Re: Standard Library Interest?

["Stephane Richard" <stephane.richard@verizon.net>]

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"Marin David Condic" <nobody@noplace.com> wrote in message
news:3F81FBEC.9010103@noplace.com...
> O.K. Maybe we have a difference of opinion, but that's all right. I'm
> willing to be persuaded, but I think that *some* scheme for a library is
> a good thing. How would you address the concern that if you make it part
> of the standard, it is etched in stone and you can't do anything about
> adding to it or fixing it for ten years? How would you create a climate
> wherein a developer can count on getting *something* but isn't frozen
> out of new developments, good ideas, enhancements, etc.?
>
> You can have an absolute standard that is good for stability or you can
> have a totally fluid environment that reacts quickly to changes.
> Somewhere in the middle should be a useful compromise.
>
> MDC
>

Maybe I read it wrong, but to me what should be in the ARM as a standard
shouldn't define the end of life, but how life should begin (cheap attempt
at a metaphore here...awaiting flying tomatoes ;-).

By that I mean that the standard from what I've seen don't tell you the end
of the language's possibilities, but ranther the beginning of them, on which
to build enhancements.  And that any addition to the standard should reflect
the definition of the language itself.

Let's take an example here, say we wanted to adda  GUI library to Ada as a
standard, I would be more tempted to add say wxWindows, or maybe GTK ada
because the follow in the phylosophy of ada as being multiplatform,
expandable, etc etc..if we were to code our own GUI library independant of
all existing ones, it would have to be exactly the same, multiplatform,
expandable, and everything else that is expected of Ada.  This may not be
the best example, but it is an example that reflects my thoughts :-).

To me that's what a standard should define, and it is what it defines so
far, not the end of things, but their beginnings.  As such, of course a good
strong stable foundation is always better to build on than a weak one.

-- 
St�phane Richard
"Ada World" Webmaster
http://www.adaworld.com