Re: Ada subset -- why not?

[gauthier@unilim.fr (Michel Gauthier)]

In article <vijay-0102951423400001@vijay.chinalake.navy.mil>,
vijay@nawc690.chinalake.navy.mil (Jim Vijay) wrote:

>>  [...] why is there not an Ada-lite on the market? [...] 

It is a very old dabate.
My experience is that we should take great care about Ada subsets, even
in the case of teaching uses. Let me argue.

Of course, students do not build complex programs, which leads some
lecturers to think that an Ada subset is sufficient for them.
My experience is that some basic libraries should be given to the students,
so that they can experiment not-invented-here components very early
in their life. To be used in this frame, these components should be very
robust (exceptions, messages, exotic cases), and I could never reach
the expected level of robustness with an Ada subset.

Of course, real-time features and representation clauses might be
avoided, but all of genericity, exceptions, overloading, tasking, VERY
strong typing have to be kept in the basic language.

-- 
Michel Gauthier - Laboratoire d'informatique - 123 avenue Albert Thomas
F-87060 Limoges - fax +33()55457315
----- Are the messages that objects exchange also objects ? -----