Re: Ada and Automotive Industry

[dewar@merv.cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)]

Ken Tindall says

"I think we should have a little respect for the Boeing point-of-view.
It doesn't help them to be continuously pushed by academics to
adopting unsound techniques. They have to live with the consequences of
screwing up big time."

In any language you only use tools that are appopriate to the job. The use
of Ada tasking, and various tasking constructs works well in some situations,
and is inappropriate to others. 

The important thing is to base the deisions on what tools to use on well
founded technical judgment, and not vague (and quite misleading) generalities
like "Ada tasking is too inefficient to use". 

I was struck at one meeting I was at with project leaders from various
avionics groups. One group mentioned that it was using Ada tasking for
critical flight control functions, and one of the other groups reacted
amazed. Turned out they had not even *considered* using Ada tasking?
Why not? Because they had heard that it was too inefficient.

You do not have to be an academic to object to this method of
decision making.

I would guess that the Boeing decision makes perfect sense in the context
of their application, but to draw vague generalizations from it makes
little sense. You have to carefuly evaluate in the context of your own
project what tools should be used, and you will do a better job of this
evaluation if you base it on technical facts and good technical understanding
rather than rumours!