Decline?

Decline?

[Thomas]

Today I stumbled on this fairly old (2003) paper on the merits (or lack 
of!) of Ada.

http://www.sei.cmu.edu/pub/documents/03.reports/pdf/03tn021.pdf

As I'm a complete beginner in Ada, I have no way of knowing if this 
paper is spot on, or way off.

It doesn't really matter very much to me, as I'm just learnig Ada for 
fun (and so far I'm having lots of fun!), but should I ever decide to 
use it for any "real" projects, it's of course worth considering if the 
author, Jim Smith, is right in his bleak conclusion:

-----
Program managers considering the technical and programmatic risks of 
incorporating specific programming languages in software-intensive 
systems could reasonably -conclude that Ada is a programming language 
with a dubious or nonexistent future.
-----

Sounds awfully dark and gloomy eh?

So, what's your take on this? Is Ada still an important player? Did Ada 
2005 change anything? Is all well and good in the Ada world, and Jim 
Smith is simply blowing smoke out of his blowhole?

Sincerely,
Thomas

Re: Decline?

[gpriv]

On Mar 12, 9:44 am, Thomas <tho...@kenshi.dk> wrote:
> Today I stumbled on this fairly old (2003) paper on the merits (or lack
> of!) of Ada.
>
> http://www.sei.cmu.edu/pub/documents/03.reports/pdf/03tn021.pdf
>
> As I'm a complete beginner in Ada, I have no way of knowing if this
> paper is spot on, or way off.
>
> It doesn't really matter very much to me, as I'm just learnig Ada for
> fun (and so far I'm having lots of fun!), but should I ever decide to
> use it for any "real" projects, it's of course worth considering if the
> author, Jim Smith, is right in his bleak conclusion:
>
> -----
> Program managers considering the technical and programmatic risks of
> incorporating specific programming languages in software-intensive
> systems could reasonably -conclude that Ada is a programming language
> with a dubious or nonexistent future.
> -----
>
> Sounds awfully dark and gloomy eh?
>
> So, what's your take on this? Is Ada still an important player? Did Ada
> 2005 change anything? Is all well and good in the Ada world, and Jim
> Smith is simply blowing smoke out of his blowhole?
>
> Sincerely,
> Thomas

If popularity is the major criteria to choose the language we all
should use VB.

George.

Re: Decline?

[Ludovic Brenta]

> If popularity is the major criteria to choose the language we all
> should use VB.

Nah. VB is a niche language compared to COBOL. COBOL rules, man :)

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Decline?

[Thomas]

gpriv@axonx.com wrote:
> 
> If popularity is the major criteria to choose the language we all
> should use VB.
> 
> George.

Hehe, good point.

I'm not so much worried about the popularity thing - it's more the 
"nonexistent future" statement that made me wonder.

:o)
Thomas

Re: Decline?

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2008 08:00:36 -0700 (PDT), gpriv@axonx.com wrote:

> On Mar 12, 9:44 am, Thomas <tho...@kenshi.dk> wrote:

>> Today I stumbled on this fairly old (2003) paper on the merits (or lack
>> of!) of Ada.
>>
>> http://www.sei.cmu.edu/pub/documents/03.reports/pdf/03tn021.pdf
>>
>> As I'm a complete beginner in Ada, I have no way of knowing if this
>> paper is spot on, or way off.
>>
>> It doesn't really matter very much to me, as I'm just learnig Ada for
>> fun (and so far I'm having lots of fun!), but should I ever decide to
>> use it for any "real" projects, it's of course worth considering if the
>> author, Jim Smith, is right in his bleak conclusion:
>>
>> -----
>> Program managers considering the technical and programmatic risks of
>> incorporating specific programming languages in software-intensive
>> systems could reasonably -conclude that Ada is a programming language
>> with a dubious or nonexistent future.
>> -----

I doubt that they consider anything is a rational way...  I cannot remember
a case when language choice was a subject of a serious (rational)
consideration.

>> Sounds awfully dark and gloomy eh?

Yep, it has been sounded that way since 90s, almost 20 years, how
distressing... (:-))

>> So, what's your take on this? Is Ada still an important player? Did Ada
>> 2005 change anything?

I don't think so. Ada 2005 brought mainly cosmetic changes, and the
language technical merits is not an issue anyway.

>> Is all well and good in the Ada world, and Jim
>> Smith is simply blowing smoke out of his blowhole?

It is difficult to say. IMO Ada world is too fragmented.

> If popularity is the major criteria to choose the language we all
> should use VB.

Popularity is a measure of the language choices already made.

...
 I guess that the subject of an economical/sociological analysis is not
language recommendation, but merely a description of what's going on. These
are different things. Ada could be a better choice, but VB is chosen.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Decline?

[Jeffrey R. Carter]

Thomas wrote:
> Today I stumbled on this fairly old (2003) paper on the merits (or lack 
> of!) of Ada.
> 
> http://www.sei.cmu.edu/pub/documents/03.reports/pdf/03tn021.pdf

FUD. The safety-critical sector is not likely to abandon Ada any time soon.

-- 
Jeff Carter
"I fart in your general direction."
Monty Python & the Holy Grail
05

Re: Decline?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Thomas writes:
> gpriv@axonx.com wrote:
>>
>> If popularity is the major criteria to choose the language we all
>> should use VB.
>>
>> George.
>
> Hehe, good point.
>
> I'm not so much worried about the popularity thing - it's more the
> "nonexistent future" statement that made me wonder.

The paper was published in 2003 and stated the future was "dubious or
nonexistent".  Since then:

* a new revision of the language was published.
* AdaCore and the FSF made several major releases of their compiler and IDE;
* Aonix released their Eclipse Ada plug-in;
* AdaControl (several releases);
* Ada Web Server (several releases);
* PolyORB (several releases);
* the GNU Ada Project was started;
* the amount of Ada sources shipped as part of Debian went from 576 kSLOC
  to 1 MSLOC (June 2005) to 1.3 MSLOC (April 2007);
* the professional Ada conferences continued to take place;
* Ada was featured at the "Rencontres Mondiales du Logiciel Libre" in 2004;
* and again at FOSDEM 2006;
* GNU/Linux Magazine France published a series of 17 articles by Yves
  Bailly, covering all aspects of the language (to the point where
  students I talked to thought Ada was "fashionable")

I probably forgot lots of other noteworthy events but you get the idea.

I think that's not too bad for a "dubious or nonexistent future".

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Decline?

[Thomas]

Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> 
> The paper was published in 2003 and stated the future was "dubious or
> nonexistent".  Since then:
> 
> * a new revision of the language was published.
> * AdaCore and the FSF made several major releases of their compiler and IDE;
> * Aonix released their Eclipse Ada plug-in;
> * AdaControl (several releases);
> * Ada Web Server (several releases);
> * PolyORB (several releases);
> * the GNU Ada Project was started;
> * the amount of Ada sources shipped as part of Debian went from 576 kSLOC
>   to 1 MSLOC (June 2005) to 1.3 MSLOC (April 2007);
> * the professional Ada conferences continued to take place;
> * Ada was featured at the "Rencontres Mondiales du Logiciel Libre" in 2004;
> * and again at FOSDEM 2006;
> * GNU/Linux Magazine France published a series of 17 articles by Yves
>   Bailly, covering all aspects of the language (to the point where
>   students I talked to thought Ada was "fashionable")
> 
> I probably forgot lots of other noteworthy events but you get the idea.
> 
> I think that's not too bad for a "dubious or nonexistent future".

I think you're absolutely right. It's good to know that the language 
I've started learning is alive and well.

Thank you.  :o)
Thomas

Re: Decline?

[Jerry]

Ada ignorance pops up in unexpected places. I know a guy who is a
friend of a friend who is in his early 50s and has worked for
Honeywell for at least 20 years. This particular part of Honeywell is
virtually a division of Boeing. He manages a project to send non-
flight data from the 787 while it is parked at a gate. I asked what
language they were using and he said C. I asked if any Ada was
involved. His answer: "Ada is obsolete."

Jerry

Re: Decline?

[VilleWitt]

On Mar 13, 7:34 am, Thomas <tho...@kenshi.dk> wrote:
> Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>
> > The paper was published in 2003 and stated the future was "dubious or
> > nonexistent".  Since then:
>
> > * a new revision of the language was published.
> > * AdaCore and the FSF made several major releases of their compiler and IDE;
> > * Aonix released their Eclipse Ada plug-in;
> > * AdaControl (several releases);
> > * Ada Web Server (several releases);
> > * PolyORB (several releases);
> > * the GNU Ada Project was started;
> > * the amount of Ada sources shipped as part of Debian went from 576 kSLOC
> >   to 1 MSLOC (June 2005) to 1.3 MSLOC (April 2007);
> > * the professional Ada conferences continued to take place;
> > * Ada was featured at the "Rencontres Mondiales du Logiciel Libre" in 2004;
> > * and again at FOSDEM 2006;
> > * GNU/Linux Magazine France published a series of 17 articles by Yves
> >   Bailly, covering all aspects of the language (to the point where
> >   students I talked to thought Ada was "fashionable")
>
> > I probably forgot lots of other noteworthy events but you get the idea.
>
> > I think that's not too bad for a "dubious or nonexistent future".
>
> I think you're absolutely right. It's good to know that the language
> I've started learning is alive and well.
>
> Thank you.  :o)
> Thomas

I started to learn Ada 95 up to christmas '07, and I love it. I digged
John Barnes Programming in Ada 95 after I read most of the Ada
wikibook. Im from Denmark as well, and only when told to use other
languages than Ada, I do. I starting to look at GNU HURD to see if any
parts could be written in Ada, and it seems like it is possible,
however no compiler is yet in Debian GNU/Hurd.

Ville

"GNU, Ada and dvorak - I may be crazy, but it is one elegant mix, when
you get used to it!"

Upsurge? (was: Decline?)

[Ludovic Brenta]

Thomas wrote:
>  I'm just learnig Ada for fun (and so far I'm having lots of fun!)

VilleWitt wrote:
> I started to learn Ada 95 up to christmas '07, and I love it.

It is good to see new people learning out of interest and being vocal
about it. I went that route in 2003. Out of curiosity, what brought
you to Ada?

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Upsurge?

[Thomas]

Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> Thomas wrote:
>>  I'm just learnig Ada for fun (and so far I'm having lots of fun!)
> 
> VilleWitt wrote:
>> I started to learn Ada 95 up to christmas '07, and I love it.
> 
> It is good to see new people learning out of interest and being vocal
> about it. I went that route in 2003. Out of curiosity, what brought
> you to Ada?
> 
> --
> Ludovic Brenta.


I've been working with PHP/XSLT/Javascript and some CLI scripting for 
years, and while I enjoy working with PHP (I don't much care for 
Javascript, but in the web world it's difficult to avoid), I felt the 
time had come for me to learn a "real" programming language.

I had also become friends with a guy from America, an old school 
programmer with a solid background in languages like Forth, REXX and 
COBOL. We decided to help each other learn something new, and that was 
the final push I needed to get started.

So I set out to find a language we could pick up.

The obvious choices would've been C or perhaps C++, as there's an 
abundance of books/tutorials and communities. All my computers are 
running Slackware (he's on Opensuse), so all the tools needed would've 
been readily at hand. But it just seemed so boring. Everybody and his 
monkey are doing C/C++/C#. There's an air of "been there, done that" 
surrounding those languages, IMHO.

I also thought about Java, but it just seemed like such a pain to get 
even the simplest things going. I may not have given it a real chance, 
but if you're almost bored to death 10 minutes into your first tutorial, 
then it's probably not the right choice. Also my American friend had no 
lost love for Java.

What in the end made me decide on Ada was http://rosettacode.org

I looked at the different tasks and the solutions posted, and Ada just 
intrigued me. I began reading a bit about it, and the more I read, the 
more it seemed like THIS was the language I was going to learn. It was 
massively different from what I was used to working with, so it would 
really put my brain to the test. I suggested it, and my friend agreed, 
and here we are.

So far we've been learning Ada for 3-4 weeks, and we're having a blast! 
It's difficult, it's hard, it's completely different from what we're 
used to. It's just the right thing.

I personally really look forward to the day where I can build a piece of 
software using Ada, just as easy as I can with PHP today. There's quite 
a few things running in my company I would like to do in Ada, and seeing 
as I own the company, I can do as I damn well please.  :D

Regards,
Thomas

Re: Upsurge?

[Alex R. Mosteo]

Thomas wrote:

> Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>> Thomas wrote:
>>>  I'm just learnig Ada for fun (and so far I'm having lots of fun!)
>> 
>> VilleWitt wrote:
>>> I started to learn Ada 95 up to christmas '07, and I love it.
>> 
>> It is good to see new people learning out of interest and being vocal
>> about it. I went that route in 2003. Out of curiosity, what brought
>> you to Ada?
>> 
>> --
>> Ludovic Brenta.
> 
> 
> I've been working with PHP/XSLT/Javascript and some CLI scripting for
> years, and while I enjoy working with PHP (I don't much care for
> Javascript, but in the web world it's difficult to avoid), I felt the
> time had come for me to learn a "real" programming language.
> 

If you're into web business, you might as well find interesting AWS, which is
an excellent Ada embedded web server with accompanying tool suite. I
especially like the embeddable resources (useful in many Ada programs, besides
web oriented) and the templates parser for generation of reports/web pages.

https://libre.adacore.com/aws/

> (...)

Re: Decline?

[Gene]

On Mar 12, 8:42 pm, Ludovic Brenta <ludo...@ludovic-brenta.org> wrote:
> Thomas writes:
> > gp...@axonx.com wrote:
>
> >> If popularity is the major criteria to choose the language we all
> >> should use VB.
>
> >> George.
>
> > Hehe, good point.
>
> > I'm not so much worried about the popularity thing - it's more the
> > "nonexistent future" statement that made me wonder.
>
> The paper was published in 2003 and stated the future was "dubious or
> nonexistent".  Since then:
>
> * a new revision of the language was published.
> * AdaCore and the FSF made several major releases of their compiler and IDE;
> * Aonix released their Eclipse Ada plug-in;
> * AdaControl (several releases);
> * Ada Web Server (several releases);
> * PolyORB (several releases);
> * the GNU Ada Project was started;
> * the amount of Ada sources shipped as part of Debian went from 576 kSLOC
>   to 1 MSLOC (June 2005) to 1.3 MSLOC (April 2007);
> * the professional Ada conferences continued to take place;
> * Ada was featured at the "Rencontres Mondiales du Logiciel Libre" in 2004;
> * and again at FOSDEM 2006;
> * GNU/Linux Magazine France published a series of 17 articles by Yves
>   Bailly, covering all aspects of the language (to the point where
>   students I talked to thought Ada was "fashionable")
>
> I probably forgot lots of other noteworthy events but you get the idea.
>
> I think that's not too bad for a "dubious or nonexistent future".
>

Thanks.  We're one of the schools mentioned in this depressing
document that uses Ada for CS1 and CS2.  We're still firm believers
that there exist zero better languages for _educating_ computer
scientists.  Fortunately we also have zero need to train enty level
programmers in our CS major, which most schools do.

I have to confess that we have recently changed the last semester of
the CS3 course to Java for a number of reasons, not least of which is
to give students a sense that they may, after lots of hard work, have
earned the knowledge to operate in that environment without mother Ada
to keep them on the straight path.

The Air Force Academy, also mentioned, has, I regret to say, gone over
to the dark side.

Re: Decline?

[Georg Bauhaus]

On Thu, 2008-03-13 at 11:00 -0700, Gene wrote:

> The Air Force Academy, also mentioned, has, I regret to say, gone over
> to the dark side.

Ignoring, for the moment, the inevitable force of
"Hey, the party is over there, now!".

What I still don't understand (from my remote point of view),
is this: some of the attractiveness of Java appears to be
connected with @Annotations and special VMs, these days.
(I understand this creates opportunities for producing more
guarantees, e.g. regarding lifetime or memory use, in many ways.)

At least a number of features of this kind seem to correspond
more or less directly with plain vanilla properties of the Ada
language. We have two compilers producing J-code from Ada source.
Using them, we'd just have to write Ada with no more int-based
array indexing, no need to ..., ... OK. Can there be any doubt that
language choice has statistically little to do with language
influences on production and maintenance, but is really just
a social, P.O.E.T.ical process?


(Problem 1 (economy). Assign weights to P, O, E, and T totaling 1.0.)

Hm. The language preference process has already found one
declared end, reportedly for Ada. Let's see whether this
Java one succeeds in becoming management's paradise.


-- Georg

Re: Decline?

[Randy Brukardt]

"Ludovic Brenta" <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org> wrote in message
news:87tzjb8nfa.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org...
...
> The paper was published in 2003 and stated the future was "dubious or
> nonexistent".  Since then:
>
> * a new revision of the language was published.

You can add to that:

* A new version of the ACATS (test suite) has been released for the new
revision of the language;
* John Barnes updated his huge Ada textbook for the new revision of the
language (and I believe that Burns/Welling did the same with their book).

                                 Randy.

Re: Decline?

[Stefan.Lucks]

> * John Barnes updated his huge Ada textbook for the new revision of the
> language (and I believe that Burns/Welling did the same with their book).

I can confirm that -- I recently received my copy of the revised 
Burns/Wellings book. 

-- 
------ Stefan Lucks   --  Bauhaus-University Weimar  --   Germany  ------
               Stefan dot Lucks at uni minus weimar dot de
------  I  love  the  taste  of  Cryptanalysis  in  the  morning!  ------

Textbooks (Was: Decline?)

[Jacob Sparre Andersen]

Stefan.Lucks@medien.uni-weimar.de writes:

>> * John Barnes updated his huge Ada textbook for the new revision of the
>> language (and I believe that Burns/Welling did the same with their book).
>
> I can confirm that -- I recently received my copy of the revised 
> Burns/Wellings book.

I have used Barnes' "Programming in Ada 2005", but I am not completely
happy with it as a textbook.  I think a part of the problem is in the
exercises.  It takes too many pages to get to some working (read:
compilable) examples.  In addition to this I have my students'
complaints that Barnes occassionally seems to be preaching rather than
teaching.  (This isn't something that bothers me directly.)

How does Burns' and Wellings' "Concurrent and Real-Time Programming in
Ada" compare to "Programming in Ada 2005" as a textbook?

Greetings,

Jacob
-- 
"No!  The universe is ours."

Re: Textbooks (Was: Decline?)

[Peter C. Chapin]

Jacob Sparre Andersen wrote:

> How does Burns' and Wellings' "Concurrent and Real-Time Programming in
> Ada" compare to "Programming in Ada 2005" as a textbook?

I don't think the Burns/Wellings book would make a good textbook... at 
least not in a first course on Ada. It is too specialized and doesn't 
spend much time talking about the non-tasking aspects of the language. 
It would probably be wonderful for a correspondingly specialized course 
but for a general course on Ada, it isn't really what one would want.

I'm teaching Ada this semester and I am *not* using the Barnes book as 
the text book. I considered doing so. However, the problem is that the 
Barnes book is a bit too detailed; it contains all kinds of information 
that my first time Ada programmers would probably find distracting 
and/or confusing. I did show them the book in class and said, "If you 
are interested in going further with Ada you should definitely get a 
copy of this book." A couple of them wrote down the ISBN but I'm not 
sure if any of them did buy it.

For a text book in my class I've been using some free resources such as 
the Wikibook and "Ada Distilled." However, I haven't been entirely 
satisfied with that. The problem is that those resources present the 
material in an order that isn't compatible with my approach to teaching. 
Specifically they tend to throw moderately advanced topics into the 
middle of discussions on more elementary topics. Thus I have to tell my 
students, "read sections x, y, and z, but skip subsections x.3, y.5, and 
the material on blah." These instructions are more complicated than 
necessary and I'm sure they make the readings seem a bit disconnected.

I'm working with second year students so a nice textbook would be 
helpful. When I teach the seniors I usually just say, "This material is 
covered in the book," and leave it to them to figure out where. In that 
case a carefully organized textbook is less necessary.

Peter

Re: Textbooks (Was: Decline?)

[Georg Bauhaus]

On Fri, 2008-03-14 at 07:39 -0400, Peter C. Chapin wrote:

> I'm working with second year students so a nice textbook would be 
> helpful. When I teach the seniors I usually just say, "This material is 
> covered in the book," and leave it to them to figure out where. In that 
> case a carefully organized textbook is less necessary.

IMHO, one of the best books introducing just Ada to the beginning
student is
  Naiditch, David: Rendezvous with Ada 95.
  Jon Wiley & Sons.

While the sentences in this book are so simple that you might think
they are too simple, this is deceptive. A teacher insisting on
careful reading of simple sentences will have everyone profit.
The book is written with a definitive pedagogical attitude, it seems
full of experience, and is sparkling with elucidating hints
(anonymous means nameless).
 "In order for two tasks to interface, one task must call
 the other task. The task that does the calling is known
 as the calling task. The task that is called is known as
 the acceptor task." (p.509)
When did you last hear of an acceptor task? Does it give
some new insight into why there is an "accept" keyword in
the language?

Re: Upsurge?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Thomas wrote:
> What in the end made me decide on Ada was http://rosettacode.org

Funny, I wasn't aware of this site and I'm surprised at the large
number of samples for Ada.  So, you can add to my list of "things that
happened since 2003":

* Many code samples posted on rosettacode.org by Ada enthusiasts
* Wikibook "Ada Programming" written from scratch by enthusiasts, then
voted a "Featured Book" in, I believe,  2006.

Furthermore, part of the work for designing and publishing Ada 2005
was funded by Ada-Europe and ACM SIGAda (for the USA). If you want to
help make Ada's future a bright one, I recommend you become a member
and contribute financially (the membership fees are very low). There
are benefits; for example, if you join Ada-Europe within the next
couple of weeks, you'll receive a printed copy of the Ada 2005
Rationale by John Barnes. See http://www.ada-europe.org or your
national Ada user group.

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Upsurge?

[Thomas]

Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> Thomas wrote:
>> What in the end made me decide on Ada was http://rosettacode.org
> 
> Funny, I wasn't aware of this site and I'm surprised at the large
> number of samples for Ada.  So, you can add to my list of "things that
> happened since 2003":
> 
> * Many code samples posted on rosettacode.org by Ada enthusiasts
> * Wikibook "Ada Programming" written from scratch by enthusiasts, then
> voted a "Featured Book" in, I believe,  2006.
> 
> Furthermore, part of the work for designing and publishing Ada 2005
> was funded by Ada-Europe and ACM SIGAda (for the USA). If you want to
> help make Ada's future a bright one, I recommend you become a member
> and contribute financially (the membership fees are very low). There
> are benefits; for example, if you join Ada-Europe within the next
> couple of weeks, you'll receive a printed copy of the Ada 2005
> Rationale by John Barnes. See http://www.ada-europe.org or your
> national Ada user group.
> 
> --
> Ludovic Brenta.


I can only encourage all you skilled Ada people to help build an even 
larger collection of Ada examples on rosettacode.org. It's a great idea, 
and I'm certain it could help further Ada. Every little bit helps! Oh, 
and it's also an awesome resource for a beginning Ada programmer. 
Sometimes cookbook examples are so much easier to understand than books. 
  :o)

I've contacted the national danish Ada group to hear how I can help 
support Ada.

Sadly the danish Ada group website is currently dead (perhaps there's 
something a webmonkey like me can help with!), but hopefully the email 
registered at ada-europe.org is valid. Time will tell.

Thanks a lot for the link Ludovic.

Regards,
Thomas

Re: Decline?

[Eric Hughes]

On Mar 13, 1:50 pm, Georg Bauhaus <rm.plus-
bug.t...@maps.futureapps.de> wrote:
> What I still don't understand (from my remote point of view),
> is this: some of the attractiveness of Java appears to be
> connected with @Annotations and special VMs, these days.
> (I understand this creates opportunities for producing more
> guarantees, e.g. regarding lifetime or memory use, in many ways.)

And Java 6 adds support for compile-time processing of annotations,
not just VM support.

View annotations as language extensions with clunky syntax.  It's a
way of prototyping language features without maintaining an entire
compiler.  I fully expect that the most successful annotation systems
are going to end up supported natively by the language itself.  This
group of features lowers the bar to participation lower than it ever
has been.  The larger participant pool means a wider distribution of
quality, which means more great ideas at the high end of the
distribution tail.

Eric

Re: Upsurge?

[Stephen Leake]

Thomas <thomas@kenshi.dk> writes:

> What in the end made me decide on Ada was http://rosettacode.org

Now that's a good reason to update that site with more Ada solutions.

Everyone who is complaining about the declining popularity of Ada
should go there, pick a task they know how to do in Ada, and post the
solution!

-- 
-- Stephe

Ada i Danmark (Was: Upsurge?)

[Jacob Sparre Andersen]

Thomas wrote:

> I've contacted the national danish Ada group to hear how I can help
> support Ada.

We're not very active at the moment.  I am considering to arrange a
get-together for the members, but I haven't actually done anything
about it yet.  Another plan is to restart the Ada programming
workshops I earlier arranged in cooperation with the Linux user group
in Copenhagen.  Basically somebody has to decide a date.

> Sadly the danish Ada group website is currently dead

I wasn't aware of that.  (But then, I never used it for anything.)

> (perhaps there's something a webmonkey like me can help with!), but
> hopefully the email registered at ada-europe.org is valid. Time will
> tell.

I am pretty sure it is.  Otherwise you can contact me.

Greetings,

Jacob
-- 
"... while the C compiler will happily generate code for
 almost anything produced by leaning on the keyboard."

Re: Ada i Danmark (Was: Upsurge?)

[Thomas]

Jacob Sparre Andersen wrote:
> We're not very active at the moment.  I am considering to arrange a
> get-together for the members, but I haven't actually done anything
> about it yet.  Another plan is to restart the Ada programming
> workshops I earlier arranged in cooperation with the Linux user group
> in Copenhagen.  Basically somebody has to decide a date.

How many members are there in Denmark?


> 
>> Sadly the danish Ada group website is currently dead
> 
> I wasn't aware of that.  (But then, I never used it for anything.)
> 
>> (perhaps there's something a webmonkey like me can help with!), but
>> hopefully the email registered at ada-europe.org is valid. Time will
>> tell.
> 
> I am pretty sure it is.  Otherwise you can contact me.

I will! Email is on the way.  :o)

Regards
Thomas

Re: Ada i Danmark

[Jacob Sparre Andersen]

Thomas wrote:

[ the Danish Ada association ]

> How many members are there in Denmark?

I think we are somewhere between 10 and 20 members.

Greetings,

Jacob
-- 
"simply because no one had discovered a cure for the universe as a
 whole - or rather the only one that did exist had been abolished"

Re: Decline?

[adaworks]

"Thomas" <thomas@kenshi.dk> wrote in message 
news:47d7de50$0$89175$157c6196@dreader1.cybercity.dk...
> Today I stumbled on this fairly old (2003) paper on the merits (or lack of!) 
> of Ada.
>
> http://www.sei.cmu.edu/pub/documents/03.reports/pdf/03tn021.pdf
>
Any paper that relies so heavily on input from Reifer is, in my opinon, suspect.
He is a turncoat, once an AJPO Director and pretender to be an advocate
of Ada who, upon leaving his position in AJPO, turned on the entire Ada
intiative and began deprectating it.  People who knew of his former AJPO
role took his ill-considered advice and this did as much to damage the
progress of Ada and its acceptability as anyone.   I have stopped
placing credence in anything he writes.

The paper is a few years old.   New initiatives have been on-going.  Note that
it continues to compliment Ada on its being a more effective alternative than
other languages.   Ada is still a superior technology over C++, Java, and
most other languages.   It is not popular for a lot of reasons, some of which
go back to the inflexibility of the Ada 83 model.   With Ada 95 and Ada2005,
it surpasses, as a language, those alternatives.

The place where Ada needs improvement is, more and improved libraries
to support continuing ideas in software development (not a need for language
improvement), better community awareness of its benefits, and a more
effective campaign to present its successes.

Richard Riehle

Re: Textbooks (Was: Decline?)

[adaworks]

Ada Distilled includes a complete set of fully-coded programs that work.
When you use that book, be sure to also download the separate file that
includes the programs.   Then, you can present those programs in any
order you wish.

I have intended to update Ada Distilled for Ada 2005, but my time has
been taken by other duties.   If I am able to complete the major project
I am currently working on (in between my teaching duties) by the end
of June, I'll try to get started on an updated version of Ada Distilled.
Any work I do on it is unfunded and strictly a labor of love, so it needs
to take a lower priority than those duties that do help me pay my mortgage
and entertain my grandchildren.

Since Ada Distilled is in the public domain, I welcome any initiative to
update it by the community.   I don't make any money from it so it
belongs to everyone with an interest in Ada.

Richard Riehle
======================================================
"Peter C. Chapin" <pchapin@sover.net> wrote in message 
news:47da6400$0$1774$4d3efbfe@news.sover.net...
> Jacob Sparre Andersen wrote:
>
>> How does Burns' and Wellings' "Concurrent and Real-Time Programming in
>> Ada" compare to "Programming in Ada 2005" as a textbook?
>
> I don't think the Burns/Wellings book would make a good textbook... at least 
> not in a first course on Ada. It is too specialized and doesn't spend much 
> time talking about the non-tasking aspects of the language. It would probably 
> be wonderful for a correspondingly specialized course but for a general course 
> on Ada, it isn't really what one would want.
>
> I'm teaching Ada this semester and I am *not* using the Barnes book as the 
> text book. I considered doing so. However, the problem is that the Barnes book 
> is a bit too detailed; it contains all kinds of information that my first time 
> Ada programmers would probably find distracting and/or confusing. I did show 
> them the book in class and said, "If you are interested in going further with 
> Ada you should definitely get a copy of this book." A couple of them wrote 
> down the ISBN but I'm not sure if any of them did buy it.
>
> For a text book in my class I've been using some free resources such as the 
> Wikibook and "Ada Distilled." However, I haven't been entirely satisfied with 
> that. The problem is that those resources present the material in an order 
> that isn't compatible with my approach to teaching. Specifically they tend to 
> throw moderately advanced topics into the middle of discussions on more 
> elementary topics. Thus I have to tell my students, "read sections x, y, and 
> z, but skip subsections x.3, y.5, and the material on blah." These 
> instructions are more complicated than necessary and I'm sure they make the 
> readings seem a bit disconnected.
>
> I'm working with second year students so a nice textbook would be helpful. 
> When I teach the seniors I usually just say, "This material is covered in the 
> book," and leave it to them to figure out where. In that case a carefully 
> organized textbook is less necessary.
>
> Peter 

Re: Textbooks (Was: Decline?)

[Peter C. Chapin]

adaworks@sbcglobal.net wrote:

> Ada Distilled includes a complete set of fully-coded programs that work.
> When you use that book, be sure to also download the separate file that
> includes the programs.   Then, you can present those programs in any
> order you wish.

Thanks for the information, I'll check it out.

> I have intended to update Ada Distilled for Ada 2005, but my time has
> been taken by other duties.   If I am able to complete the major project
> I am currently working on (in between my teaching duties) by the end
> of June, I'll try to get started on an updated version of Ada Distilled.

An update would be great, of course, but I understand very well the 
limitations of time. I'd love to be able to say that I could help update 
it, but the reality is that my time constraints are too great for that.

Peter

Re: Textbooks

[Jacob Sparre Andersen]

Richard Riehle wrote:

> Ada Distilled includes a complete set of fully-coded programs that
> work.  When you use that book, be sure to also download the separate
> file that includes the programs.  Then, you can present those
> programs in any order you wish.

I have tried to use Ada Distilled in a course, but it didn't work out
as well as I had hoped.  Mostly because I wasn't teaching experienced
programmers.  For inexperienced students, it isn't quite right.

Greetings,

Jacob
-- 
"... while the C compiler will happily generate code for
 almost anything produced by leaning on the keyboard."

Re: Textbooks

[adaworks]

"Jacob Sparre Andersen" <sparre@nbi.dk> wrote in message 
news:ygeve3n3yq4.fsf@hugsarin.dmusyd.edu...
> Richard Riehle wrote:
>
>> Ada Distilled includes a complete set of fully-coded programs that
>> work.  When you use that book, be sure to also download the separate
>> file that includes the programs.  Then, you can present those
>> programs in any order you wish.
>
> I have tried to use Ada Distilled in a course, but it didn't work out
> as well as I had hoped.  Mostly because I wasn't teaching experienced
> programmers.  For inexperienced students, it isn't quite right.
>
Right.  Ada Distilled is not intended for inexperienced programmers. It is
directed to those who have quite a bit of experience in solving programming
problems, and who will understand the kinds of problems the programs are
intended to illustrate.

Also, it is light on theory.   I have tried to annotate each programming 
example,
including some annotations from the ALRM.   I also included an annotated
version of Text_IO and some other packages from Annex A.

Unlike some Ada programming books, every source code example is a complete
program -- compilable and executable.   A complaint I once had from some of
my students was that some textbooks show a fragment of code and follow with
the equivalent of, "The solution is left as an exercise for the student."   I 
tried
to avoid that kind of thing.

I have received email from people all over the world, including Iran and some
other places where we are not on good terms.  I even had an invitation to teach
Ada in Iran using Ada Distilled, an invitation I politely declined.    Instead, 
I
referred them to a friend in the French Ada community who I know to be
an excellent instructor.  I never received word on whether that training took
place, and I don't need to know.   He did not know I recommended him.

Meanwhile, I have made a little bit of progress with the new version.   I added
examples with distinguished receiver notation and a few smaller items.  I'll try
to get it revised suficiently for posting to the AdaIC web site this year.

Many thanks to all of those who have been so generous in their comments,
advice and suggestions.  You are always welcome to send other suggestions
to me that might improve the overall benefit of the book.

Richard Riehle 

Re: Upsurge?

[Poul-Erik Andreasen]

Thomas wrote:
> Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>> Thomas wrote:
>>> What in the end made me decide on Ada was http://rosettacode.org
>>
>> Funny, I wasn't aware of this site and I'm surprised at the large
>> number of samples for Ada.  So, you can add to my list of "things that
>> happened since 2003":
>>
>> * Many code samples posted on rosettacode.org by Ada enthusiasts
>> * Wikibook "Ada Programming" written from scratch by enthusiasts, then
>> voted a "Featured Book" in, I believe,  2006.
>>
>> Furthermore, part of the work for designing and publishing Ada 2005
>> was funded by Ada-Europe and ACM SIGAda (for the USA). If you want to
>> help make Ada's future a bright one, I recommend you become a member
>> and contribute financially (the membership fees are very low). There
>> are benefits; for example, if you join Ada-Europe within the next
>> couple of weeks, you'll receive a printed copy of the Ada 2005
>> Rationale by John Barnes. See http://www.ada-europe.org or your
>> national Ada user group.
>>
>> -- 
>> Ludovic Brenta.
> 
> 
> I can only encourage all you skilled Ada people to help build an even 
> larger collection of Ada examples on rosettacode.org. It's a great idea, 
> and I'm certain it could help further Ada. Every little bit helps! Oh, 
> and it's also an awesome resource for a beginning Ada programmer. 
> Sometimes cookbook examples are so much easier to understand than books. 
>  :o)
> 
> I've contacted the national danish Ada group to hear how I can help 
> support Ada.
> 
> Sadly the danish Ada group website is currently dead (perhaps there's 
> something a webmonkey like me can help with!), but hopefully the email 
> registered at ada-europe.org is valid. Time will tell.


I am encounterring a serius server crash, and i don't have the means for 
the time being to set up a new server.Perhaps we can find another solution.


Poul-Erik Andreasen

Re: Textbooks

[John McCormick]

For novice programmers have a look at my CS1 and CS2 books:

"Programming and Problem Solving with Ada" by Dale, Weems, and
McCormick.  Jones and Bartlett, 2000.  ISBN 0-7637-0792-9.

"Ada Plus Data Structures" by Dale and McCormick.  Jones and Bartlett,
2007.  ISBN 0-7637-3794-1.


John McCormick


On Mar 16, 2:38 am, Jacob Sparre Andersen <spa...@nbi.dk> wrote:
> I have tried to use Ada Distilled in a course, but it didn't work out
> as well as I had hoped.  Mostly because I wasn't teaching experienced
> programmers.  For inexperienced students, it isn't quite right.

Ada UK, was: Re: Upsurge?

[Simon Clubley]

In article <f70e10ff-2feb-4b3d-a53d-22e9152e858d@s37g2000prg.googlegroups.com>, Ludovic Brenta <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org> writes:
> 
> Furthermore, part of the work for designing and publishing Ada 2005
> was funded by Ada-Europe and ACM SIGAda (for the USA). If you want to
> help make Ada's future a bright one, I recommend you become a member
> and contribute financially (the membership fees are very low). There
> are benefits; for example, if you join Ada-Europe within the next
> couple of weeks, you'll receive a printed copy of the Ada 2005
> Rationale by John Barnes. See http://www.ada-europe.org or your
> national Ada user group.
> 

I notice that there isn't a national Ada UK organisation listed on
http://www.ada-europe.org/members.html but I thought that one existed.

Was I mistaken or has it closed ?

Simon.

-- 
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Microsoft: Bringing you 1980's technology to a 21st century world

Re: Upsurge?

[Thomas]

Poul-Erik Andreasen wrote:
> I am encounterring a serius server crash, and i don't have the means for 
> the time being to set up a new server.Perhaps we can find another solution.

I might be able to help Poul-Erik.

What do we need?

Regards,
Thomas

Re: Ada UK, was: Re: Upsurge?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Simon Clubley wrote:
> Ludovic Brenta writes:
> > Furthermore, part of the work for designing and publishing Ada 2005
> > was funded by Ada-Europe and ACM SIGAda (for the USA). If you want to
> > help make Ada's future a bright one, I recommend you become a member
> > and contribute financially (the membership fees are very low). There
> > are benefits; for example, if you join Ada-Europe within the next
> > couple of weeks, you'll receive a printed copy of the Ada 2005
> > Rationale by John Barnes. See http://www.ada-europe.org or your
> > national Ada user group.
>
> I notice that there isn't a national Ada UK organisation listed on
> http://www.ada-europe.org/members.html but I thought that one existed.
>
> Was I mistaken or has it closed ?

Officially, it merged into Ada-Europe a few years ago. Its former
publication, "Ada User", eventually became Ada-Europe's quarterly "Ada
User Journal". So, if you are interested in the AUJ and the Ada 2005
Rationale, you can become a direct member of Ada-Europe.

(Personally, I think it is a shame that the UK, probably the European
country with the most Ada developers, now lacks a national
organisation and corresponding vote in ISO ballots.)

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Ada UK, was: Re: Upsurge?

[Dirk Craeynest]

About the existence of Ada UK, Simon Clubley wrote:
> > Was I mistaken or has it closed ?

and Ludovic Brenta responded:
> Officially, it merged into Ada-Europe a few years ago.

Indeed: in early 2004 Ada UK effectively stopped operations and
transferred its membership application and renewal process to Ada-
Europe.

The announcement that was distributed at that time can still be
retrieved at <http://web.archive.org/web/20031206045442/http://
www.adauk.org.uk/>.

> Its former
> publication, "Ada User", eventually became Ada-Europe's quarterly "Ada
> User Journal". So, if you are interested in the AUJ and the Ada 2005
> Rationale, you can become a direct member of Ada-Europe.

See <http://www.ada-europe.org/join.html> for more info.

> (Personally, I think it is a shame that the UK, probably the European
> country with the most Ada developers, now lacks a national
> organisation and corresponding vote in ISO ballots.)

Note that the UK is still represented in WG9, the ISO working group on
Ada: see <http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/WG9/members.htm>.

But this obviously happens outside the context of a national Ada
organization...

Given all the Ada work going on in the UK, and the recent Ada
conferences there in the past 3 years, it would be great if a few
people would get together and recreate an Ada UK organization.

Anyway, for now I can only strongly concur with Ludovic and encourage
everyone in the UK who's interested in Ada-Europe's activities to
apply for direct Ada-Europe membership.

We're looking forward to many new members!

Dirk Craeynest
Ada-Europe vice-president

Re: Upsurge?

[DScott]

Thomas wrote:
...
> I had also become friends with ... an old school 
> programmer with a solid background in languages like Forth, REXX and 
> COBOL.
ROFLMAO!
Thanks, Kaz!

-- 
Fui et vidi experiri.
=DSM=

Re: Upsurge?

[Thomas]

DScott wrote:
> Thomas wrote:
> ...
>> I had also become friends with ... an old school programmer with a 
>> solid background in languages like Forth, REXX and COBOL.
> ROFLMAO!
> Thanks, Kaz!
> 


Hehe, I was wondering when you would turn up! I guess the old satellite 
connection is back with a vengeance then?

Two Ada newbies in the same comp.lang.ada thread - indeed we're seeing 
an Upsurge!

:o)
/Thomas

Re: Upsurge?

[DScott]

Thomas wrote:
...
> Hehe, I was wondering when you would turn up! I guess the old satellite 
> connection is back with a vengeance then?
> 
> Two Ada newbies in the same comp.lang.ada thread - indeed we're seeing 
> an Upsurge!
> 
> :o)
> /Thomas
Yes. Bandwidth problem and "keep alive" fixed. Now I need to get IRC back on before all my 
nick's expire!

BTW: Have you cajoled any of these lovely people into giving us a dissertation committee 
flogging about our first effort? They'll have to forgive us, at least, for not writing 
multitasking at 3 weeks post-natal! ;)
Bwahahaha!

-- 
Fui et vidi experiri. <=(starting with the Bendix LGP-30)
=DSM=

Re: Upsurge?

[Thomas]

DScott wrote:
> 
> BTW: Have you cajoled any of these lovely people into giving us a 
> dissertation committee flogging about our first effort? They'll have to 
> forgive us, at least, for not writing multitasking at 3 weeks 
> post-natal! ;)
> Bwahahaha!
> 

I haven't asked yet, but I plan on setting up a bunch of pastebin links 
to bits of our code when we've cleaned it up according to our own 
slightly modified Ada Style Guid.

It should provide comp.lang.ada with a few cheap laughs. :o)

-- 
/Thomas L�cke

-- The major difference between a thing that might go wrong
-- and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a
-- thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually
-- turns out to be impossible to get at or repair.

Re: Textbooks (Was: Decline?)

[stefan-lucks]

On Fri, 14 Mar 2008, Jacob Sparre Andersen wrote:

> How does Burns' and Wellings' "Concurrent and Real-Time Programming in
> Ada" compare to "Programming in Ada 2005" as a textbook?

Burns' and Wellings' book is a great textbook about Real-Time programming, 
for readers/students who already know Ada. It is not a good introduction 
into programming in Ada. 

So long

Stefan Lucks

-- 
------ Stefan Lucks   --  Bauhaus-University Weimar  --   Germany  ------
               Stefan dot Lucks at uni minus weimar dot de
------  I  love  the  taste  of  Cryptanalysis  in  the  morning!  ------