Re: Anyone else actually like Ada?

[att-out!cbnewsl!willett@rutgers.edu (david.c.willett)]

>From article <1993Jul23.122525.26017@hellgate.utah.edu>, by matwood%peruvian.c
s.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Mark Atwood):

{Some material deleted}

> I hate the politics and hypocracy in the DoD world, and am offended by the
> people I meet who think that all they need to know about it is that "the
> DoD designed it, you know what THAT means (roll eyes)."  But I love the
> language that it so readable and comprehensable, and expressive enough to
> say damn near everything that everyone else needs OS calls, nonstandard
> extensions, or knowledge of the compiler/runtime/hardware to hack together.
> 
> Am I so strange?
> 
> --
> Mark Atwood                  | My school and employer have enough problems
> matwood@peruvian.cs.utah.edu | without being blamed for mine.
>

	I don't think you're strange at all for liking Ada, Mark.  It's 
unfortunate that elaborating on why I believe that would probably start 
another flame war.  I became an Ada "disciple" (if that's what people
want to call us) when I saw how easily a multi-vendor project coded by
geographically dispersed development teams integrated.  I was an integration
engineer on the project and was braced for trouble.  Amazingly, there was
none.

	The real reason for our integration success was good software 
engineering discipline, not simply Ada; but the language compelled (coerced)
the reluctant into practicing the discipline :^).  I'm convinced that Ada is
on target by enforcing the SE discipline at the language level since developers
permit the compiler to be the bad guy and compilers don't respond to 
external (e.g. cost/schedule) influence.
 
-- 
Dave Willett          AT&T Federal Systems Advanced Technologies
If you want to know --- ASK!  -- Linda Ellerbee