Borland or Microsoft or @@@ doesn't do a "Cheap" Ada compiler? ===> Climb on Soapbox This summer, I had an opportunity to answer that question, by being forced to use MicroSoft C (both versions 5.1 and 6.0). What I discovered (as far as the MicroSoft C is concerned) is that Microsoft doesn't have a C compiler. They have a compiler for some language, but it's not C. I've taken C programs that I've used on lots of compilers. These programs fit both the rules for (old-style, to me silly) K&R C, as well as the rules for new-style, ANSII (half-way reasonable) C. But they won't compile and run on Microsoft C. A variety of compiler bugs. Language features it wouldn't accept. Size restrictions on a 640K PC that means C-program to equivalent size to that of systems Implementation languages that compile on a 256K mainfrane won't compile on a PC using MSC. I know several people who have validated an Ada compiler. It's a hard job. It's easy to sell a C compiler; you just put something cheap enough out, and people will buy it; I know that I did. But it's not easy to sell an Ada compiler; first of all it has to compile Ada! That is, it has to pass some independent quality control step! What a strange idea for many software developers! Of course, I like compilers (like ones for Ada) that will accept and compile the langauge. I don't like compilers (like so many for C) that insist on rewriting the language in their own philosophy. Thus I never know what my programs "should do". Of course I don't mind compilers that have both "their extensions" for specialized needs as well as a "do it the standard way" option. But then, maybe I'm a strange consumer. On one multi-user system with over 3000 users, I filed 30% of all the bug-reports, finding things that didn't work right-and-left. Most users appear not to read the specifications, and think anything that the program gives or doesn't give them is right. <=== Descend from Soapbox ...Paul -- Paul Stachour Secure Computing Technology Corp stachour@sctc.com 1210 W. County Rd E, Suite 100 Arden Hills, MN 55112 [1]-(612) 482-7467 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 1990-12-18 15:21 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-20 1:59 ` Dick Dunn 1990-12-20 19:11 ` Ada survival without daddy Lord Byron (was leg. mandate) g_harrison 3 siblings, 1 reply; 25+ messages in thread From: Dick Dunn @ 1990-12-20 1:59 UTC (permalink / raw) emery@linus.mitre.org (David Emery) writes: > >From: bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) > >I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in one of the military > >service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university that got > >federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach > >Ada or have their money taken away. > > Actually, I think there's something to be said for this idea... (I think there's something to be said for it too...but we probably don't agree on what should be said.:-) I think that it's high time Ada was cut loose from its life-support system of government-mandated ramming-down- our-throats and allowed to live or die. I'm serious. If Ada can't sur- vive on its own, it's not viable. (For the record, although I'm not much of an Ada fan, I do think Ada *can* survive. It won't be the top language, but it has its place(s).) In fact, I think that some of the mandated use of Ada has damaged its growth. People look at it and say "oh, that's only for government work, and it's all tied up in bureaucracy...we don't want it." >...Even > more, I think that any DARPA or DoD-funded project should submit a > waiver request to do their work in something besides Ada... This is the first step on a slippery path to a very uncomfortable level of government control. Again, if Ada is so desirable, why does it have to be forced? Let the folks who are doing the research choose the language they find appropriate to the tasks they need to do. I can see obvious cases for using at least C, C++, Icon, LISP, Ada, and assembly language in various aspects of research. As for using Ada for the mere sake of single- language consistency...well, see what Emerson had to say about consistency. > ...but there are a lot of > research projects that could be used on gov't systems, except for the > fact that they're implemented in languages that create a significant > maintenance/adaptability problem (e.g. C, lisp). I don't see that either C or LISP have any inherent maintenance or adaptability problems. Seems like it's more a problem of excessive narrowness or rigidity in gov't systems if they can't handle multi- lingual software. Note that the position I'm taking in the latter part of this posting is not anti-Ada, but anti-single-language. The idea that one programming language can be suitable for all programming tasks is bogus from the word go. -- Dick Dunn rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd Boulder, CO (303)449-2870 ...Mr. Natural says, "Use the right tool for the job." ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Ada survival without daddy Lord Byron (was leg. mandate) 1990-12-20 1:59 ` Dick Dunn @ 1990-12-20 19:11 ` g_harrison 1990-12-21 19:15 ` Ada in Industry: Merit not Mandate Richard Pattis 0 siblings, 1 reply; 25+ messages in thread From: g_harrison @ 1990-12-20 19:11 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <1990Dec20.015945.24282@ico.isc.com>, rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) writes: > emery@linus.mitre.org (David Emery) writes: >> >From: bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) >> >I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in one of the military >> >service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university that got >> >federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach >> >Ada or have their money taken away. >> >> Actually, I think there's something to be said for this idea... > NO! This sets academic freedom back 200 years! :-) anyway... > I think that it's high time Ada was cut > loose from its life-support system of government-mandated ramming-down- > our-throats and allowed to live or die. I'm serious. If Ada can't sur- > vive on its own, it's not viable. (For the record, although I'm not much > of an Ada fan, I do think Ada *can* survive. It won't be the top > language, but it has its place(s).) > > In fact, I think that some of the mandated use of Ada has damaged its > growth. People look at it and say "oh, that's only for government work, > and it's all tied up in bureaucracy...we don't want it." > I am NOT sure Ada could survive on its own to satisfy the language-proliferation [once] problems experienced by DoD; I also believe that the attitude toward it would kill it almost immediately. The press has been full of negative comments. [I DO hope that I am wrong!] I have been actively programming in it for six years, but it does have some real faults (which I will not get into here.). Languages like Pascal and C have them too, but there are also many pre-conceived notions about the language that would kill it immediately: "Too Big," "Too hard to learn." "Government-only languge," "Seriously flawed," "Too expensive," "Too slow," etc. etc. The non-DoD Ada efforts in this country and especially in Europe are very interesting, and I would like to hear some of the stories (successes and failures) about working with Ada in a non-educational and non-mandated environment. > -- > Dick Dunn rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd Boulder, CO (303)449-2870 > ...Mr. Natural says, "Use the right tool for the job." ------------------------------------------------------*------o Happy--- -- George C. Harrison ------------------------------ * * ----o_o___ New--- ----- Professor of Computer Science -------------- * * * ----\ o /-Year-- ----- Norfolk State University, ----------------- *Merry* ----\ /-------- -------- Norfolk, Virginia 23504 --------------- * * * * * ----|--------- ----- INTERNET: g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu ------ *Christmas* --_|_-------- ----------These are MY views.... you may share them..*** ----------------- ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Ada in Industry: Merit not Mandate 1990-12-20 19:11 ` Ada survival without daddy Lord Byron (was leg. mandate) g_harrison @ 1990-12-21 19:15 ` Richard Pattis 1990-12-26 17:45 ` James THIELE 0 siblings, 1 reply; 25+ messages in thread From: Richard Pattis @ 1990-12-21 19:15 UTC (permalink / raw) One of my ex-students is now highly placed in Boeing Commercial (not Aerospace - the government contracting division). He is in charge of Avionics for the new 777. He reported to me that of the expected 10M lines of avionics code, about 60% will be written in Ada (this is up from 2M lines out of 6M in their last plane). He says almost all new software will be written in Ada: much of the 4M lines of non-Ada code will control more straightforward systems unchanged from previous airplanes. The numbers are approximate, but I believe that this is an example of a company in an economically competitive market that has chosen to use Ada based on merit, not mandate. Rich Pattis ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Ada in Industry: Merit not Mandate 1990-12-21 19:15 ` Ada in Industry: Merit not Mandate Richard Pattis @ 1990-12-26 17:45 ` James THIELE 0 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: James THIELE @ 1990-12-26 17:45 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <14228@june.cs.washington.edu> pattis@cs.washington.edu (Richard Pattis) writes: | One of my ex-students is now highly placed in Boeing Commercial (not | Aerospace - the government contracting division). He is in charge of | Avionics for the new 777. He reported to me that of the expected 10M lines | of avionics code, about 60% will be written in Ada (this is up from 2M lines | out of 6M in their last plane). He says almost all new software will be | written in Ada: much of the 4M lines of non-Ada code will control more | straightforward systems unchanged from previous airplanes. | | The numbers are approximate, but I believe that this is an example of a | company in an economically competitive market that has chosen to use Ada | based on merit, not mandate. | | Rich Pattis I wouldn't be too sure about the *merit* issue. I used to be intimately involved with a 747 project at Boeing and am still in touch with Boeing and vendor personnel on the 777. The vendor who used Ada on my project for the 747-400 (circa 1987-89) and those who are using it for the 777 do both commercial *and* DOD work. They make no bones about the fact that since they expect to have to use Ada on future DOD contracts they might as well standardize on Ada for all their jobs. The idea that they are using Ada solely on merit does not, it seems to me, match history. Nonetheless there are advantages to using Ada in that environment. To my mind there is the language standardization issue - these vendors were in the past using all kinds of languages: FORTRAN, PASCAL, PL/M, and weird ALGOL dialects can all be found in late 70s and 80s vintage avionics code. Ada certainly is a better language than most or all of these others. Note, however, that Boeing Commercial Airplanes division has not in the past required any given language be used by a supplier and they aren't on the 777. Another factor that I feel is leading to greater use of Ada is standardization on fewer processor types. On the 757 and 767 there where thirteen (13!) vendor designed types of 16-bit minicomputers and over twenty types of 8-bit micros, each programmed in assembler or with a vendor's home grown compiler. On the 777 almost every major processor will be from the 80x86 or 680x0 families or one of a few RISC types. With maturing Ada compilers available on these machines it is getting easier to go with Ada. Note the word *maturing* - in 1986 we did a study at Boeing that failed to find a single 68000 Ada compiler that could generate code that ran within a factor of two speed of a comercial PASCAL even on simple looping programs. One thing that is not an advantage for Ada in this environment is Ada's tasking model. Vendors typically build a tasking executive that they call from since Ada tasks fit avionics problems so poorly. Also please note that Ada is not a panacea. It is perfectly possible to write a bad Ada program. I have a wonderful horror story on this point. James Thiele -- microsoft!jamesth USE Standard_Disclaimer; ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 18:26 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery @ 1990-12-17 20:57 ` Michael Feldman 1 sibling, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-17 20:57 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <9728@as0c.sei.cmu.edu> bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: > >Nope, just fears. I sat in a meeting where an individual (working in >one of the military service DoD secretariets) insisted that any university >that got federal money (ROTC, research grants, etc.) should be told to teach >Ada or have their money taken away. Luckily, no one took him too seriously, >but his position was such that many people have to take him seriously (and >he advises other more senior people on technical issues, such as Ada). Sheesh! No wonder Ada has a bad name, with guys like this rattling around the Ada business. I'll bet he's a friend of Reagan who believes that government should get off the backs of the people, too. :-) Every time I start thinking charitably, someone comes along and makes a good case for cynicism. Sad commentary. Mike Feldman ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-15 17:02 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-17 18:26 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-17 22:13 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Michael Feldman ` (2 more replies) 1 sibling, 3 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Charles H. Sampson @ 1990-12-17 20:42 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2455@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu () writes: >In article <9700@as0c.sei.cmu.edu> bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: >> >>If the percentage doesn't approach 100 fast enough then they will mandate >>mindless translations. >Oh, Lord - I hope not! Seriously, I don't have a lot of inside information, >but I really don't think this is what it's about. Do you have any serious >info suggesting this mindlessness? (I realize that we're all cynics in this >business, but fact and cynicism shouldn't be confused. Got facts?) I haven't seen any mandate yet, at any level, but expressions of inter- est in mechanical (read mindless) translation from various languages to Ada keep cropping up in the part of the Navy that I work with. Usually some software house is trying to sell the Navy on the benefits of transitioning to Ada and the wonderful tool they have to aid that transition. I've had to critique a few of these efforts. The translated Ada was appalling, even when the proponents were claiming that the program should be maintained (for decades) in Ada rather than its original, natural, language. These efforts always seem to be presented as quck-and-dirty proofs-of-concept, with pro- mises that the final product will be truly wonderful, as soon as a lot of our tax money is spent. Charlie ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson @ 1990-12-17 22:13 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-18 10:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada g_harrison 1990-12-18 17:41 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 2 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-17 22:13 UTC (permalink / raw) Referring to Charlie Sampson's note on translations: Of course the computing business has seen this translation stuff before. I hope nobody would seriously consider just mechanically translating Cobol to Ada for the hell of it. Would you all agree that unless a system needs _serious_ revision, we shouldn't fix what ain't broke? Given pragma INTERFACE and some reasonable way to call Ada programs from another language (I know, it's not easy as things stand now), it seems to me that even a multi-language system is better than either perpetuating old languages just for module-to-module compatibility or mindlessly translating badly-written Cobol into badly-written Ada. Who agrees ? Is there any consensus on this out there (after all, I'm stuck in the Ivory Tower :-))? Mike Feldman ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-17 22:13 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Michael Feldman @ 1990-12-18 10:59 ` g_harrison 1990-12-18 17:41 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 2 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: g_harrison @ 1990-12-18 10:59 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2585@cod.NOSC.MIL>, sampson@cod.NOSC.MIL (Charles H. Sampson) writes: > In article <2455@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu () writes: >>In article <9700@as0c.sei.cmu.edu> bwb@sei.cmu.edu (Bruce Benson) writes: >>> >>>If the percentage doesn't approach 100 fast enough then they will mandate >>>mindless translations. [stuff deleted] > to Ada and the wonderful tool they have to aid that transition. I've had > to critique a few of these efforts. The translated Ada was appalling, even > when the proponents were claiming that the program should be maintained (for > decades) in Ada rather than its original, natural, language. These efforts > always seem to be presented as quck-and-dirty proofs-of-concept, with pro- > mises that the final product will be truly wonderful, as soon as a lot of > our tax money is spent. > > Charlie Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to translate [relatively] hard to maintain code to [relatively] easy to maintain Ada. Wasn't maintain - ABILITY one of the goals of the language and of the "mandate?" When someone foists a translator on us, we need to be able to show a useful Ada program that will never reverse-engineer into FORTRAN, etc. In my research I've been using a program to run a back-propogation neural network with delta learning rule and momentem terms. There are about ten FLOAT, STRING, and INTEGER parameters to the program that (in many cases) significantly alter the run-time characterists of the code. This neural network learns and recognizes all sorts of input patterns. The learning methods are easy to "tweek." etc. All of this is done without recompilation. I am "_NOT_" telling everyone what a cleaver programming I am; I am just saying that writing this in virtually any other language would be a real pain to maintain. I am reminded about making a silk purse out of a ...... [Excuse me for taking up your disk storage but...] A few years ago at the Nth Annual Ada Technology Conference someone presented some hard facts about maintaining a set of FORTRAN programs vs. rewriting them into [GOOD] Ada. Ada won, of course, and I suspect the speaker was somewhat slanted in his/her view. However, the facts were indeed impressive because it showed that Ada supports good software engineering practices in what can be an effecient way. It wasn't that Ada was the answer and FORTRAN wasn't: it was that good Soft. Eng. IS the solution to actually saving money. George ------------------------------------------------------*------o Happy--- -- George C. Harrison ------------------------------ * * ----o_o___ New--- ----- Professor of Computer Science -------------- * * * ----\ o /-Year-- ----- Norfolk State University, ----------------- *Merry* ----\ /-------- -------- Norfolk, Virginia 23504 --------------- * * * * * ----|--------- ----- INTERNET: g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu ------ *Christmas* --_|_-------- ----------These are MY views.... you may share them..*** ----------------- ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-17 22:13 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Michael Feldman 1990-12-18 10:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada g_harrison @ 1990-12-18 17:41 ` Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 2 siblings, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Matthias Ulrich Neeracher @ 1990-12-18 17:41 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2467@sparko.gwu.edu>, mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes: > Referring to Charlie Sampson's note on translations: > > Of course the computing business has seen this translation stuff before. > I hope nobody would seriously consider just mechanically translating > Cobol to Ada for the hell of it. Would you all agree that unless a > system needs _serious_ revision, we shouldn't fix what ain't broke? > > Given pragma INTERFACE and some reasonable way to call Ada programs from > another language (I know, it's not easy as things stand now), it seems to > me that even a multi-language system is better than either perpetuating > old languages just for module-to-module compatibility or mindlessly > translating badly-written Cobol into badly-written Ada. Who agrees ? > Is there any consensus on this out there (after all, I'm stuck in the > Ivory Tower :-))? Amen ! (From another Ivory Tower). Could it be that sometimes even for new projects, a multi-language system is better than a single-language one. When I read about writing expert systems in Ada, I have the impression that this is not exactly the kind of thing Ada is good at. Wouldn't it be better to write the "expert" part in Prolog ? > Mike Feldman Matthias ----- Matthias Neeracher mneerach@iiic.ethz.ch "These days, though, you have to be pretty technical before you can even aspire to crudeness." -- William Gibson, _Johnny Mnemonic_ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-13 19:10 Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 1990-12-14 16:56 ` Bruce Benson @ 1990-12-14 20:59 ` Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 1990-12-15 17:50 ` Pat Rogers 1990-12-18 17:37 ` Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 3 siblings, 2 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Matthias Ulrich Neeracher @ 1990-12-14 20:59 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu>, mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes: > "Sec. 8092. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, after June 1, 1991, > where cost-effective, all Department of Defense software shall be written ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > in the programming language Ada, in the absence of a special exemption > by an official designated by the Secretary of Defense." To me, this looks like a rather radical attempt to prohibit further use of Ada :-). But then again, has there *ever* been something cost-effective produced for the Department of Defense ? Matthias ----- Matthias Neeracher mneerach@iiic.ethz.ch "These days, though, you have to be pretty technical before you can even aspire to crudeness." -- William Gibson, _Johnny Mnemonic_ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-14 20:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Matthias Ulrich Neeracher @ 1990-12-15 17:50 ` Pat Rogers 1990-12-18 17:37 ` Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 1 sibling, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Pat Rogers @ 1990-12-15 17:50 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <18173@neptune.inf.ethz.ch>, mneerach@iiic.ethz.ch (Matthias Ulrich Neeracher) writes: > In article <2449@sparko.gwu.edu>, mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael > Feldman) writes: > > "Sec. 8092. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, after June 1, 1991, > > where cost-effective, all Department of Defense software shall be written > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > > in the programming language Ada, in the absence of a special exemption > > by an official designated by the Secretary of Defense." > > To me, this looks like a rather radical attempt to prohibit further use > of Ada :-). But then again, has there *ever* been something cost-effective > produced for the Department of Defense ? > Quite a bit, I would think. COBOL is not my favorite language, but it would be difficult not to consider it quite an advance for the times, and cost- effective over its lifetime. With respect to Ada, I have seen a presentation by a fellow consultant to the effect that, once familiar with the language, a very considerable increase in productivity is typical/possible. (So it is not just a maintenance issue.) The distinguishing thing about the presentation is that he claims to have the data to prove it -- a database of many (>100) projects. My personal experience with the language (10 years) agrees with his assertion. Pat Rogers Software Arts & Sciences progers@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
* Re: Legislative Mandate for Ada 1990-12-14 20:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 1990-12-15 17:50 ` Pat Rogers @ 1990-12-18 17:37 ` Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 1 sibling, 0 replies; 25+ messages in thread From: Matthias Ulrich Neeracher @ 1990-12-18 17:37 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <737@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu>, progers@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu (Pat Rogers) writes: > In article <18173@neptune.inf.ethz.ch>, mneerach@iiic.ethz.ch (Matthias Ulrich Neeracher) writes: > > But then again, has there *ever* been something cost-effective > > produced for the Department of Defense ? > > Quite a bit, I would think. COBOL is not my favorite language, but it would > be difficult not to consider it quite an advance for the times, and cost- > effective over its lifetime. COBOL must have been an interesting idea in its time. The mistake, IMO, was to massively push its use. The "user-friendly" syntax seems now almost universally to be recognized as a disaster. As for cost-effective, I wonder whether it wouldn't have been even more cost-effective to delay the standardization for some years, in favor of a better language. I don't doubt that COBOL was a progress when it was created, but for how many years now has COBOL been a hindrance to progress. Likewise, I wonder whether it is really necessary and wise to hard-code all these laws requiring use of Ada now, thus forcing programmers to live with Ada's inconveniences for maybe 50 years or longer. > With respect to Ada, I have seen > a presentation by a fellow consultant to the effect that, once familiar with > the language, a very considerable increase in productivity is typical/possible. > (So it is not just a maintenance issue.) The distinguishing thing about the > presentation is that he claims to have the data to prove it -- a database of > many (>100) projects. My personal experience with the language (10 years) > agrees with his assertion. Does this data take into account that programmers using Ada were maybe subject to a lot of additional training ? At least in one small study I have read about, I wondered whether the (indisputable) improvements had anything to do at all with Ada or whether not all this could be explained with the improved training of the programmers and the greater attention given to them. > Pat Rogers Matthias ----- Matthias Neeracher mneerach@iiic.ethz.ch "These days, though, you have to be pretty technical before you can even aspire to crudeness." -- William Gibson, _Johnny Mnemonic_ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 25+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~1990-12-26 17:45 UTC | newest] Thread overview: 25+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed) -- links below jump to the message on this page -- 1990-12-13 19:10 Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman 1990-12-13 22:12 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-14 4:47 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-14 2:59 ` g_harrison 1990-12-14 16:56 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-14 17:00 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-15 17:02 ` Michael Feldman 1990-12-17 18:26 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-17 20:39 ` David Emery 1990-12-18 11:15 ` g_harrison 1990-12-18 14:10 ` RICK CARLE 1990-12-18 15:21 ` Bruce Benson 1990-12-18 22:46 ` compilers for Ada; " Paul Stachour 1990-12-20 1:59 ` Dick Dunn 1990-12-20 19:11 ` Ada survival without daddy Lord Byron (was leg. mandate) g_harrison 1990-12-21 19:15 ` Ada in Industry: Merit not Mandate Richard Pattis 1990-12-26 17:45 ` James THIELE 1990-12-17 20:57 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Michael Feldman 1990-12-17 20:42 ` Charles H. Sampson 1990-12-17 22:13 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Michael Feldman 1990-12-18 10:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada g_harrison 1990-12-18 17:41 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada; mindless translations Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 1990-12-14 20:59 ` Legislative Mandate for Ada Matthias Ulrich Neeracher 1990-12-15 17:50 ` Pat Rogers 1990-12-18 17:37 ` Matthias Ulrich Neeracher
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