From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,c4dceed07079aa0e X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2004-02-29 11:51:18 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!wn51feed!worldnet.att.net!attbi_s53.POSTED!not-for-mail From: tmoran@acm.org Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: An article in Science magazine about the future of References: X-Newsreader: Tom's custom newsreader Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: 67.161.24.134 X-Complaints-To: abuse@comcast.net X-Trace: attbi_s53 1078084278 67.161.24.134 (Sun, 29 Feb 2004 19:51:18 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 29 Feb 2004 19:51:18 GMT Organization: Comcast Online Date: Sun, 29 Feb 2004 19:51:18 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:5954 Date: 2004-02-29T19:51:18+00:00 List-Id: > I can't access full text of the article as well (they charge $10 per article > for non-subscribers), ... You aren't missing much, IMO. Here's my summary: Software is important - worldwide current investment of trillions of dollars. It has an error rate of 10 .. 10,000 /million lines, so there are between 5 million and 50 billion bugs. There are 5 million programmers, producing an average 5K lines/yr. [and presumably between 50 and 0.05 bugs/year] The "How Programming Languages Have Evolved" section gives a 600 word history of programming languages. Ada is not mentioned. Trends mentions Simplicity, Robustness, Portability, Internet compatibility, and Concurrency. It mentions C# and Java. Part of Simplicity is having a syntax familiar to C and C++ programmers. Languages of the Future mentions application specificity and research on speech, gesture, etc. "Each field has at least one language that is used primarily by the practioners of that field. Most college students today are familiar with languages for editing documents, formatting papers, creating presentations, and performing calculations." Making Software Systems More Reliable mentions things like N-version programming but "...programmers tend to make the same kind of mistakes even if they don't communicate with one another." "Researchers are actively exploring many techniques to make more reliable software systems, keeping the frailties of human programmers in mind. Static type checking and model checking provide promising avenues for detecting errors earlier in the software life cycle." Resilient, or even self-correcting, software will take some time.