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=-0.8 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_DATE autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,ffce418d7a49585f X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 1994-09-18 16:53:28 PST Path: bga.com!news.sprintlink.net!redstone.interpath.net!ddsw1!news.kei.com!yeshua.marcam.com!charnel.ecst.csuchico.edu!olivea!spool.mu.edu!agate!library.ucla.edu!csulb.edu!csus.edu!netcom.com!netcomsv!annwfn!annwfn!merlin From: merlin@annwfn.com (Fred McCall) Subject: Re: Air Force shows how meaningless Ada waiver process is Date: Sat, 17 Sep 1994 08:40:26 -0400 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Message-ID: <85B31DC7912@annwfn.com> References: <35517g$8um@schonberg.cs.nyu.edu> Organization: Is For People Who Don't Have Real Work X-Newsreader: Newsy 0.22 Date: 1994-09-17T08:40:26-04:00 List-Id: In <35517g$8um@schonberg.cs.nyu.edu> dewar@cs.nyu.edu Robert Dewar writes: >As for the claim that the mandate is responsible for the perceived poor >quality of Ada tools (a broad brush characterization that is not at all >generally fair -- there are good Ada tools and bad Ada tools around), I >know this is a popular view from the vendor-bashers club of which you >seem to be one of the founding members, but apart from a lot of rhetoric, >I have never seen any convincing argument that this is the case. Well, having worked with a number of tools (and currently working with what are probably top-end Ada tools -- at least they cost enough), I have to agree in part with the 'vendor bashers'. I've found the quality of tools to be lower than comparable ones for other languages, as well as being more expensive. Compiler messages are cryptic (I expect a lot more informative messages -- if the language is going to be that picky and try to force safe practices, the compilers ought to know a lot more than mine is telling me when an error is found). Development tools are buggy and/or difficult to use. *EVERYTHING* requires more in the way of resources (including money). I consider all of this as fall-out from having a captive audience. The Ada Mandate should go. [No, I'm not going to mention the vendors, except to say that they are aware of our discontent and seem very interested in trying to address our problems. But then, we're talking about a *lot* of money.] >In fact, you could well argue that the failure of vendors to generate >sufficient revenue to support continued improvement etc was due to the >mandate not being enforced well enough, although that's also a hard >after-the-fact argument to make convincingly. I'm afraid I find that to be a pretty sad argument, period. If the only way that Ada companies could generate sufficient revenue to produce reasonable tools and support was to have a market that was forced to pay whatever they asked, regardless of the quality of the tools, then all I can say is that the language itself has not made a case for its use. Pascal managed fairly nicely. Where was their captive market? C seems to have done ok, after a somewhat slow start (along with UNIX). Where was their captive market? C++ seems to have taken right off. Where was their captive market? Lots of languages have managed to succeed without a captive market. Lots have also managed to fail (or only establish niche markets). If Ada is the right language to use (after having evaluated all the technical and cost factors), then that's what people should use. However, if it's not, then people should be free to use the best, most cost effective solution. If Ada is that solution (over the lifecyle), then SOMEONE IS GOING TO ACTUALLY HAVE TO DEMONSTRATE THAT. I've read both the original Ada vs. C 'studies' and more recent Ada9X vs C++ 'remarks' (I don't think they're detailed enough or fact-based enough to call them 'studies') and I still don't find that Ada has made its case. It all reads as if a language proponent were writing propaganda. It's real simple. Dump the Ada mandate and we'll find out. I think the language has been protected long enough. [Note that Europe is probably going to come up with a different answer. After all, they liked Algol, too, but it wasn't exactly a rousing success on this side of the pond.] -- "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live in the real world." -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden --------------------------------------------------------------------------- merlin@annwfn.com -- I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.