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Date: 5 Mar 93 20:37:35 GMT
From: emery@mitre-bedford.arpa  (David Emery)
Subject: Re: Importance of Ada in DARPA, other federal R&D
Message-ID: <EMERY.93Mar5153735@goldfinger.mitre.org>
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

At the time Ada first came out, existing libraries of C code weren't
much more common than Ada libraries.  One of the big differences was
the availability of cheap/free C compilers, as compared to expensive
Ada compilers.  C grew in popularity due in large part to the spread
of free Unix to graduate schools.  Its popularity in the PC world
comes from all of the grad (and undergrad) students who learned C in
college, and then went into the PC world.

Hopefully Ada has learned its lesson with the GNAT Ada 9X project.
It's too bad that DOD didn't fund a free Ada compiler and distribute
it in the early-mid '80s.  Part of this was due to the fear of selling
good software to the Commies...

Incidentally, DARPA funded much of the UCB work on Berkeley Unix, so
we can "blame" DARPA for the widespread adoption of C in universities.

				dave