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From: dewar@merv.cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)
Subject: Re: decline of Ada?
Date: 1996/11/21
Message-ID: <dewar.848578278@merv>#1/1
X-Deja-AN: 197885831
references: <199611121040.FAA16264@bb.iu.net> <3293BBCF.3D78@brainiac.com>
organization: New York University
newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1996-11-21T00:00:00+00:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>


JBisaillon complains about not being able to find jobs programming Ada,
and suggests that Ada programmers are no more productive than C programmers
and cost more.

Not even the most ardent fan of Ada would suggest that knowledge of Ada
per se makes programmers either employable or productive. As is the case
in most fields today, competence counts highly. There is no question that
there are jobs for competent Ada programmers.

The interesting question is whether there are jobs for less competent
C, Java etc programmers. It might temporarily be the case that this is
so, but all our experience says that this will only be temporary. We
see this happening all the time in the computer field. There is a 
shortage of people, and for a while, anyone who can spell the name
of the currrent language (COBOL one time, now Java) can get a job,
but that VERY quickly passes.

You should see the current generation of students, they are very sharp,
and they are there in numbers, and they know an amazing amount very early.
There will be little room for anyone but highly competent programmers
in any area.

As for being advised to take Ada off your resume, that can mean any number
of things

1. the advice is bad, and you are not beeing steered in the right direction
2. your other constraints (location etc) make it hard to find Ada jobs
3. your best talents are in other areas, so it is best to emaphasize them

Your factual information is rather dubious. Your model of non-productive
DoD contractors using $25K C coders and asking for waivers to use C
(on this basis???) is if not non-existent, certainly nothing like the 
normal situation. If the place you worked was like this, then it sounds
like some (drastic) downsizing was quite appropriate!