From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.5-pre1 (2020-06-20) on ip-172-31-74-118.ec2.internal X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=3.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.5-pre1 Date: 8 Jun 93 15:21:11 GMT From: emery@mitre-bedford.arpa (David Emery) Subject: Re: INFO-ADA Digest V93 #359 Message-ID: List-Id: Naive users of C don't understand the distinction between the standard library and the basic language. This is certainly not true of good C programmers, particularly those concerned with portability across platforms. One of the strengths of C is the rich 'standard library' that came with Unix. ANSI C adopts and standardizes much of this environment. The C++ community has expressed no particular desire for a C++ POSIX binding, for instance. They seem content to make use of existing C interfaces in many case. (I think this is a mistake, as it surrenders all of the advantages of C++ at this interface, which is a critical design boundary. It's too easy to propogate interface mistakes, and dropping down into C invites trouble later on in the program...) The Ada community (despite Greg's rantings) has been very active in sharing code and reuse. Unfortunately, much of this code required net access, which was not common in many production shops until recently. The ATIP program, in particular, has focused towards producing bindings and reusable components (e.g. the ADAR packages for decimal arithmetic.) The Ada9X effort has acknowleged the importance of a rich set of 'standard packages', and it will be very interesting to see how the various 9X annexes (e.g. Real-Time, Information Systems, etc) work out. There are a lot of secondary/associated standards, such as the ISO mathematical functions packages and the various binding efforts such as POSIX, SAMeDL, etc. Perhaps the problem is that no one has really done a good job of pulling this stuff together and presenting it to the community. dave