Re: A few questions on Ada and Ada implementations

[Kulin Remailer <remailer@reece.net.au>]

> > I have been looking over Ada (the 95 variant) and it looks like a
> > great language. Are there any free (as in no license restrictions, not
> > GPL- anything) GUI libraries? What choices are there for handling
> > output besides text? gcc-Ada looks good but I prefer to avoid gcc as
> > much as I can and I also haven't found anything but GtkAda that seems
> > to be GPLed.
> 
> There is a list of compilers with their licensing terms and some
> libraries in the "Ada Programming" wikibook[1].  For the compiler, your
> choices seem to be restricted to GCC (which you try to avoid) and
> Janus/Ada; 

Hi. As far as I could tell from Janus's web site, there is no 64 bit Linux
support. And I believe I checked last year on my 32 bit Linux system and
the test executables didn't run. gcc-Ada is obviously an amazing product
with complete coverage (I tried using some of the lesser-used annices and
was very pleased) but for my ultimate use it's not going to be acceptable.
Maybe it would be if I could pay 20K but that doesn't seem reasonable
unless I hit a huge home run and that would be years away.

> the others are too expensive for a hobbyist unless you can persuade the
> vendors to give you a huge discount.

I have seen postings on this newsgroup saying Adacore was about 20,000 USD
minimum but I haven't seen pricing (other than Janus who is very upfront
and clear- thanks!) from other vendors. If anybody knows how much anything
else is, please post it. Is ObjectAda in the ballpark and does it come with
GUI and database bindings?

> As for the GUI library, the choices follow from your choice of compilers.
> Most GUI libraries that are available for GNU/Linux are either pure GPL
> or use a commercial dual-licensing scheme.  Other people have already
> listed a few of these.

I saw opengl seems to be under the BSD license but GtkAda is GPL if I
understand correctly. I am not interested in dual licensing schemes because
I don't like smoke and mirrors. Simple is good. I don't mind paying (when I
have the money) because I don't expect people to work for free. But I also
don't like anything that's encumbered or has all kinds of legal complexity.

> [1] http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Ada_Programming/Installing

Thanks I'll check the link.

> Since I am also a hobbyist, I personally do not really understand your
> stance about "unencumbered" libraries; I'm perfectly happy with the
> GPL.  This gives me a much wider range of choices.

I write software for a living but I am interested in Ada for personal
use. At this point I want to explore more but I am finding the solution is
not coherent, you have to pick a compiler, and then a GUI library, and a
database binding, etc. You have to go to different places for all this. I
like one stop shopping, it's inline with the way I have always worked. We
don't prereq anything except the OS and when we sell you something it
contains everything you need to run. You don't have dependencies on any
other software. I think Janus did the right thing with CLAW but it's
Windows-only if I am not mistaken. I understand the NIX model is to do one
thing with a clear purpose and rely on other parties to fill in other
needs. This is ok in the open source world but it's not a good commercial
or even hobbyist model for many people and it certainly is not acceptable
in the marketplace I work in. Our clients also like being able to point one
finger and if I sell them something I have to be responsible for all of it
and capabable of fixing all of it. I can't blame anybody else or get 3
vendors involved and anything free or open source would be a total show
stopper. It would be alot better if a complete solution was packaged
together. At this point I'm not even an Ada hobbyist. I would be willing to
pay some amount to get started so I can see if I like working with Ada if I
had a complete solution. Then later if that solution was lacking and I had
a commercial product I wouldn't be opposed to spending more. That's why I
talked about hobbyist pricing. I don't have any business (with Ada) and I
don't know how far I'll take it. But I do know I don't want to get
started with GPL-anything or dual-anything and then get stuck with all
kinds of legal mumbo jumbo or have to ship a product with all kinds of
prereqs on stuff out of my control.

As you said it may be a no-go based on what I can spend. In the business I
work in things are very expensive and I also could not have gotten started
on my own. Only because I work for big companies do I have access to the
resources. Maybe Ada for professional use is the same way- can't get
started until you get started!

Thanks to everyone for the help. Again, I'm asking about a complete,
unencumbered solution for 64 bit Linux, and it would be nice if it could
generate code for Windows as well, but not essential. I want to be able to
write and debug code, have a capable GUI, and have a good database all in
the solution. Proprietary GUI and database are goodness in my view. If such
a thing exists I guess it's not cheap! If pricing info (and more details
about what exactly is included, in non-jargon) were more available on
various sites I guess we could have saved some time here. Thanks for
everybody's responses and sorry if I have wasted your time.

Because of my posting setup many times messages get lost or delayed. I am
sending this more than once since it didn't get posted the last few times.