Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[David Weller]

This was posted on comp.object and comp.lang.<every other language
except Ada>

I'm feeling somewhat peckish, so I'll just post it here in its
entirety without further comment:
============================================================================
Article 27510 of comp.object:
From: chrisz@parcplace.com
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng,comp.object,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.lang.c++,comp.databases.sybase,comp.databases.oracle,comp.databases.object
Subject: Fed OOPS '95 April 19th
Date: Sun, 19 Mar 95 09:14:39 PDT
Organization: ParcPlace Systems, Inc.
Lines: 137

___________________________________________________________________________
Parcplace, AMS, Rational Software, hp, OMG, ODI, Versant, LLNL, EXPERSOFT,
Computerworld Client/Server Journal and Enterprise Re-Engineering present:

   Federal Object Oriented Programming Symposium (FED OOPS 95)
        "Enterprise Integration through Object Technology"

WHO: Greatest lineup of OO Industry Experts and Technologist
WHAT: The 1st Annual FED OOPS (FEDeral Object Oriented Programming Symposium).
WHERE: Sheraton Premier, Rt. 7, Vienna, VA.  (703) 448-1234
WHEN:  Wednesday, April 19th, 1995 - 8:00 am to  6:00 pm
HOW:   To Register call 1-800-670-4277 and ask for FED OOPS, or Fax 
703-761-0766

Meet the experts and see the technology during the networking hour that 
follows.

LEARN:
Who has revolutionized BPR, CASE and ADE tools with SmallTalk.

What OO Client/Server tools can increase productivity expodentially while
reducing the cost of maintenance.

Where Government is mandating RE-USE through Object Technology, and why!

When OODBMS are needed to store your application business models.

How Industry and Government employ Object Technlogy to migrate their legacy
systems.

Why the next generation of development tools are the only way to delivery
systems that model your business.

Conference topics include;
BPR - Modeling your Business Processes in software
OO Methods - Linking business with technology through Objects
CASE - Engineering beyond your data model: Incorporating Business Rules
OO ADEs - Rapid deployment and  increased maintainability through ANSI
SmallTalk.
OO CLIENT/SERVER - The Next Generation OO Client/Server tools that migrate
legacy systems
CORBA - ORBs that allow interoperability between SmallTalk, ADA, and  C++
MIDDLEWARE - Connecting new OO applications to your legacy data bases
OODBMS - When tables and rows aren't enough!

 Speakers include leading Object Technology practitioners from government
and industry:
        Adele Goldberg -(KeyNote)Founder and Chairman of ParcPlace Systems, 
Inc.
        Belkis Leong-Hong - 	Deputy Commander - JIEO, DISA
        David Porreca - 	President and CEO of Expersoft
        Booch & Rumbaugh - 	Rational Software (Jon Hopkins narates)
        Dr. Richard Soley - 	EVP of the OMG
        Doug Kittelsen - 	AMS "Object CORE" Director
        Adriann Bowles - 	Leading Author and Columnist
        Tom Atwood - 		Founder, Object Design Inc.
        Diann McCoy - 		Deputy Commander - Center For Software, DISA
        Mike Piscotti -         LLNL - Lessons learned in OOT deployment

                TO RESERVE YOUR SEAT  FAX  or  MAIL  TODAY
                   Phone: 1-800-670-4277          FAX  703-761-0766
Name _______________________________________
Title __________________________________________
Company_________________________________________
Division ____________________________
  or  Govt. Dept.___________________________________
Agency_____________________________
Address ______________________________________________________
Internet Addr.___________________
City ________________________________  State __________________  ZIP__________
Visa/MC/Amex Number_________________________________ Exp Date_____________
           Signature ______________________________________________
Date_____________


FEDOOPS Symposium Schedule:

0700 -	Registration at Sheraton Premier, Vienna, VA,
0800 - 0845 Exposition Floor Open: See the latest in OO Technology

0845 - 1200 "Best Practices" OO Methodologies and Design:
	Belkis Leong-Hong: Advanced technology vs Standards; How does DoD 
adapt?
	David Porreca: The OO Paradigm Shift, using OO for legacy migration
	Adele Goldberg: Successful Business Automation with Objects
	Booch and Rumbaugh: A unified method for OO development and design
	Jon Hopkins: Role of software architectures in adapting Objects

1200 - 1300	Buffet lunch.  Live demonstration by Versant's "Argos" and LLNL

1300 - 1630 "Best of Breed" OO Tools in the Federal Government:
	Richard Soley: Role of CORBA in integrating OO infastructure
 	Dr. Won Kim: Integrating multiple data type and distributed data bases
	Doug Kittelsen: "Object CORE"; Frameworks for Efficient Development of
Client/Server Systems
	Tom Atwood: The next generation database technology for Objects
	Diann McCoy: The challenge in migrating legacy systems
	Adriann Bowles:   Incorporating the Objects into an Integrated System

1630 - 1700	More live Demos
1700 - 1900	Networking hour to meet the experts and see the latest and
greatest OO technology!

WHO SHOULD ATTEND: Managers and Executives involved in:

o Advanced Technology		o Business Development 	o Re-Engineering
o Program Management		o Client Server Tools	o System Integration
o Methodology			o Program/Project Management 	o CASE  Tools
o Strategic Planning		o Enterprise Integration o Systems Engineering
o Technical Direction		o Advanced Research	o Client Server

Technology expositions from best of breed Object Vendors.   (* companies who
incorporate ANSI SmallTalk80)
        ParcPlace "VisualWorks"*
        Rational Software "ROSE"*
        Object Design Inc. "Object Store"*
        UNISQL *
        Expersoft
        HP " Odapter" and "Distributed SmallTalk"*
        AMS "Object CORE"* and "Open Federal Financials"*
        Versant "ARGOS"*
        IDE "Software Through Pictures"*
        Objectivity Inc. *
        Protosoft *

TO REGISTER CALL 1-800-670-4277 today, seats are limited, reservations 
required.

Please direct Vendor Exhibition inquiries to John Weiler, ParcPlace Systems,
Inc. @ 703-848-9225







--
      Frustrated with C, C++, Pascal, Fortran?  Ada95 _might_ be for you!
	  For all sorts of interesting Ada95 tidbits, run the command:
"finger dweller@starbase.neosoft.com | more" (or e-mail with "finger" as subj.)
		if u cn rd ths, u r gd enuf to chg to Ada   :-)

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Steven D. Litvintchouk]

In article <3kkng4$j1s@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM> dweller@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM (David Weller) writes:

> This was posted on comp.object and comp.lang.<every other language
> except Ada>
>
> I'm feeling somewhat peckish, so I'll just post it here in its
> entirety without further comment:
> ============================================================================
> Article 27510 of comp.object:
> From: chrisz@parcplace.com
> Newsgroups: comp.software-eng,comp.object,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.lang.c++,comp.databases.sybase,comp.databases.oracle,comp.databases.object
> Subject: Fed OOPS '95 April 19th
> Date: Sun, 19 Mar 95 09:14:39 PDT
> Organization: ParcPlace Systems, Inc.
> Lines: 137
>
> ___________________________________________________________________________
> Parcplace, AMS, Rational Software, hp, OMG, ODI, Versant, LLNL, EXPERSOFT,
> Computerworld Client/Server Journal and Enterprise Re-Engineering present:
>
>    Federal Object Oriented Programming Symposium (FED OOPS 95)
>         "Enterprise Integration through Object Technology"

Your point is well taken.  Whenever I go to hear a presentation by a
major workstation vendor or OS vendor, they never seem to mention Ada
unless they are specifically asked about it, or unless they are
briefing an audience that they already know has high government
involvement (and sometimes not even then).  Likewise in the trade
press, articles that tout OO for business audiences often mention C++
and Smalltalk (and more recently, CORBA)--but never Ada 95.

This low profile for Ada is continuing to hurt its credibility and
marketability.  The absence of "big name" vendors who endorse Ada
(even when their audience is non-government) is particularly
discouraging.



--
Steven D. Litvintchouk
MITRE Corporation
202 Burlington Road			Fone:  (617)271-7753
Bedford, MA  01730-1420			ARPA:  sdl@mitre.org

Disclaimer:  As far as I am aware,

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Gregory Aharonian]

>This low profile for Ada is continuing to hurt its credibility and
>marketability.  The absence of "big name" vendors who endorse Ada
>(even when their audience is non-government) is particularly
>discouraging.

    Then tell the DoD to stop wasting Ada monies on contractors who have no
long term plans to do anything with Ada.  IBM, which received tons of STARS
money, has pretty much completed its discarding of everything Ada by
announcing plans to develop a Visual-Basic clone to join its family of OO
languages of Smalltalk and C++.  IBM has a BIG booth at Object World in
Boston this week, and like it has for many years (including when it was
receiving big Ada bucks from the DoD), it has no mention of Ada.

    I have yet to see one STARS porker ever show up at a commercial trade
show and push the Ada STARS technology.  All of that STARS money would have
been much better invested in companies that really cared about commercializing
Ada and Ada-based software engineering, as opposed to just filling up some
troughs.

    As for non-troughers, why would anyone want to invest in Ada when an
investment in any other language offers potential returns hundreds of times
larger than investing in Ada?  They wouldn't, which is why no one is investing
large amounts OF THEIR OWN MONIES in Ada, nor are any venture capitalists.

Greg Aharonian

P.S.  I apologize for using words like "investments", "return", etc.  I know
how nauseating these words are to socialists.

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Eric Baker]

srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) wrote:

>     Then tell the DoD to stop wasting Ada monies on contractors who have no
> long term plans to do anything with Ada.  IBM, which received tons of STARS
> money, has pretty much completed its discarding of everything Ada by
> announcing plans to develop a Visual-Basic clone to join its family of OO
> languages of Smalltalk and C++.  IBM has a BIG booth at Object World in
> Boston this week, and like it has for many years (including when it was
> receiving big Ada bucks from the DoD), it has no mention of Ada.
>

I hate to agree with Mr. Aharonian but he does make a good point.  I work with a
defense contractor that touts it's love affair with Ada and how it is the "right
thing to do" on our contracts.  The same company gets a large commercial contract
(i.e. no Ada mandate) and plans to use C++.  If I am not mistaken, the company
has not produced a product with C++ previously (C was popular until we forced Ada
 use).  It will be difficult to "mainstream" Ada with this two-faced attitude
in the commercial world.


> P.S.  I apologize for using words like "investments", "return", etc.  I know
> how nauseating these words are to socialists.


Is Greg implying that Ada users are socialists?!


Eric Baker (Republican)

My opinions are mine only.

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Gregory Aharonian]

>> P.S.  I apologize for using words like "investments", "return", etc.  I know
>> how nauseating these words are to socialists.
>
>Is Greg implying that Ada users are socialists?!  
>
>Eric Baker (Republican)

No, I am only implying that Ada policy makers are socialists.  They spend
other people's money with no accountability on behalf of the nation.  Their
mismanagement ends up in distortions of the marketplace that result in an
overpriced and uncompetitive products that can only be sold with massive
government subsidies (much like the Ada Mandate props up Ada vendors and
contractors), and scare away profit-driven enterprises, resulting in a few
large bloated companies commanding most of the business (with the Ada world
reduced to Rational/Verdix/Meridian, Alsys/Telesoft, and Loral/IBMFSD/Unisys)
who usually end up hiring former socialist bureacrats.

Ada has been reduced to such a pathetic commercial state that it needs
government (ADAIC) and academic (SIGADA) shills to promote Ada (like at
this week's Object World in Boston), with vendors so loathe to marketing
Ada that not once in the past six years has any Ada compiler vendor in
any software magazine or journal run a full page ad for an Ada compiler
with pricing for at least three months in a row.

I was talking to one of the socialist bureacrats at DISA who expressed a
sincere desire in seeing an Ada compiler marketed commercially with a
competitive price, like a souped up version of the Ada CDROM for $50.
It is an utterly idiotic investment for a capitalistic (try doing a five
year business plan on such a proposition), but nice sounding to a socialist
bureaucrat who didn't even know the cost of a one-time, full-page, four
color ad in any software journal.

    Until such time as someone comes forth with any statistic for any segment
of the non-Mandated marketplace that shows that Ada has a non-trivial market
share, Ada policy management by the DoD will continue to be a disaster.  Too
much money has been and is being given to people who basically lie to the DoD
about their interest and belief in Ada, starting with everyone involved with
STARS.

Greg Aharonian

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Robert Dewar]

Perhaps the operational definitions here are:      

Capitalists: people who give money to Greg
Socialists: people who give money to anyone else

There are probably quite a few would-be business men who feel this way :-)

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Michael Feldman]

In article <SRCTRAN.95Mar23081453@world.std.com>,
Gregory Aharonian <srctran@world.std.com> wrote:
>
>Ada has been reduced to such a pathetic commercial state that it needs
>government (ADAIC) and academic (SIGADA) shills to promote Ada (like at
>this week's Object World in Boston), with vendors so loathe to marketing
>Ada that not once in the past six years has any Ada compiler vendor in
>any software magazine or journal run a full page ad for an Ada compiler
>with pricing for at least three months in a row.

Without taking away from most of your points, with which I mostly agree,
I do want to correct the record on one thing: SIGAda is NOT an academic
organization, if by that you mean dominated by university people. I
don;t know what the membership ratio is, but I'll bet it's not more
than 20-25% academic. And the officers and AdaLetters editor have
been almost exclusively industrial folks. K.M. George, indeed an
academic (Oklahoma State) has just taken over as editor of AdaLetters;
he is the first academic in many years (maybe EVER) to do so.

The SIGAda group that ran the exhibit at Object World consisted of
no academics at all; most of the work there was done by Charlene Roberts
Hayden, employed by GTE in the Boston area. The group at ACM Computing
Week - mostly an academic _conference_ - was Hal Hart (TRW), Rick Conn
(MITRE), and me. The SIGAda guy in charge of liaison to conferences
for the exhibit is Ed Colbert, a small-business guy who does training
and other consulting. Treasurer is David Emery (just moved from MITRE in
Mass. to Hughes in Canada; he is working on the Canadian air-traffic 
control system, in Ada of course.

Academic? Not! 

You may be right in some areas, Greg, but your notion of what SIGAda is, 
is pure B.S. Take a hint from _this_ academic (yes, I am one, chair of
the SIGAda Education Working Group, unsurprisingly): do some homework.

Mike Feldman

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Colin James III]

In article <SRCTRAN.95Mar26113435@world.std.com>,
Gregory Aharonian <srctran@world.std.com> wrote:
>
>>Capitalists: people who give money to Greg
>>Socialists: people who give money to anyone else
>>There are probably quite a few would-be business men who feel this way :-)
>>Robert Dewar
>
>   Coming from someone who has received millions of dollars from the DoD
>for GNAT, the results of which you are now using to launch a business,
>your hypocrisy shows once again.
>
>   Get the DoD to stake me the same amount of money, and then let see who
>can do the most to benefit Ada.  But as one of the troughers, stick to
>troughing.
>
>Greg Aharonian


I concur.  What ACT is doing is unconscionable, dopey, and wrong.  
Besides, GNAT isn't Ada95 by a long shot.

To have seen Ed Schoenberg (ACT crony of Robert Dewar) as an Ada rep at 
TOOLS EUROPE '95 was enough to queer even the most casual observer on the 
efficacy of GNAT.  What a pill.  That was enough to drive anyone to C++.
The Ada community in Europe is in such bad shape that Rational and 
Thomson split the cost of having Professor Schoenberg there:  Team Puke.

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Gregory Aharonian]

>Capitalists: people who give money to Greg
>Socialists: people who give money to anyone else
>There are probably quite a few would-be business men who feel this way :-)
>Robert Dewar

   Coming from someone who has received millions of dollars from the DoD
for GNAT, the results of which you are now using to launch a business,
your hypocrisy shows once again.

   Get the DoD to stake me the same amount of money, and then let see who
can do the most to benefit Ada.  But as one of the troughers, stick to
troughing.

Greg Aharonian

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Dale Stanbrough]

In article <3l3dgc$4gi@stout.entertain.com> Colin James III,
cjames@stout.entertain.com writes:
>>   Coming from someone who has received millions of dollars from the DoD
>>for GNAT, the results of which you are now using to launch a business,
>>your hypocrisy shows once again.
>>
>>   Get the DoD to stake me the same amount of money, and then let see
who
>>can do the most to benefit Ada.  But as one of the troughers, stick to
>>troughing.
>>
>>Greg Aharonian

As someone involved in getting Ada introduced to a course, I can assure
you
that the availability of Gnat Ada has helped a lot. The students also
appreciate
its availability and pricing :-).

Dale

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[R. William Beckwith]

David Weller (dweller@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM) wrote:
: Fed OOPS ... OOPS!  We forgot to include Ada!

They forgot C++ too.  Gee, does this mean that C++ is dying?  ;-)

Seriously, you may notice that neither ParcPlace's Visual Works
ads and IBM's VisualAge ads mention the Smalltalk language.
They both talk about developing object-oriented, client-server
applications.

The implication is that the product is important for their
branding, not the language.

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Robert Dewar]

Well I guess we must be doing *something* right to draw such fire from
the eminent Greg Aharonian and Colin James III :-)

Just so everyone else has a clear picture of what ACT is up to, the idea is
to generate continuing support for the development of GNAT by offering
commercial support services to any users of GNAT who need such commercial
support. 

Two important points here. 

First: GNAT will continue to be freely available, any maintenance we do,
including any fixes, modifications and improvements made in response to
trouble reports from paid support customers, will be made available by
FTP and on CD/ROM etc to everyone.

Second: ACT won't in any sense own GNAT, it couldn't if it wanted to, which
it certainly doesn't. We provide only servce, and presumably people will
sign up for this support if they need it, and if ACT provides appropriate
value.

A complex product like GNAT is clearly out of range to be maintained purely
on the basis of volunteer efforts, and we are definitely interested in
seeing GNAT survive and prosper. We don't think that it is reasonable to
expect the government to continue to foot the cost of this maintenance, and
the Cygnus experience indicates that it is viable for a free software
product to survive and prosper on this basis.

Incidentally, we fully expect other companies to provide support and
services for GNAT. Already Labtek has forged ahead with the NT version,
and SGI is integrating the SGI version into their advanced software
environment tools. We are happy to work closely with anyone who wants
to get involved with the GNAT work.

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Harry Rockefeller]

In article <3l5655$4qk@goanna.cs.rmit.edu.au> Dale Stanbrough <dale@rmit.edu.au> writes:

   Organization: RMIT, Melbourne, Australia

   In article <3l3dgc$4gi@stout.entertain.com> Colin James III,
   cjames@stout.entertain.com writes:
   >>Greg Aharonian writes:

   >>   Coming from someone who has received millions of dollars from the DoD
   >>for GNAT, the results of which you are now using to launch a business,
   >>your hypocrisy shows once again.
   >>
   >>Get the DoD to stake me the same amount of money, and then let see who
   >>can do the most to benefit Ada.  But as one of the troughers, stick to
   >>troughing.

   As someone involved in getting Ada introduced to a course, I can assure
   you
   that the availability of Gnat Ada has helped a lot. The students also
   appreciate
   its availability and pricing :-).

An Australian as well as U.S. student would enjoy the *pricing*.
This is because this price is not the cost.  U.S. taxpayers are footing
most of the bill.  The rest is deferred to future U.S, taxpayers.  I
can't really blame you for missing Greg's point.  I too was happy to
get government help to put me through college.  But now that I work
for a not-dependent-on-gov't-money profitable business and have
children of my own I find I have clearer thinking.

upper class => future oriented

P.S. Isn't the smiley supposed to look like (-: from your side of the
world? ;-)
--
Harry Rockefeller  | We all have our opinions    | FlightSafety International
harryr@ssd.fsi.com | but Truth is not debatable. | Simulation Systems Division
(918) 251-0500     | Isaiah 55:6&9 the Bible     | Broken Arrow, OK 74012    

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Vladimir Vukicevic]

In article <3l3dgc$4gi@stout.entertain.com> cjames@stout.entertain.com (Colin James III) writes:
> In article <SRCTRAN.95Mar26113435@world.std.com>,
> Gregory Aharonian <srctran@world.std.com> wrote:
> >   Coming from someone who has received millions of dollars from the DoD
> >for GNAT, the results of which you are now using to launch a business,
> >your hypocrisy shows once again.
> > <Irrelevant flamage from Greg removed to protect reader's sanity>
> 
> I concur.  What ACT is doing is unconscionable, dopey, and wrong.  
> Besides, GNAT isn't Ada95 by a long shot.
> 
> To have seen Ed Schoenberg (ACT crony of Robert Dewar) as an Ada rep at 
> TOOLS ... <Irrelevant flamage from Colin again removed to protect
> reader's sanity [and to keep down their lunch, obviously.]>

Greg, Colin, why don't you two pool the money you spend on your
Internet accounts, and take out a nice big Ada ad in some magazine, or
in some other way advertise Ada to people who might not get a chance
to see it otherwise. (From the amount of postings you churn out, this
shouldn't be a problem cost-wise.) Then, you can sit back and relax,
knowing that 1) You've done the Ada world a big favor by advertising
the language; 2) You're following your own teachings, and spending
some of your own money instead of the "millions of dollars from the
DoD"; and 3) You've done the majority of other readers of
comp.lang.ada a huge favor.

	- Vladimir

Re: Fed OOPS ... OOPS! We forgot to include Ada!

[Richard A. O'Keefe]

harryr@ssd.fsi.com (Harry Rockefeller) writes:
>An Australian as well as U.S. student would enjoy the *pricing*.
[of GNAT]
>This is because this price is not the cost.  U.S. taxpayers are footing
>most of the bill.  The rest is deferred to future U.S, taxpayers.

I would remind US readers of comp.lang.ada that not all programmers in
the US were _trained_ in the US.  I myself worked happily in the US for
about 4 four years, and in that company, about half of the technical
staff were US trained.  The rest of the technical people came from
Portugal, England, New Zealand, the Middle East, and yes, even Australia.

If Australian students learn using GNAT, what happens to US interests?
(1) The demand for Ada products and services in Australia goes up.
    Is there any reason why US businesses cannot compete in this market?
(2) The supply of good Ada-trained programmers available for hire by US
    businesses operating in US territory goes up.
(3) The supply of good Ada-trained programmers available for hire by US
    businesses operating in Australia (and there are quite a few) goes up.  
(4) The defence forces of a US ally are able to hire people trained in the
    use of Ada, which means that US military products are more saleable in
    this country.
(5) Ada-bashers lose the famous excuse "Ada isn't used outside the DoD, so
    we can ignore it", which gives Ada a better chance in the US, which
    helps the US software industry...
( ) ...

Human life is not a zero-sum game.
-- 
"The complex-type shall be a simple-type."  ISO 10206:1991 (Extended Pascal)
Richard A. O'Keefe; http://www.cs.rmit.edu.au/~ok; RMIT Comp.Sci.