Re: ARG asks Ada Community for API Proposals.

[Dale Stanbrough <dstanbro@bigpond.net.au>]

In article <uet84otoe3m4c4@corp.supernews.com>,
 "Randy Brukardt" <randy@rrsoftware.com> wrote:

> Speaking for myself (not necessarily the ARG), I don't think you should
> read too much into those criteria. They certainly were not intended to
> be an exclusive list. To my mind, the important point is that the
> libraries have a community consensus (where "community" is intentionally
> vague), and are not just something written by someone in their basement.
> If Grace has a consensus, then it will necessarily meet the usage
> criteria, if not immedately, certainly by the time the standard gets
> done.
> 
> As far as point 2 goes, it seems to me that the ease-of-use criteria got
> omitted. I don't think anyone wants complex solutions where simple ones
> will do. Going overboard on functionality can be a mistake, because if
> the package is too large, people will have trouble using it.


What are the likely new features of Ada though? If we have 
can have some form of implicit instantiation of generics, or
if Ada provides fully fledged constructors (not just functions)
or if Ada deprecates the use of some features, then all of these
could well affect the design of any class libraries.

Perhaps Ada needs to have a library standardisation process
which is 180 degrees out of phase with the language standardisation,
so that we can incorporate features placed into the language.

Dale