Re: JAVA and ADA JGNAT

[Jean-Marc Bourguet <bourguet@my-deja.com>]

In article <877lgxuquu.fsf@deneb.cygnus.argh.org>,
  Florian Weimer <fw@s.netic.de> wrote:
> Robert Dewar <robert_dewar@my-deja.com> writes:
>
> > Actually I think part of what goes on here is that ACT is
> > *more* open than a lot of the Linux and GCC development.
>
> If you mean Linux = kernel, this is wrong, I think. Release cycles are
> very short, and if there's a fix for a particular problem, you can get
it
> at once and don't have to wait for the next release.

> In the past, I've struggled with several GNAT bugs although they had
> already been fixed in ACT's internal version.

And how many bugs have you not struggled with because the quality
control of ACT is better that what it is possible to do with a
more open development?

I've worked on compilers. The most important thing when you develop
such kind of program is the test suites, and the test suites for a
compiler can not be made public because they contain code coming from
the ACT customers and from DEC for which ACT do not have the right.
I'd not like do work on GNAT without beeing able to run those tests.
Yes, I may fix my problem, but sure I'll break a lot of other things.

Open development has a cost (beeing able to get the same quality
is one, there are other). I do not know if the assertion of ACT
that for GNAT the cost would outfit the benefice is valid. I only
know that I've no data to say otherwise.

The only people who seemed to be motivated enough to work on gnat
(and not only wanting access to the version of the day), are the
members of ALT. And I understand that they got support from ACT.

> Maybe you can obtain these fixes if you've got a support contract,
> but with other free software, this is not necessary.

From what I've gotten here and on chat, it is quite difficult to get
access to the internal version. You'd have to show a bug which stop
you (i.e. no workaround) which is fixed. I think the value of the
support contract is not the access to the internal version, but access
to R. Dewar to ask him questions and get an answer.

-- Jean-Marc


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