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From: bobduff@world.std.com (Robert A Duff)
Subject: Re: Gripe about Ada, rep specs that won't.
Date: 1996/03/25
Message-ID: <Dotzpu.9sE@world.std.com>#1/1
X-Deja-AN: 144180970
references: <00001a73+00002504@msn.com> <dewar.827495863@schonberg>
 <dewar.827528663@schonberg> <4j6dod$lbn@watnews1.watson.ibm.com>
organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1996-03-25T00:00:00+00:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

In article <4j6dod$lbn@watnews1.watson.ibm.com>,
Norman H. Cohen <ncohen@watson.ibm.com> wrote:
>A have a meta-reaction.  While most of these GNAT-defined pragmas,
>restrictions, and packages are technically sound, if I were a competing
>Ada implementor, I would be distressed by the so-far unchallenged role of
>GNAT in setting de facto standards.  Why aren't the other implementors
>demanding an immediate meeting of the URG to agree on a common set of
>implementation-defined items?

That's probably a good idea.

However, it's not quite as bad as you make it sound.  At least *some* of
these implementation-defined items are discussed by more than one
vendor.  And they get discussed by users when Robert or somebody posts
about it on comp.lang.ada.  For example, I know the semantics of pragma
Unchecked_Union were discussed by at least 2 vendors, a language
designer who's not a vendor (namely me), and by some users.  It
certainly wasn't a case of a single vendor going off and producing some
half-baked solution on their own.

This will, one hopes, lead to some de-facto standardization in pragmas,
bindings to windowing systems, etc.  There is, of course, still a place
for pragmas that aren't standardized at all -- not even de facto.

In the paragraph above, you say, "if I were a competing Ada
implementor".  The more interesting thing is, "if I were a user".  After
all, the purpose of compiler vendors is to serve the users, and not the
other way around.

- Bob