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-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,5faad1722103f6a7 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public Path: g2news1.google.com!news1.google.com!newshub.sdsu.edu!elnk-nf2-pas!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net.POSTED!a6202946!not-for-mail From: Jeffrey Carter Organization: jrcarter commercial-at acm [period | full stop] org User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030624 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: 7E7 Flight Controls Electronics References: <90Stc.15309$be.3117@newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net> <40b86431$0$186$edfadb0f@dread11.news.tele.dk> <40B888E0.5040707@noplace.com> <40B8C86A.3050302@noplace.com> <40BE6BFD.8030305@noplace.com> <40BF141F.8020001@noplace.com> <40C05C95.8020900@noplace.com> In-Reply-To: <40C05C95.8020900@noplace.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: <6l3wc.1643$uX2.1263@newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net> Date: Fri, 04 Jun 2004 18:38:58 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 63.184.105.244 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net 1086374338 63.184.105.244 (Fri, 04 Jun 2004 11:38:58 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 04 Jun 2004 11:38:58 PDT Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:1102 Date: 2004-06-04T18:38:58+00:00 List-Id: Marin David Condic wrote: > I'd question that statistic. "Developed" as in "Developed today on new > program starts?" or "Developed" as in "Historically since the beginning > of computer languages, more programs have been developed in..." Guess it > depends on what the meaning of the word "is" is... ;-) Question all you want. How about "developed" as in being used by developers today? It may be modifications to existing programs, but more developers are being paid to use COBOL than any other language. > I'd also disagree with characterizing Cobol as a "failure" when in its > day it succeeded in capturing nearly *all* of the business programming > market. Did Ada capture nearly *all* of the embedded programming market? > I like Ada, but if the definition of "success" is "achieving the stated > goal" and the original stated goal of Ada was to address the embedded > market, someone could make a fair case that capturing less than 1% of > that market might just qualify as a "failure" by a reasonably objective > standard. Or can anyone/anything be a success just by setting the bar > low enough? Ada's goal was to be used for embedded weapon SW for the US DOD. In its heyday, it captured far more than 1% of that market, assisted by the mandate. I guess by your definition Ada was a success. COBOL wasn't a failure. I was simply quoting your own words about Ada in an attempt at humor. It's because of its success that COBOL is so widely used today. Businesses that have a lot of SW in COBOL don't want to have SW in a lot of different languages, so they stick with COBOL. In that they are smarter than the DOD is today. -- Jeff Carter "So if I understand 'The Matrix Reloaded' correctly, the Matrix is basically a Microsoft operating system--it runs for a while and then crashes and reboots. By design, no less. Neo is just a memory leak that's too hard to fix, so they left him in ... The users don't complain because they're packed in slush and kept sedated." Marin D. Condic 65