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-Thread: 103376,11414a19b0e4a97a X-Google-NewGroupId: yes X-Google-Attributes: gida07f3367d7,domainid0,public,usenet X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news2.google.com!news4.google.com!feeder2.cambriumusenet.nl!feed.tweaknews.nl!192.87.166.28.MISMATCH!tudelft.nl!txtfeed1.tudelft.nl!feeder.news-service.com!feeder.news-service.com!85.214.198.2.MISMATCH!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Ludovic Brenta Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Advice on selling Ada to a C shop Date: Sun, 20 Jun 2010 20:06:10 +0200 Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Message-ID: <87aaqpmve5.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org> References: <87hbkym4i2.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Injection-Date: Sun, 20 Jun 2010 18:06:11 +0000 (UTC) Injection-Info: mx01.eternal-september.org; posting-host="jEH+nN5MHjCNHYzSxyCSug"; logging-data="16672"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX19E8DHW8h3aFq/+P3p0f/gI" User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.1 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:PH3NQE/ZrFao2UbcKfYL1blv9LI= sha1:AysH5vUE9BvQqtHPECpgS9eV6+8= Xref: g2news2.google.com comp.lang.ada:12809 Date: 2010-06-20T20:06:10+02:00 List-Id: Fritz Wuehler writes: >> People with a prejudice against Ada will try to find any excuse to >> justify their rejection. I think the main excuse they will try is "we >> cannot find Ada programmers". To remove this excuse, it is of paramount >> importance that you show that (a) you know Ada and have experience with >> it, so you can be the "in-house expert" and (b) there is a wide offering >> of books, training courses, compilers, libraries and commercial support >> for the language. > > If so, then the game is already over. There were days when the best tool > won, if after a little competition. Unfortunately now we are in the days of > software ruled by idiot bean counters and MBAs, and worse, the stock > market. > > There is no such thing as vision that goes past the end of this quarter. > > You can't sell a product, or a technology, or an employee who will save you > millions or hundreds of millions of dollars in the long run even if that > return on investments starts within a year or two. But you can sell a > cheaper anything this quarter. > > The industry and academia killed Ada in commercial programming before it > ever got a chance. And now it's too late for anything that requires > changing a mindset or paying top dollar for a toolchain (look at GHS > prices!) or a high wage for Ada programmers, when Java and C++ jockeys are a > commodity labor item. > > Unless you can come up with a programming platform/language/system that > costs you less right now, in people, in hardware, in software, you have the > snowball's chance in Hell of making it happen. Good doesn't matter, cheap > wins every time. I'm not so pessimistic, at least I will not give in without a fight :) If you already know Ada, then to the evil bean counters, the training costs zero; you can offer to give introductory training to a couple of your colleagues yourself, reducing the immediate cost of training. If you explain that your use of Ada saves you 20% of the development cost *this quarter* and 50% the next quarter, you can win. -- Ludovic Brenta.