Re: Point a beginner in the right direction? Cheap bare-board to run with a RTOS for running ADA

[Simon Clubley <clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP>]

On 2013-07-08, Dmitry A. Kazakov <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> wrote:
> On Mon, 08 Jul 2013 12:54:56 +0200, G.B. wrote:
>
>> Non-modern hardware is as cheap as a plastic spoon!
>
> That is why it is not available. Fetch me an i486 board.
>  
>> Price is a convincing argument when the effect of the embedded
>> system is simple.
>
> Not really. In fact embedded boards are far more expensive than consumer's
> boards. An industrial Atom board has the price of a complete PC with ten
> times more memory and higher performance.
>

If that's what you think, then it's time for you to become enlightened,
Dmitry. :-)

Start here:

https://www.olimex.com/Products/

When people come to comp.lang.ada and talk about wanting to learn Ada and
get it running in a bare metal environment, then quite often they are
talking about these types of boards, not the safety critical ones with
a price tag to match.

Not everyone needs the industrial type boards you obviously need during
your work, and there is a _vast_ embedded world of which your industrial
type environment is only a small part.

>> If Ada vendors wish to loose all but the market for expensive high
>> end systems, then that's their choice.
>
> It is not their choice. It is the board vendors who determine what is in
> the BSP. No Ada vendor has the resources to port it on every possible
> board.
>

There's nothing to stop a end user programmer writing their own BSP; this
appears to be a common capability for RTOS environments. I've written 2-3
BSPs for RTEMS over the years.

Simon.

-- 
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Microsoft: Bringing you 1980s technology to a 21st century world