Another article involving Ada on /.

Another article involving Ada on /.

[Mark Lorenzen]

Here: http://developers.slashdot.org/developers/04/06/28/170245.shtml?tid=126&tid=156&tid=172

The usual hacker-comments on Ada are also present in the
discussion. If anyone has /. mod-points left for today, please do your
duty now ;-)

Regards,
- Mark Lorenzen

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Xenos]

"Mark Lorenzen" <mark.lorenzen@ofir.dk> wrote in message
news:m3pt7jpiq1.fsf@0x5358cece.boanxx18.adsl-dhcp.tele.dk...
> Here:
http://developers.slashdot.org/developers/04/06/28/170245.shtml?tid=126&tid=156&tid=172
>
> The usual hacker-comments on Ada are also present in the
> discussion. If anyone has /. mod-points left for today, please do your
> duty now ;-)
>
> Regards,
> - Mark Lorenzen

The article is not on SlashDot, its on the ACM Queue and says nothing bad
about Ada.  Unless you are offended by article say it wasn't the
end-all-be-all, fix-all-your-problems language many hoped it to be.  The
point being, no language--however great--is going to fix all your woes.  The
only negative thing I read in the comments made some incorrect comments
about its library.  Replies to which, corrected the OP.  Not everyone who
reads SlashDot is uneducated or biased (though I would take being called a
"hacker" a compliment).  Ada's a tool, not a religion.  I use it a lot at
work, but I also use several other languages where needed (needed is not
always equal to "what you would like to use").

DrX

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Björn Persson]

Xenos wrote:

> The article is not on SlashDot, its on the ACM Queue and says nothing bad
> about Ada.

It called Ada an expensive disaster. Regardless of whether that's 
well-deserved or not, it's definitely a negative opinion.

-- 
Björn Persson                              PGP key A88682FD
                    omb jor ers @sv ge.
                    r o.b n.p son eri nu

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Mark Lorenzen]

"Xenos" <dont.spam.me@spamhate.com> writes:

> "Mark Lorenzen" <mark.lorenzen@ofir.dk> wrote in message
> news:m3pt7jpiq1.fsf@0x5358cece.boanxx18.adsl-dhcp.tele.dk...
> > Here:
> http://developers.slashdot.org/developers/04/06/28/170245.shtml?tid=126&tid=156&tid=172
> >
> > The usual hacker-comments on Ada are also present in the
> > discussion. If anyone has /. mod-points left for today, please do your
> > duty now ;-)
> >
> > Regards,
> > - Mark Lorenzen
> 
> The article is not on SlashDot, its on the ACM Queue and says nothing bad

The article is on slashdot and it references an article on the ACM Queue.

> about Ada.  Unless you are offended by article say it wasn't the
> end-all-be-all, fix-all-your-problems language many hoped it to be.  The
> point being, no language--however great--is going to fix all your woes.  The

The article is completely hopeless, but that is off-topic in this NG.

> only negative thing I read in the comments made some incorrect comments
> about its library.  Replies to which, corrected the OP.  Not everyone who

The comments *are* the usual comment about Ada being too verbose, and
C/C++ being easier to read. These are the comment from people who
write programs that have a lifetime of one year and never have to do
any maintenance themselves.

> reads SlashDot is uneducated or biased (though I would take being called a
> "hacker" a compliment).  Ada's a tool, not a religion.  I use it a lot at

For me "hacker" is a derogatory term.

> work, but I also use several other languages where needed (needed is not
> always equal to "what you would like to use").
> 
> DrX

Regards,
- Mark Lorenzen

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Larry Kilgallen]

In article <m3lli7p8pr.fsf@0x5358cece.boanxx18.adsl-dhcp.tele.dk>, Mark Lorenzen <mark.lorenzen@ofir.dk> writes:
> "Xenos" <dont.spam.me@spamhate.com> writes:

>> reads SlashDot is uneducated or biased (though I would take being called a
>> "hacker" a compliment).  Ada's a tool, not a religion.  I use it a lot at
> 
> For me "hacker" is a derogatory term.

For the average Slashdot poster*, it is a compliment.

*We can only guess about the average Slasdot _reader_.

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Ed Falis]

On 29 Jun 2004 01:24:16 +0200, Mark Lorenzen <mark.lorenzen@ofir.dk> wrote:

> For me "hacker" is a derogatory term.

"Hacker" was once a noble approach to software.  It's long since been  
coopted.

-- 
"Scientists should always state the opinions on which their facts are  
based".

-- Unknown

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Stan Milam]

Mark Lorenzen wrote:
> For me "hacker" is a derogatory term.
>

Goodness, I cannot count the times in 20 years of programming I've been 
given a leviathian of a program(s) with no documentation and told to 
"fix it or else...."  That means hacking through thousands of lines of 
code to figure out what is going on.  I have made a career of hacking 
through broken code to figure out what the heck it did and fix it.  I'm 
proud of the term "hacker," but I would be leery of the term "cracker."

Regards,
Stan Milam.

Re: Another article involving Ada on /.

[Mark Lorenzen]

Stan Milam <stmilam@swbell.net> wrote in message news:<Cl4Ec.9698$3f2.9640@newssvr24.news.prodigy.com>...
> Mark Lorenzen wrote:
> > For me "hacker" is a derogatory term.
> >
> 
> Goodness, I cannot count the times in 20 years of programming I've been 
> given a leviathian of a program(s) with no documentation and told to 
> "fix it or else...."  That means hacking through thousands of lines of 
> code to figure out what is going on.  I have made a career of hacking 
> through broken code to figure out what the heck it did and fix it.  I'm 
> proud of the term "hacker," but I would be leery of the term "cracker."
> 
> Regards,
> Stan Milam.

Having been exposed to the harsh realities of corporate life for only
a little over 5 years, I can not say that I have participated in many
projects. I have, however, tried once to hack through thousands of
lines of code in order to figure out what happened in a program, and
it wasn't fun at all. It was exceptionally boring.

For me, engineering (that includes software engineering) is about
*construction* with sound engineering methods. I love formal methods
and applicative languages as I think they represent sound engineering
tools. Sadly nobody uses them - therefore I am also hacking, like more
or less everybody else in software "engineering".

I am still so young (*cough*) that I have a na�ve hope, that things
will be better as the trade matures. But then, has it matured during
the last 20 years?

Regards,
- Mark Lorenzen