Re: Ada 95 for SCO?

[dewarr@my-dejanews.com]

In article <6tcnk7$5ce@priv-sys04-le0.telusplanet.net>,
  warwicks@telusplanet.net (Chris Warwick) wrote:
> In article <6sutco$jiu$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dewarr@my-dejanews.com wrote:
>
> >It certainly would not be very difficult to target GNAT to
> >SCO, and indeed we did create a SCO port to a very early
> >version of GNAT. However, we have had no significant customer
> >interest in such a port so far.
>
> I am aware of one of our subcontractor's using the free version of GNAT on
SCO
> in order to unload some of the development work off the VADS compiler... So,
> I find Mr. Dewar's comment rather odd... We did at one point ask for the cost
> of supporting the GNAT on SCO and the price was somewhat more than we are
> paying for VADS...
>

I don't see what you find odd. As I said a very old obsolete
version of the port does exist. If you are willing to use
unsupported software of unknown provenance that is very out
of date and has many serious known errors, then you may
indeed be able to use that old SCO port. For most purposes,
even student use at this stage, this port will be found to
be too out of date to be effectively usable, even if you
are willing to use unsupported freeware (I use this term,
as distinct from free software, to refer to software that
does indeed cost $0, but you get what you pay for :-)

As I said before, a SCO port has been discussed on and off.
In the past, we have had only isolated customers interested,
and no interest from SCO itself, which of course results in
prohibitively high prices, since no one customer can
reasonably afford the full cost of a port (the fact that
the full cost was only "somewhat" more than the cost of
some other compiler is actually pretty interesting, it
shows a strength of the gcc/gnat technology in its
relatively low porting costs).

The good news is that there are renewed signs of interest
in the SCO port, both on the part of SCO and several users.
So it is looking more likely that an up to date, fully
supported SCO port may become available on the same basis
as other GNAT ports. If you are interested in this
possibility, by all means contact sales@gnat.com for
details and to let us know of your interest


Robert Dewar
Ada Core Technologies


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