Re: Mike Feldman, meet Archie

[srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian)]

>I agree that there is room for a serious Ada study, but in the list
>Greg mentions, the *only* thing that counts is "contacting software
>development companies."  The reason is that 'real developers' are too
>busy doing 'real work' to write tech reports, and they generally do
>not place their code in the public domain.  Studying Archie and WAIS


Dave,
	I should have been more specific about the technical reports,
for they are important to analyze for the following reasons.  There is
much software that comes out of the DoD that appears as listings in
technical reports available from DTIC/NTIS.  For example, about a year
ago I came across a technical report for cruise missile trajectories
over irregular terrains, which contained either Fortran or C code  (a
report a few foreign agencies snapped up).
  	These reports are a good measure of what goes on inside the
DoD research and development world, and the DoD academic world.  It
measures how people in the Mandated world who have a choice of language
for these smaller projects choose languages.  For example, there is a
constant stream of Master's thesis available from the Naval Postgraduate
School and Air Force Wright Patterson Graduate School, many of which have
excellent source code in them.  For example, a few years ago I was able
to snag a nice recursive descent compiler for Ada written in Ada.
	Analysis of these reports shows that Ada is making inroads into
these defense facilities, but at a rate indicating that it is just
another language, as opposed to something that the DoD is all out to
get accepted.  A classic case was some tank battlefield simulation code
written in Fortran available from the Ballistic Research Lab.  I had the
report with the source code listed, but didn't feel like typing it in.
I called up the guy and asked for the code, which he refused to give to
me for some mumbling reason, even though I already had the listing.
I then tried plan B, saying that I was interested in translating the code
to Ada, and would swap my Ada translation for a diskette of the Fortran
source code.  At this point, he said that if could get someone at the
Ballistic Research Lab to buy him an Ada compiler, he would have done it
himself and didn't need me, but no one wanted to buy him an Ada compiler.
After I stopped laughing, I realized he wasn't going to release the code
and said goodbye.

    Trust me, this is not an isolated incident depicting DoD apathy to
Ada acceptance and the difficulties of trying to do anything with existing
DoD software.

    I could gone for years about bullshit like this throughout the DoD
with regards to Ada unhappiness and hostility to software reuse.  It's a
shame that no one at AJPO or anywhere else is interested in the truth.

    Anyways, analysis of DoD technical reports available publicly
(I have access only to the ADA reports, and not anything classified ADB or
higher) will reveal much about Ada attitudes inside the DoD, as well as
leading to the discovery of tons of great software that is available.
Too bad no one is interested about all of this great software, or Ada
attitudes inside the DoD (of which I think, based on the many not-for
circulation email messages I get, that the Air Force is the most unhappy
having Ada "forced" on them).

Greg Aharonian
Source Translation & Optimization
617-489-3727  (my phone number, not my Social Security number)
-- 
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Greg Aharonian
Source Translation & Optimiztion
P.O. Box 404, Belmont, MA 02178