From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00, REPLYTO_WITHOUT_TO_CC autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,c5f189513e1f5f8a X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,domainid0,public,usenet X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news2.google.com!news2.google.com!Xl.tags.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local01.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.bt.com!news.bt.com.POSTED!not-for-mail NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 22 Mar 2009 09:42:53 -0500 From: Brian Drummond Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Ada as a first language Date: Sun, 22 Mar 2009 14:44:05 +0000 Reply-To: brian@shapes.demon.co.uk Message-ID: References: <01d59695$0$20632$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com> X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.7/32.534 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Usenet-Provider: http://www.giganews.com X-AuthenticatedUsername: NoAuthUser X-Trace: sv3-an66Vc7nboNQpAACLOfOdfNhl0p5GD1tDu5UjMmrVH6IkqrEuhPVEd131qbSETzcfBONuj/fcyIcdRA!a0sPjqCWa6bJumAgMR8MoEAIjUKY456v1kGSfmhv7BwCOKk/+1863BZ9P3g9DOnFPuw7KP9nfe3n!Iee0 X-Complaints-To: abuse@btinternet.com X-DMCA-Complaints-To: abuse@btinternet.com X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Postfilter: 1.3.39 Xref: g2news2.google.com comp.lang.ada:5190 Date: 2009-03-22T14:44:05+00:00 List-Id: On Sun, 22 Mar 2009 13:26:51 +1100, Chris wrote: >Hi All, > >I am a mechanical engineer, and I have become interested in robotics >embedded systems. I have little experience in this area other that >plugging in electronic components and clicking run. > >I had recently started to learn Java, when I found out about Ada. From >what I have seen of Ada, I really like the way that the language is >structured, that is has a proper standard, and it seems like a good >choice for the types of projects that I have in mind. > >I have down loaded GNAT with the GPS IDE, as well as the work bench for >eclipse (although I haven't had it working yet), and have been trying to >work my way through the examples. > >My concern lies in the smaller community for Ada. As an >amateur/hobbyist, am I biting off more than I need to? I would have to say that, in itself, it's easily the best language for the job. However it is something of a minority language; you will be limited in the support and tools you can find for it. For example if you are interested in robotics you may wish to develop for embedded processors, e.g. to read position sensors and control stepper motors (or BLDC or induction motors, depending how serious you are!) Of all the small embedded controllers, only one family (the Atmel AVR) has an Ada compiler targetting it. (google AVR Ada) As it happens the AVR is quite a good choice - there are low-cost boards, programmers, and peripherals (sensors, steppers) for it (www.arduino.cc) , and it is used in a number of popular robotics projects (http://www.reprap.org) HOWEVER I can't find ANY tutorial on putting these (AVR Ada and Arduino) together. It can't be too hard. And it looks like an ideal match. But ... no, I haven't tried it either. One piece of good news is that Ada interfaces to C fairly easily. Assuming that works in the AVR-Ada compiler (can anyone confirm that?) you can use any C libraries (e.g. to talk to peripherals) on a "fit and forget" basis, from Ada. - Brian