Re: Ada in Debian: gnat-4.4 is in unstable; please test

[Ludovic Brenta <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org>]

Someone asked me privately, but I feel this is of interest to
everyone:
> Do you have plans to add gprbuild and ASIS also?

I have plans to update ASIS to the GNAT GPL 2009 version; this will be
part of the library transition that I announced here.  I will in fact
update all existing packages.

As for gprbuild, this is a new package and I'm not planning to do it
myself as I am in fact trying to concentrate on fewer packages.  If
someone is interested in packaging GPTBuild, please do not hesitate;
as I have said repeatedly:
- I will help would-be packagers of Ada software in Debian; just
contact me privately if you need pointers.
- you do not have to be a Debian Developer before you contribute (in
fact the opposite is true: you must own and maintain packages in
Debian before you are even considered for Debian Developer status).

The Debian release manager has admitted that his announcement[1]
concerning the new release schedule was premature.  So the plan for a
freeze in December 2009 is officially abandoned[2].  A new plan and
schedule are due in September.

[1] http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090729
[2] http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090730

This does have an impact on my own schedule and I am no longer in a
big hurry; I will await the decision in September and, based on that,
will decide on my own release goals.  Tentatively:

- enable support for multiarch (i.e. for i386/amd64 and others: emit
64-bit binaries on 32-bit platforms and vice-versa; for mips/mipsel,
emit little-endian code on big-endian platforms and vice-versa).  This
is a new feature in GCC 4.4.

- enable support for the Distributed Systems Annex through the
addition of PolyORB.  Xavier Grave and Reto Buerki are working on this
and have already managed to get CORBA and MOMA (Message-Oriented
Middleware Architecture) working.  I am sponsoring the package for
them.

The bottom line is: for now, please continue to test gnat-4.4 as
extensively as you can, and please consider helping out with a package
you are particularly interested in.  I have already received valuable
feedback in the form of bug reports (and encouragements, thanks for
that!) and I trust that Debian Squeeze will not only be worthy of
Debian's reputation, but its support for Ada will raise the bar even
higher.

--
Ludovic Brenta.