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-Thread: 103376,5b3cb1d740c0b77f,start X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news1.google.com!postnews2.google.com!not-for-mail From: rod.chapman@praxis-cs.co.uk (Rod Chapman) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: ANN: New technical paper from Ada Europe 2004 now available Date: 30 Jun 2004 07:46:23 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: 62.173.119.178 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1088606789 20264 127.0.0.1 (30 Jun 2004 14:46:29 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 30 Jun 2004 14:46:29 +0000 (UTC) Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:2007 Date: 2004-06-30T07:46:23-07:00 List-Id: I'm pleased to announce the availability of two new technical papers that were recently presented at Ada Europe 2004. Both are available now in PDF at www.sparkada.com Note that the first of these joinly took the best paper award at the conference. The latter was awarded best presentation. "High-Integrity Ada in a UML and C World", Peter Amey and Neil White Abstract The dictates of fashion and the desire to use "hot" technology not only affects software developers but also influences potential customers. Where once a client was just content to accept something that worked (actually, would be delighted to have something that worked) now they are concerned about the means by which it was constructed; not just in the sense of was it well-enough constructed but in the more malign sense of was fashionable technology used. This paper shows how the customer's desire to use de facto standards such as UML and their wish to use language such as C?perhaps to support a small or unusual processor; to integrate with other subsystems; for the perceived comfort of future portability; ot for other, non-technical reasons?can be aligned with the professional engineer's need to use those tools and languages which are truly appropriate for rigorous software development. "High-Integrity Interfacing to Programmable Logic with Ada" Adrian J Hilton, Praxis Critical Systems Limited and Jon G Hall, Open University. Abstract Programmable Logic Devices (PLDs) are now common components of safety-critical systems, and are increasingly used for safety-related or safety-critical functionality. Recent safety standards demand similar rigour in PLD specification, design and verification to that in critical software design. Existing PLD development tools and techniques are inadequate for the higher integrity levels. In this paper we examine the use of Ada as a design language for PLDs. We analyse earlier work on Ada-to-HDL compilation and identify where it could be improved. We show how program fragments written in the SPARK Ada subset can be efficiently and rigorously translated into PLD programs, and how a SPARK Ada program can be effectively interfaced to a PLD program. The techniques discussed are then applied to a substantial case study and some preliminary conclusions are drawn from the results.