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From: mjsilva@my-deja.com
Subject: Re: Customer balks at Ada -- any hope?
Date: 2000/07/25
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In article <397CCF84.D54A1BC2@ix.netcom.com>,
  Richard Riehle <laoXhai@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
>
> mjsilva@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > We're bidding on a custom industrial controller, and I've proposed
to
> > write the firmware in Ada.  The powers-that-be here are satisfied
with
> > that, but the customer is afraid nobody will be around to maintain
it.
> > They're happier with C or C++, alas.  Anybody have any good answers
to
> > their concern?
> >
>
> This situation is so common that we should have some kind of canned
> response.   However,
> there are a lot of people out there who will never be persuaded about
the
> virtues of Ada over
> C and C++ regardless of what facts are presented.    A bunch of
misinformed
> software developers
> at a mid-west USAF base comes to mind.
>
> Someone once said, "He convinced against his will is of the same
opinion
> still."   Your customer
> will continue to be wary of Ada simply because of the widespread
mythology
> about it.
>
> A few things can be said that might make sense.   An Ada program,
> well-written will probably be
> more readable ten years from now than any program in C or C++ by a
> programmer who has never
> seen any of the above mentioned languages.   The Ada compiler you
used for
> the project will
> still be around somewhere.   If someone understands the nature of
firmware,
> that same someone
> will have no difficulty understanding your Ada code unless you make
it so
> cryptic that it reads like
> C or C++ just to be mischievous.
>
> That being said, I doubt you will have any success persuading the
customer
> that Ada is a better
> choice.  Such people make up their minds, like the previously
mentioned
> software developers, and
> simply close their minds to anything different from what they have
already
> decided.  You could write
> the code in both languages and let them see the difference.  Doubt
that
> will help, but it might be worth
> a try.

I don't sense they have an active animus towards Ada, but only a
concern about maintenance.  I've prepared a response that tries to
point out the technical benefits of Ada and the relative unsuitability
of C/C++ for high reliability software (I found quite a few quotes from
DoD and NASA documents that help).  I've also tried to emphasize that a
decent embedded programmer should pick up maintenance Ada quickly and
that, OTOH, most of the vast pool of C/C++ programmers are not
necessarily qualified to do embedded programming.

Anyway, I'll give it my best shot.  The more I step back from C/C++ the
more unsuitable it seems to me for creating reliable software (and the
more important reliability becomes in my priorities).

Mike


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