Re: JAVA and ADA JGNAT

[Florian Weimer <someone@deneb.cygnus.argh.org>]

Jean-Marc Bourguet <bourguet@my-deja.com> writes:

> 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.

I've misread this statement, I think.  The explanation by Robert Dewar
that followed but which I neglected to quote made it quite clear that
he meant that most of the code Cygnus develops for their customers
never makes it into the public GCC version, and this seems to be true.

On the other hand, the development process of the *public* GCC version
hosted by Cygnus is much more open than the GNAT development process.
When I posted my reply, I was focused on this one, I think.

> > 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?

To be honest: I don't know.  That's the reason why I was very careful
not to give any advice to anyone on how to structure their development
process.  I only was irritated by Robert Dewar's statement of the
openness of ACT because I confused the development process with the
result.

> Open development has a cost (beeing able to get the same quality
> is one, there are other). 

Yes, that's certainly true.  Given the size of the free software Ada
community, it's probably better to invest manpower in actual GNAT
development than to support a potential bazaar directly at ACT by
maintaining a CVS repository and related things.