From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,103b407e8b68350b X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-01-04 08:47:05 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news.airnews.net!cabal12.airnews.net!usenet From: "John R. Strohm" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Anybody in US using ADA ? One silly idea.. Date: Sat, 4 Jan 2003 10:34:39 -0600 Organization: Airnews.net! at Internet America Message-ID: X-Orig-Message-ID: References: X-A-Notice: References line has been trimmed due to 512 byte limitation Abuse-Reports-To: abuse at airmail.net to report improper postings NNTP-Proxy-Relay: library1-aux.airnews.net NNTP-Posting-Time: Sat Jan 4 10:45:53 2003 NNTP-Posting-Host: !_ikE1k-X4_$2jT (Encoded at Airnews!) X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4522.1200 Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:32531 Date: 2003-01-04T10:34:39-06:00 List-Id: "Kevin Cline" wrote in message news:ba162549.0301040105.7d1a7ad6@posting.google.com... > "John R. Strohm" wrote in message news:<694A0F8ED8C6BEE3.22D30132AB9CC656.F5BBD1A702580BDE@lp.airnews.net>... > > I don't know whether I can use this as a counterexample or not. My > > recollection is that Silicon Graphics was using Ada internally VERY early in > > their life, and they were keeping this VERY quiet because it was helping > > them, a lot, and they didn't really want anyone else to know. > > I'm skeptical that Ada was ever very widely used at SGI. I don't have any data one way or the other to prove it. I observe that SGI had a complete Ada toolset for their machines long before any of the other Unix workstation companies did. > > Rational used Ada internally, and it helped them a lot. They published > > their numbers, but the reaction at GD/FW was that it just wasn't possible to > > get those kinds of numbers. > > At the time, Rational had an Ada compiler to sell, and not much else, > so their numbers are suspect. A few reports trickled out that other people using the R1000 were getting similar numbers. Also, it is very easy to reality-check the Rational numbers, to a rough order of magnitude: Take the number of SLOC in the product, which they reported, divide by the number of years the company had been in existence, and you get SLOC/year. From there, it is utterly trivial to divide by trial values of SLOC/man/year to estimate the number of programmers involved, and then compare them to the company headcount and money burn rate. The short answer is that Rational's numbers stand up under reality checking. > > McDonnell-Douglas had been using assembly language on F-15. For the > > IFFC/Firefly demonstration, they jumped into Ada with both feet, > > enthusiastically, and reported very good numbers, for a digital flight > > control application. > > I would certainly expect programming in Ada to be much more productive > than programming in assembly language! Their numbers were good even for high-order language development. There is this, also. At the time, the conventional wisdom was that Ada would not EVER be suitable for "real" embedded work. Using it for digital flight controls *and* firecontrol, and doing a successful demonstration (gun shootdown of a QF-102 drone from a 90 degree aspect: something that is essentially impossible for a human pilot on his own), *AND* getting good productivity numbers to boot, was a very solid counter to that belief.