Re: Script-like jobs in Ada (ideas for HAC)

[Stephen Leake <stephen_leake@stephe-leake.org>]

On Friday, April 24, 2020 at 5:11:43 PM UTC-7, Nasser M. Abbasi wrote:
> Main advantage of scripts, and by this I really mean bash, sh, python, and may
> be perl, is that these come pre-installed on Linux. 

As you point out below, Linux /= all computers.

An Ada compiler is one of the first things I install on any computer I buy; not a big deal.

> Hence any script written will run as is, with no need to having to first
> "compile" it for that specific version of the OS. 

Ada is far more cross-platform than bash; Ada will compile and run on Windows, bash won't (I know, you can install Mingw2, and I do).

More to the point Ada will do _exactly_ the same thing, or complain that it can't; a scripting language is likely to guess what you might want it to do.

> Also easy to email one
> a script and they run on their end. No need to install a compiler first,
> figure how to compile it, link it, etc...

I always have Ada installed. I never have the latest Hot Scripting Language installed, and when someone emails me a script in that (or more likely, a url for a script), installing that and then trying to get the script to work is _very_ frustrating! (most recent example was some Python script that required a module; the standard install process for modules was broken).

> That is I think is the main advantage of scripts over compiled
> languages. Ease of use.

Bosh. I am far more productive in Ada than in any other language.

-- Stephe