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=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Path: border1.nntp.dca3.giganews.com!border2.nntp.dca3.giganews.com!border4.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!goblin3!goblin1!goblin2!goblin.stu.neva.ru!reality.xs3.de!news.jacob-sparre.dk!loke.jacob-sparre.dk!pnx.dk!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: "Randy Brukardt" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Point a beginner in the right direction? Cheap bare-board to run with a RTOS for running ADA Date: Tue, 9 Jul 2013 15:30:37 -0500 Organization: Jacob Sparre Andersen Research & Innovation Message-ID: References: <8a3093bb-90b3-4081-9b0b-dfde5aa6b851@googlegroups.com> <993despcuk1d.1ifczvyo501px.dlg@40tude.net> <51da9a80$0$6561$9b4e6d93@newsspool4.arcor-online.net> <1lfymwgas7bnf$.kh3wyk2tncb0.dlg@40tude.net> <1bj6kquk0z8ak$.oyr1yls3ny3e.dlg@40tude.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: static-69-95-181-76.mad.choiceone.net X-Trace: loke.gir.dk 1373401843 6096 69.95.181.76 (9 Jul 2013 20:30:43 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@jacob-sparre.dk NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 9 Jul 2013 20:30:43 +0000 (UTC) X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.5931 X-RFC2646: Format=Flowed; Original X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2900.6157 X-Original-Bytes: 4358 Xref: number.nntp.dca.giganews.com comp.lang.ada:182395 Date: 2013-07-09T15:30:37-05:00 List-Id: "Simon Clubley" wrote in message news:krh26d$8b0$1@dont-email.me... > On 2013-07-09, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: ... > What is needed is to create a Ada compiler which will create code which > runs in bare metal mode on a number of specific architectures (ARM and > MIPS would be my personal initial preferences). I agree with Dmitry, this sounds like nonsense. Certainly you can write a cross-compiler, but it can't "target bare-metal". Most machines need a substantial RTS to support anything. The Z80s that we targeted when we started out didn't even support multiple and divide in hardware -- you would have been limited to plus and minus (and no arrays, as those require multiplying to do indexing) without an RTS. Early Janus/Ada was available for bare-metal (still is, nominally) -- we provided the source code of the RTS and customers could tailor it to their actual hardware board. But there was no way to make that process portable in any sense -- every hardware implementation was different. And nothing I've heard here suggests that anything has changed in that respect. So it makes sense to target a particular board (Lego Mindstorms, Raspberry PI), but targeting all boards is nonsense. > At this point, I'm beginning to think you are either trolling or just > refusing to accept (for whatever reason) that there's a vast embedded > market out there, outside of what you are used to, which could be a > target for Ada. I started out creating tiny Ada subsets, and I've come to believe that those do Ada far more harm than good. The only sort of Ada that can run on those targets is an emasculated Ada that is likely to repell, rather than attract people to "real" Ada down the road. (And yes, I feel that way about Spark and Ravenscar, too; those both are rooted in the technology limitations of the 1990s and one would hope that we can now move on to more generally useful things.) > Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP > Microsoft: Bringing you 1980s technology to a 21st century world And that's what Ada (and Linux) is doing, too. It's only become practical to use a lot of that 80s technology in very recent years. (Plus it works well, why change for the sake of change?) Why single out Microsoft for this? Besides, that is *exactly* what you want people to do (go back to 1980s Ada subsets); it is really silly to advocate in a message for doing the very thing that your signature is railing against. Randy.