Do you do ASIS?

Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

I've spent the last year and a half involved in the ASIS world with
several clients:
writing applications, porting applications, working with ACT/GNAT
and OCS to wring out/roll out/etc. their versions of ASIS 2.0,
summarizing my lessons learned in a couple of ASIS-related papers, etc.

Frankly speaking, it wasn't until a few years ago that I really
knew what ASIS was all about. I am trying to assess, as a supplier
of ASIS tools/expertise/etc and a general ASIS enthusiast, and
determine the scope of the ASIS market.

   I have touched base with several of the vendors and there are
   varying degrees of interest and disinterest in pursuing any hard
   marketing of ASIS
   to their customers, for varying reasons.


   On one hand, maybe I should simply trust the vendors. They should
   know their customers best.

   Or ... as with the two clients for which I have done ASIS work,
   .... there is such a paucity of "ASIS talent" out there that most
   clients have given up on utilizing ASIS

   Or ... the compiler vendor for a given customer is just not doing
   anything with ASIS
   (and if the users knew that other vendors WERE supplying ASIS ..
    they might give that vendor a look see ...)

   Or ..... there is not a market, or they have all the tools that
   they need or are choosing not to port them to Ada95.

   Or ASIS is a solution chasing a problem, and the number of ASIS
   tools that can be written is a bounded set and supplying ASIS
   to customers really doesn't do the customers much good.

   Or ... something else ...

Any thoughts?

Thanx

Joe Wisniewski     Commercial Software Solutions, Ltd (CSS)
   wisniew@acm.org
    (Voice/Msg)   877/301-538-0136
    (Fax)         301-987-9709

"Dico tibi verum, libertas optima rerum;
Nunquam servili sub nexu vivito, fili." - WW


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[David W. Glessner]

In article <89ot3v$og9$1@nnrp1.deja.com>,
  Joe Wisniewski <wisniew@acm.org> wrote:

> Any thoughts?

What's ASIS?  :-)/2

How would ASIS help me do my job better?  I think ASIS (or something
like it) may be behind the scenes when I use Apex's and
GNAT/emacs/ada-mode's source navigation facilities, but what else
can it be used for?

I tried Apex's "Visit ASIS" feature the other day, hoping it
would tell me which "/" operator the compiler had chosen for a
particular expression.  No luck.  Granted, maybe I should have
RTFM.

--
David


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

In article <89pbt1$448$1@nnrp1.deja.com>,
  David W. Glessner <david_glessner@my-deja.com> wrote:
> In article <89ot3v$og9$1@nnrp1.deja.com>,
>   Joe Wisniewski <wisniew@acm.org> wrote:
>
> > Any thoughts?
>
> What's ASIS?  :-)/2
>
> How would ASIS help me do my job better?  I think ASIS (or something
> like it) may be behind the scenes when I use Apex's and
> GNAT/emacs/ada-mode's source navigation facilities, but what else
> can it be used for?

   Standards checkers
   Calling trees
   Browsers
   Type dictionary tools
      (Say you have to store off data objects and send them to an
       off-line application that has to interpret the data/
       walk the bits.)
   Style enforcers
   Any kind of tool that needs to interrogate the source
     (All occurrences of ..... whatever)
   Testing tools/driver generator tools, etc.
      (This is an area that I think might have the most appeal.)
    Dependency analysis
   Tasking Analysis
   Any kind of static analysis
   Answer to "Which types have a size that can not be guaranteed to
     be known at compile time.
   etc.

>
> I tried Apex's "Visit ASIS" feature the other day, hoping it
> would tell me which "/" operator the compiler had chosen for a
> particular expression.  No luck.  Granted, maybe I should have
> RTFM.
>
> --
> David
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.
>


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Steven Hovater]

Hi David

You need to either set an environment variable - e.g.
setenv APEX_ENABLE_ASIS true
in your .cshrc, then start Apex. (this is from
my memory) or have your Apex admin enable it.

We used this heavily in a consulting gig I did recently.
If you're on an HP, you may have to have your sys admin
bump up the kernel stack size, but Solaris seems to rock.
I haven't tried this with Apex on the AIX, Tru64 or SGI platforms,
but I expect it to work.

Regarding ASIS and Apex - the ASIS 1.x stuff is supported in
Apex, likely to be so for a LONG time, and there is now also support
for  ASIS 2.0 in the Apex 3.2 series.

Still having a problem, gimme a shout/email. ASIS is tough to get started
in,
but the power it offers is incredible, once you're up the learning curve.

Regards,
Steve

--
--
Steven Hovater
svh@rational.com
Software Engineering Consultant
Phone/fax:781-676-2565/2500
Rational Software
Pager: 888-906-2209
83 Hartwell Ave, Lexington, MA
Amateur radio: AA1YH


"David W. Glessner" <david_glessner@my-deja.com> wrote in message
news:89pbt1$448$1@nnrp1.deja.com...
> In article <89ot3v$og9$1@nnrp1.deja.com>,
>   Joe Wisniewski <wisniew@acm.org> wrote:
>
> > Any thoughts?
>
> What's ASIS?  :-)/2
>
> How would ASIS help me do my job better?  I think ASIS (or something
> like it) may be behind the scenes when I use Apex's and
> GNAT/emacs/ada-mode's source navigation facilities, but what else
> can it be used for?
>
> I tried Apex's "Visit ASIS" feature the other day, hoping it
> would tell me which "/" operator the compiler had chosen for a
> particular expression.  No luck.  Granted, maybe I should have
> RTFM.
>
> --
> David
>
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[tmoran]

A year or so ago I considered using ASIS to help automate the
building of indexes for Claw's Help system.  At that time, it
didn't appear ready, so I used AYACC instead.  Would ASIS today
be an appropriate tool for that kind of job?

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

In article <9vTv4.602$zz5.39941@news.pacbell.net>,
  tmoran@bix.com wrote:
> A year or so ago I considered using ASIS to help automate the
> building of indexes for Claw's Help system.  At that time, it
> didn't appear ready, so I used AYACC instead.  Would ASIS today
> be an appropriate tool for that kind of job?
>

  Which vendor's compiler? That is ultimately the question.

Joe


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[tmoran]

> Which vendor's compiler?  That is ultimately the question.

  I don't understand.  Shouldn't a program that makes ASIS calls
to fetch information work identically regardless of whose
compiler, or whose ASIS implementation, it is calling?  (Not that
there seem to be all that many choices...)  Or are you talking
about efficiency and ease of use?

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

In article <VyXv4.2560$w9.46549@news.pacbell.net>,
  tmoran@bix.com wrote:
> > Which vendor's compiler?  That is ultimately the question.
>
>   I don't understand.  Shouldn't a program that makes ASIS calls
> to fetch information work identically regardless of whose
> compiler, or whose ASIS implementation, it is calling?  (Not that
> there seem to be all that many choices...)  Or are you talking
> about efficiency and ease of use?
>

   In an ideal world, yes. The point is that not all of the vendors
   support ASIS (especially the ASIS 2.0 interface for Ada95).
   So, which vendor you use is critical to the answer to the question.

   ACT has implemented pretty much all of the 2.0 interface including
   the Data Decomposition package. OCS is working on this. Rational
   has several versions of ASIS depending on whether you are using
   Ada83 or Ada95. The last time that I talked to someone at
   DDC-I or RR, they had no plans on rolling to the 2.0 spec.

   AFAIK, no other vendors have plans on implementing
   the 2.0 interface (although some support the 1.0 interface at
   various levels.) , for various reasons, I suppose. Some are
   supporting their customers needs for ASIS tools directly, some
   don't see a market, some .... I don't know. (I'm not intentionally
   leaving anyone's products out of this discussion. Please chime in.)

   This all goes to the core of my original post.

Joe



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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

In article <89pkls$abk$1@nnrp1.deja.com>,
  Joe Wisniewski <wisniew@acm.org> wrote:
> In article <VyXv4.2560$w9.46549@news.pacbell.net>,
>   tmoran@bix.com wrote:
> > > Which vendor's compiler?  That is ultimately the question.
> >
> >   I don't understand.  Shouldn't a program that makes ASIS calls
> > to fetch information work identically regardless of whose
> > compiler, or whose ASIS implementation, it is calling?  (Not that
> > there seem to be all that many choices...)  Or are you talking
> > about efficiency and ease of use?
> >
>
>    In an ideal world, yes. The point is that not all of the vendors
>    support ASIS (especially the ASIS 2.0 interface for Ada95).
>    So, which vendor you use is critical to the answer to the question.
>
>    ACT has implemented pretty much all of the 2.0 interface including
>    the Data Decomposition package. OCS is working on this. Rational
>    has several versions of ASIS depending on whether you are using
>    Ada83 or Ada95. The last time that I talked to someone at
>    DDC-I or RR, they had no plans on rolling to the 2.0 spec.
>
>    AFAIK, no other vendors have plans on implementing
>    the 2.0 interface (although some support the 1.0 interface at
>    various levels.)

     I believe Aonix also has the 2.0 interface, but I believe that
     that they don't have the data decomposition annex. Sorry, Steve,
     didn't mean to slight you guys.

     Joe

>    , for various reasons, I suppose. Some are
>    supporting their customers needs for ASIS tools directly, some
>    don't see a market, some .... I don't know. (I'm not intentionally
>    leaving anyone's products out of this discussion. Please chime in.)
>
>    This all goes to the core of my original post.
>
> Joe
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.
>


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Robert A Duff]

Does ASIS allow you to find the place in the source code that
corresponds to pieces of the program?  Does it allow you to get the text
of comments?

- Bob

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

In article <wccsny4ue0h.fsf@world.std.com>,
  Robert A Duff <bobduff@world.std.com> wrote:
> Does ASIS allow you to find the place in the source code that
> corresponds to pieces of the program?

  If I understand your question, yes.
  That is, what line of what file is procedure a.b at?

>Does it allow you to get the
text
> of comments?

  There are queries for both commented and non_commented images.
  So, AFAIK, the answer to that is also yes.

  (ASIS folx?) Are there any implementation-dependent issues with
  comments?

   Joe

>
> - Bob
>


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Michael Garrett]

For the new to Ada, What is ASIS. Up until now I thought that ASIS was a
compiler vendor!!

Thanks!

Michael C. Garrett

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Joe Wisniewski]

In article <89r1hq$jr0$1@ssauraab-i-1.production.compuserve.com>,
  "Michael Garrett" <michaelgarrett@csi.com> wrote:
>
>
> For the new to Ada, What is ASIS. Up until now I thought that ASIS was
a
> compiler vendor!!
>
> Thanks!
>
> Michael C. Garrett
>
>
Ada Semantic Interface Specification.

Visit www.acm.org/sigada/wg/asiswg/asiswg.html

Joe


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Lionel Draghi]

Michael Garrett wrote:
> 
> For the new to Ada, What is ASIS. Up until now I thought that ASIS was a
> compiler vendor!!
> 
...
This could be added to the Ada FAQ.

Lionel.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[William J. Thomas]

> Any thoughts?

Yes ASIS is a beautiful thing, it is essentially a set of Ada packages that
allows a user to treat an Ada library as a "database" of source code.
Personally I've been waiting for almost two decades for an ASIS
implementation for the Alsys/Aonix PC products.

 At one point in time it just might have made a difference by enabling
hungry end users to add much needed tools to an open architecture, but now,
most folks wouldn't know what to do with it.

Could it be marketed, yes any good tool can be marketed once you show folks
they need it and it solves problems.

Team up with someone who will create a dynamite GUI builder for Gnat, (I
mean a good one) and you could pave the way for a great environment !!!

William J. Thomas

wjthomas@WCVT.Com

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Robert Dewar]

In article <IDix4.59$f_1.12450@eagle.america.net>,
  "William J. Thomas" <wjthomas@wcvt.com> wrote:
> Team up with someone who will create a dynamite GUI builder
> for Gnat, (I mean a good one) and you could pave the way for a
> great environment !!!


Everyone can agree that they want a "good" GUI builder (it would
be hard to disagree, but stating this without details is not
much help). It would be constructive for example to explain
what you would like to see that is not provided by GLADE, the
GUI builder associated with GtkAda.

Robert Dewar
Ada Core Technologies


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Ehud Lamm]

On Wed, 8 Mar 2000, Robert Dewar wrote:

| It would be constructive for example to explain
|what you would like to see that is not provided by GLADE, the
|GUI builder associated with GtkAda.
|

I just downloaded GtkAda and tried it out a few minutes ago. It seems
quite nice, and powerful. However it did cause a general protection fault
a few times, so I am a bit worried. This is under win95, Gnat3.11 (I know,
sorry...) What failed was the generate source dialog of glade. 

Does this ring a bell to anyone?

Ehud Lamm mslamm@mscc.huji.ac.il
http://purl.oclc.org/NET/ehudlamm <== My home on the web 
Check it out and subscribe to the E-List- for interesting essays and more!

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Charles Hixson]

OK.  Here's my wish-list (apologies if I misunderstand glade).
In most of these I will be thinking of Win95 systems, since that is
what most of the applications that I build will probably end up on.
(Win3.1 support would be nice, but lets be reasonable :-)
1)  It should be able to be used in the generation of stand-alone
programs that do not require a separate library to have been
previously installed in the computer.  (My main quarrel with gtk is
that it requires that gtk have been previously installed ... and
sometimes I don't have the luxury to specify that.)
2) It should have a small footprint.  (Partial contradiction of 1,
sorry about that.  Both hold.)
3) It should be reducible to a text screen if necessary.  (The
comment earlier about:  If worst comes to worst, just declare an
80x23 array of characters ... [etc.])
4) It should be "embeddable" into fancier forms for use when they
are available.  (An example of this would be something that would
take one parameter that matches the built GUI and another that
matches some add-on (say, a sprite that dances around the cursor, or
drop-shadows around every menu box, or...) and result in
"something"  (code?, object referenced?) that can be used to draw
the fancier form.  (It would be nice if the file format was
accommodating enough that these could be stacked with several layers
of upgraded being sandwiched together.)
5)  It should be a layered protocol, with many optional annexes, so
that no more than is needed has to be included with the compiled
program.

Of course the simple parts of this can be handled by the Ansi.sys
package with the ?Feldman? screen drawing extensions.  And the fancy
parts can be handled by Glade.  But from my position of ignorance it
doesn't appear that there is any smooth transition between the two
positions.  (Does Win2K come with GTK installed?  If so, then as the
decade passes most of this will become increasingly less relevant.
But since there are still Win3.1 machines, it may be awhile before I
can count on GTK being pre-installed.)

Robert Dewar wrote:

> In article <IDix4.59$f_1.12450@eagle.america.net>,
>   "William J. Thomas" <wjthomas@wcvt.com> wrote:
> > Team up with someone who will create a dynamite GUI builder
> > for Gnat, (I mean a good one) and you could pave the way for a
> > great environment !!!
>
> Everyone can agree that they want a "good" GUI builder (it would
> be hard to disagree, but stating this without details is not
> much help). It would be constructive for example to explain
> what you would like to see that is not provided by GLADE, the
> GUI builder associated with GtkAda.
>
> Robert Dewar
> Ada Core Technologies
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Robert Dewar]

In article <38C6D176.9A7AB6C7@earthlink.net>,
  Charles Hixson <charleshixsn@earthlink.net> wrote:

> 1)  It should be able to be used in the generation of
> stand-alon programs that do not require a separate library to
> have been previously installed in the computer.

This seems to be to be old style (DOS like) thinking, not
applicable to modern Windows environments, given the importance
of COM objects.

Any serious program distributed for Windows today is distributed
in installable form, most likely with install shield, and any
necessary libraries, DLL's etc can be installed automatically
as part of the installation process.

Virtually all distributed software for Windows is in this form,
so it seems quite unnecessary to try to accomodate anything
else. Note that the "Win 3.1 support would be nice" is also
evidence that this is thinking that comes from a bygone era :-)
The reference to Feldman's screen package also shows this
old style thinking, since this package is obviously quite
unsuitable for the generation of nice looking GUI's with
decent fonts etc.

The idea that you would have multiple applications installed
on a Windows 2000 machine all of which contained embedded
copies of complex graphics packages statically linked really
makes no sense.

So in fact it seems that you are asking for something far
different than what I thought was being discussed, namely
a very simple package that generates very crude fixed-width
dos-style interfaces (I really can't bring myself to call
these GUI's at all). That's certainly a reasonable thing
that someone might want in some case, but definitely GLADE
and similar GUI tools are not about satisfying this kind
of requirement.


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Charles Hixson]

Well, I suppose that it is "old style DOS thinking", but I need to
be able to stick the program on a floppy (zipped), mail it off to
another site, and depend on the receiver installing it correctly.  I
am barely able to depend on them copying the files to the same
directory they were in before (this will usually work, I suspect
that they usually copy everything to C:).  I definitely can't depend
on them doing anything more complex.  If I had the
time-money-equipment I could make use of an installer, and achieve
the effect that I want, but I'd need to run the installer the first
time, and I'm not there.

On machines that I set up, I happily use things that require set-up,
but on machines that I don't have any contact with, and that are
barely supported by the agency's tech department ... experience
indicates I can't depend on it.  Some of the machines have gone out
of service because they got so full of dust that they overheated
(these were 286's, but I've no reason to believe that things have
improved).  It turned out that the computer was being kept by the
open door of a fire-house.  The operator was more competent that
average for my users (he *WAS* a fireman), but it didn't occur to
him (or his supervisors, or his co-workers) that this would cause
any problem.  The first sign was when several diskettes in a row
wouldn't load.

So I feel that "DOS thinking" is appropriate for my situation.

Robert Dewar wrote:

> In article <38C6D176.9A7AB6C7@earthlink.net>,
>   Charles Hixson <charleshixsn@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> > 1)  It should be able to be used in the generation of
> > stand-alon programs that do not require a separate library to
> > have been previously installed in the computer.
>
> This seems to be to be old style (DOS like) thinking, not
> applicable to modern Windows environments, given the importance
> of COM objects.
>
> Any serious program distributed for Windows today is distributed
> in installable form, most likely with install shield, and any
> necessary libraries, DLL's etc can be installed automatically
> as part of the installation process.
>
> Virtually all distributed software for Windows is in this form,
> so it seems quite unnecessary to try to accomodate anything
> else. Note that the "Win 3.1 support would be nice" is also
> evidence that this is thinking that comes from a bygone era :-)
> The reference to Feldman's screen package also shows this
> old style thinking, since this package is obviously quite
> unsuitable for the generation of nice looking GUI's with
> decent fonts etc.
>
> The idea that you would have multiple applications installed
> on a Windows 2000 machine all of which contained embedded
> copies of complex graphics packages statically linked really
> makes no sense.
>
> So in fact it seems that you are asking for something far
> different than what I thought was being discussed, namely
> a very simple package that generates very crude fixed-width
> dos-style interfaces (I really can't bring myself to call
> these GUI's at all). That's certainly a reasonable thing
> that someone might want in some case, but definitely GLADE
> and similar GUI tools are not about satisfying this kind
> of requirement.
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Robert A Duff]

Robert Dewar <robert_dewar@my-deja.com> writes:

> Any serious program distributed for Windows today is distributed
> in installable form, most likely with install shield, and any
> necessary libraries, DLL's etc can be installed automatically
> as part of the installation process.

...usually overwriting an existing DLL with a newer version, with a
different set of bugs.  :-(

- Bob

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Ted Dennison]

In article <wccput1lcw6.fsf@world.std.com>,
  Robert A Duff <bobduff@world.std.com> wrote:
> Robert Dewar <robert_dewar@my-deja.com> writes:
>
> > Any serious program distributed for Windows today is distributed
> > in installable form, most likely with install shield, and any
> > necessary libraries, DLL's etc can be installed automatically
> > as part of the installation process.
>
> ...usually overwriting an existing DLL with a newer version, with a
> different set of bugs.  :-(

or better yet, an *older* version.

Always install Windows software in chronological order. :-)

--
T.E.D.

http://www.telepath.com/~dennison/Ted/TED.html


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Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Nick Roberts]

For example, the instructions that come with the latest (version 4.0)
Acrobat Reader from Adobe include: if you have version 3.2 installed, you
must manually uninstall this version before installing version 4.0,
otherwise [something to the effect that the system will crash]. Just great.
(And typical, too.)

--
Nick Roberts
http://www.adapower.com/lab/adaos


> > > Any serious program distributed for Windows today is distributed
> > > ...
> >
> > ...usually overwriting an existing DLL with a newer version, with a
> > different set of bugs.  :-(
>
> or better yet, an *older* version.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Florian Weimer]

"Nick Roberts" <nickroberts@callnetuk.com> writes:

> For example, the instructions that come with the latest (version 4.0)
> Acrobat Reader from Adobe include: if you have version 3.2 installed, you
> must manually uninstall this version before installing version 4.0,
> otherwise [something to the effect that the system will crash]. Just great.
> (And typical, too.)

Strange.  For quite a long time, I've been running Acrobat Reader 3.x
and 4.0 in parallel (I didn't even notice, until I saw two Acrobat
Reader windows having different toolbars on the same screen.)

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Samuel T. Harris]

Florian Weimer wrote:
> 
> "Nick Roberts" <nickroberts@callnetuk.com> writes:
> 
> > For example, the instructions that come with the latest (version 4.0)
> > Acrobat Reader from Adobe include: if you have version 3.2 installed, you
> > must manually uninstall this version before installing version 4.0,
> > otherwise [something to the effect that the system will crash]. Just great.
> > (And typical, too.)
> 
> Strange.  For quite a long time, I've been running Acrobat Reader 3.x
> and 4.0 in parallel (I didn't even notice, until I saw two Acrobat
> Reader windows having different toolbars on the same screen.)

I instructions I read were to the effect that if
I uninstall Acrobat 3 after installing Acrobat 4
then I would have to reinstall Acrobat 4.

I choose not in uninstall Acrobat 3 and Acrobat 4
works fine. If I do unintall Acrobat 3, then I'll
have to reinstall Acrobat 4.

-- 
Samuel T. Harris, Principal Engineer
Raytheon, Aerospace Engineering Services
"If you can make it, We can fake it!"

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Rush Kester]

You should check-out Aonix's ObjectAda for Windows Personal or
Professional editions.  Both have a GUI builder that's easy to use for
building MS Windows (95, NT, & 3.1) applications or the Java Virtual
Machine.  You can also target the MS-DOS environment, (but I don't think
the GUI builder can be used).  The cost of their compiler and a update
subscription is reasonalble.

They have a free "Special" edition that has a compiler and the GUI
builder, but you can save GUI builder's projects.
http://www.aonix.com/Products/CSDS/ada.download.html However, it should
be enough for you to get an idea of what is offered.  If you contact
Aonix you probably could arrange for an evaluation copy of either the
Personal or Professional edition.  See
http://www.aonix.com/Products/CSDS/csds.html

Rush Kester
Software Systems Engineer
AdaSoft at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab.
email:  rush.kester@jhuapl.edu
phone: (240) 228-3030 (live M-F 9:30am-4:30pm, voicemail anytime)
fax:      (240) 228-6779
http://hometown.aol.com/rwkester/myhomepage/index.html

-----------
Charles Hixson wrote:

> OK.  Here's my wish-list (apologies if I misunderstand glade).
> In most of these I will be thinking of Win95 systems, since that is
> what most of the applications that I build will probably end up on.
> (Win3.1 support would be nice, but lets be reasonable :-)
> 1)  It should be able to be used in the generation of stand-alone
> programs that do not require a separate library to have been
> previously installed in the computer.  (My main quarrel with gtk is
> that it requires that gtk have been previously installed ... and
> sometimes I don't have the luxury to specify that.)
> 2) It should have a small footprint.  (Partial contradiction of 1,
> sorry about that.  Both hold.)
> 3) It should be reducible to a text screen if necessary.  (The
> comment earlier about:  If worst comes to worst, just declare an
> 80x23 array of characters ... [etc.])
> 4) It should be "embeddable" into fancier forms for use when they
> are available.  (An example of this would be something that would
> take one parameter that matches the built GUI and another that
> matches some add-on (say, a sprite that dances around the cursor, or
> drop-shadows around every menu box, or...) and result in
> "something"  (code?, object referenced?) that can be used to draw
> the fancier form.  (It would be nice if the file format was
> accommodating enough that these could be stacked with several layers
> of upgraded being sandwiched together.)
> 5)  It should be a layered protocol, with many optional annexes, so
> that no more than is needed has to be included with the compiled
> program.
>
> Of course the simple parts of this can be handled by the Ansi.sys
> package with the ?Feldman? screen drawing extensions.  And the fancy
> parts can be handled by Glade.  But from my position of ignorance it
> doesn't appear that there is any smooth transition between the two
> positions.  (Does Win2K come with GTK installed?  If so, then as the
> decade passes most of this will become increasingly less relevant.
> But since there are still Win3.1 machines, it may be awhile before I
> can count on GTK being pre-installed.)
>
> Robert Dewar wrote:
>
> > In article <IDix4.59$f_1.12450@eagle.america.net>,
> >   "William J. Thomas" <wjthomas@wcvt.com> wrote:
> > > Team up with someone who will create a dynamite GUI builder
> > > for Gnat, (I mean a good one) and you could pave the way for a
> > > great environment !!!
> >
> > Everyone can agree that they want a "good" GUI builder (it would
> > be hard to disagree, but stating this without details is not
> > much help). It would be constructive for example to explain
> > what you would like to see that is not provided by GLADE, the
> > GUI builder associated with GtkAda.
> >
> > Robert Dewar
> > Ada Core Technologies
> >
> > Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> > Before you buy.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[William J. Thomas]

> You should check-out Aonix's ObjectAda for Windows Personal or
> Professional editions.  Both have a GUI builder that's easy to use for
> building MS Windows (95, NT, & 3.1) applications or the Java Virtual
> Machine.  You can also target the MS-DOS environment, (but I don't think
> the GUI builder can be used).  The cost of their compiler and a update
> subscription is reasonalble.

Actually that's what I use right now, its the best that's available with
support but it is still a long way from GUI heaven.  What I was looking for
was something as sophisticated as Visual Basic. Say what you want, but when
it comes to dropping in third party OCX components, nothing works like VB.
The only problem with VB is that once you get past the wonderful visual
design phase you are now stuck with a language that stinks to say the least.
After spending close to 18 years coding in Ada nothing else comes close.

But that doesn't mean I can't wish for an environment that rivals MS Visual
Studio for Ada with all the bells and whistles.


William J. Thomas
---------------------------
WJThomas@WCVT.Com

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Tarjei T. Jensen]

William J. Thomas wrote:
>What I was looking for
>was something as sophisticated as Visual Basic. Say what you want, but when
>it comes to dropping in third party OCX components, nothing works like VB.
>The only problem with VB is that once you get past the wonderful visual
>design phase you are now stuck with a language that stinks to say the least.
>After spending close to 18 years coding in Ada nothing else comes close.


Have you looked into the com stuff on http://www.adapower.com/ ? I am not into
windows programming, so I cannot say anything sensible about it except that it
exists.


Greetings,

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Jean-Pierre Rosen]

> Actually that's what I use right now, its the best that's available with
> support but it is still a long way from GUI heaven.  What I was looking
for
> was something as sophisticated as Visual Basic. Say what you want, but
when
> it comes to dropping in third party OCX components, nothing works like VB.
> The only problem with VB is that once you get past the wonderful visual
> design phase you are now stuck with a language that stinks to say the
least.
> After spending close to 18 years coding in Ada nothing else comes close.
>
A possible solution (actually used by one of my clients, worked quite well):
Design the user interface with VB, write the algorithmic part in Ada, and
communicate through CORBA.

--
---------------------------------------------------------
           J-P. Rosen (Rosen.Adalog@wanadoo.fr)
Visit Adalog's web site at http://pro.wanadoo.fr/adalog

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[David Botton]

An easier solution on Win32 is to use COM. Place your code in to an Ada COM
object (which takes about 5 minutes to spec in IDL and 2 seconds to generate
using CreateCOM) and access the Ada code naturally from VB or create forms
in a VB COM object and then take control of the VB forms by binding to them
using BindCOM.

Creating very functional GUIs for Ada by designing an HTML page (using your
favorite HTML editor, mine is notepad) and then using the COM tools to bind
to the DHTML model is also a very easy and functional solution.

There is also no reason that you can not combine GUI frameworks like GTKAda,
CLAW, or Windex by using a (20 line of code) MFC dll to hang the ActiveX
GUIs on an HWND (I have done it before).

David Botton


Jean-Pierre Rosen wrote in message <8ajajo$1ab$1@wanadoo.fr>...

>A possible solution (actually used by one of my clients, worked quite
well):
>Design the user interface with VB, write the algorithmic part in Ada, and
>communicate through CORBA.

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Robert Dewar]

In article <T4Vy4.242$3E2.55968@eagle.america.net>,
  "William J. Thomas" <wjthomas@wcvt.com> wrote:
> What I was looking for
> was something as sophisticated as Visual Basic. Say what you
want, but when
> it comes to dropping in third party OCX components, nothing
works like VB.

Check out what can be done with GNAT these days ...


Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.

Ada GUI Builders (was Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Rush Kester]

"William J. Thomas" wrote:

> > You should check-out Aonix's ObjectAda for Windows Personal or
> > Professional editions.  Both have a GUI builder that's easy to use for
> > building MS Windows (95, NT, & 3.1) applications or the Java Virtual
> > Machine.  You can also target the MS-DOS environment, (but I don't think
> > the GUI builder can be used).  The cost of their compiler and a update
> > subscription is reasonalble.
>
> Actually that's what I use right now, its the best that's available with
> support but it is still a long way from GUI heaven.  What I was looking for
> was something as sophisticated as Visual Basic. Say what you want, but when
> it comes to dropping in third party OCX components, nothing works like VB.
> The only problem with VB is that once you get past the wonderful visual
> design phase you are now stuck with a language that stinks to say the least.
> After spending close to 18 years coding in Ada nothing else comes close.
>
> But that doesn't mean I can't wish for an environment that rivals MS Visual
> Studio for Ada with all the bells and whistles.
>
> William J. Thomas
> ---------------------------
> WJThomas@WCVT.Com

You should check out David Botton's BINDCOM tool at http://www.adapower.com it
can generate an Ada binding to an .EXE, .DLL, or .OCX.

--

Rush Kester
Software Systems Engineer
AdaSoft at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab.
email:  rush.kester@jhuapl.edu
phone: (240) 228-3030 (live M-F 9:30am-4:30pm, voicemail anytime)
fax:      (240) 228-6779
http://hometown.aol.com/rwkester/myhomepage/index.html

Re: Do you do ASIS?

[Rush Kester]

I think another untapped market for ASIS is Independent Verification &
Validation (IV&V).  I'm working on an IV&V task and plan to use ASIS to
help develop special tools for the  static analysis of the source code.
Once I get over the significant learning curve, I hope to be able to build
tool that will permit  me to do "What if?" and "What about?" type questions
that arise periodically in this type of work.

There are some general purpose tools used in IV:&V work, which for example,
generate cross-references or allow interactive code navigation, but they
require a significant time or manual analysis.  With ASIS, once an analysis
tool is built, the same analysis can be performed for each new release or
on new projects with much less effort than is currently required.

Rush Kester
Software Systems Engineer
AdaSoft at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab.
email:  rush.kester@jhuapl.edu
phone: (240) 228-3030 (live M-F 9:30am-4:30pm, voicemail anytime)
fax:      (240) 228-6779
http://hometown.aol.com/rwkester/myhomepage/index.html


Joe Wisniewski wrote:

> I've spent the last year and a half involved in the ASIS world with
> several clients:
> writing applications, porting applications, working with ACT/GNAT
> and OCS to wring out/roll out/etc. their versions of ASIS 2.0,
> summarizing my lessons learned in a couple of ASIS-related papers, etc.
>
> Frankly speaking, it wasn't until a few years ago that I really
> knew what ASIS was all about. I am trying to assess, as a supplier
> of ASIS tools/expertise/etc and a general ASIS enthusiast, and
> determine the scope of the ASIS market.
>
>    I have touched base with several of the vendors and there are
>    varying degrees of interest and disinterest in pursuing any hard
>    marketing of ASIS
>    to their customers, for varying reasons.
>
>    On one hand, maybe I should simply trust the vendors. They should
>    know their customers best.
>
>    Or ... as with the two clients for which I have done ASIS work,
>    .... there is such a paucity of "ASIS talent" out there that most
>    clients have given up on utilizing ASIS
>
>    Or ... the compiler vendor for a given customer is just not doing
>    anything with ASIS
>    (and if the users knew that other vendors WERE supplying ASIS ..
>     they might give that vendor a look see ...)
>
>    Or ..... there is not a market, or they have all the tools that
>    they need or are choosing not to port them to Ada95.
>
>    Or ASIS is a solution chasing a problem, and the number of ASIS
>    tools that can be written is a bounded set and supplying ASIS
>    to customers really doesn't do the customers much good.
>
>    Or ... something else ...
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Thanx
>
> Joe Wisniewski     Commercial Software Solutions, Ltd (CSS)
>    wisniew@acm.org
>     (Voice/Msg)   877/301-538-0136
>     (Fax)         301-987-9709
>
> "Dico tibi verum, libertas optima rerum;
> Nunquam servili sub nexu vivito, fili." - WW
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.