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=-0.4 required=5.0 tests=AC_FROM_MANY_DOTS,BAYES_00 autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,3689d3c938c589e5 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2002-01-25 07:10:19 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!btnet-peer1!btnet-peer0!btnet!psiuk-p2!psiuk-p3!uknet!psiuk-n!news.pace.co.uk!nh.pace.co.uk!not-for-mail From: "Marin David Condic" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Directory listings and path names Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 09:47:10 -0500 Organization: Posted on a server owned by Pace Micro Technology plc Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: dhcp-200-133.miami.pace.co.uk X-Trace: nh.pace.co.uk 1011970032 26492 136.170.200.133 (25 Jan 2002 14:47:12 GMT) X-Complaints-To: newsmaster@news.cam.pace.co.uk NNTP-Posting-Date: 25 Jan 2002 14:47:12 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4522.1200 Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:19307 Date: 2002-01-25T14:47:12+00:00 List-Id: I agree that it is really low hanging fruit to establish a package spec and declare it to be a de facto standard. Especially for something that doesn't involve a half-million lines of code to implement and can be reasonably supported on most operating systems. There's no reason that it has to even wait for a language revision. It could be viewed this way: If the package spec outlined in the AI for file manipulation is reasonably complete and the various Ada vendors simply started shipping it with their product, then it effectively becomes an informal part of the language. Doing so allows for some experimentation and experience to be built up with it such that when the time comes to include it in a future standard, it will be well understood and reliable. I would go further to say that there are probably a large number of such packages that could be candidates for such an inclusion. And I don't think that they necessarily have to be in an annex of the ARM if the reigning view is that it is too hard to write a formal specification that can be used for validation. A reference implementation might be sufficient so long as it is widely adopted. The point being that the more things that a developer can leverage in building applications, the more useful the language becomes and the easier it is to adopt. If other languages provide libraries of useful stuff and Ada doesn't out of some sense of strict adherence to formal validation, then other languages will get used and Ada will not. Why wait for Ada0X? MDC -- Marin David Condic Senior Software Engineer Pace Micro Technology Americas www.pacemicro.com Enabling the digital revolution e-Mail: marin.condic@pacemicro.com Web: http://www.mcondic.com/ "Brian Rogoff" wrote in message news:Pine.BSF.4.40.0201250010340.88868-100000@bpr.best.vwh.net... > > Anyways, I know about the AI and I'm just making noise :-). I usually make > noise about things which will sadly never change about Ada. However, this > is really low hanging fruit and it is a shame that we don't have it now! >