Re: Ada for a programming newb.

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

Kyle Root <kappy044@myrealbox.com> writes:

> I was wondering if Ada would be suitable for me.  I've started to learn Java
> (and I actually understood most of it) but just gave up cause I found more
> interesting things to do and it seemed that I never could make time for it.
> But now I've got plenty of time and want to learn to program again.
> There doesn't seem to be as much documentation (so I'm a little confused as
> to how one'd go about learning it) as in some other languages but it is
> very easy to read and looks very pascal-like (I know because I've been
> looking at quite a few languages).
> What do you think?
> Thanks,
> Kyle

Programming is inherently difficult.  Among other lessons, experienced
programmers have learned that "the devil is in the details".  You may
get the general picture right, but you may (and indeed will) make
small mistakes in the details and your programs will fail as a result.
Different languages handle this problem differently.  Some languages
choose to be lax and forgiving to the beginning programmers, so as to
appear to be easy-going.  The price to pay is that they do not detect
your mistakes, and you have to look for them yourself when your
program fails for obscure reasons (which is called "debugging").  This
is for example the case of C and, to a lesser extent, Java.

By contrast, Ada is an old, picky lady who reviews your work very
closely and tries to point out your mistakes (she was the first
programmer in history, so she should know a good program from a bad
one :) ).  If you choose Ada, you will naturally learn to think
straight, and to be precise and systematic.  Those are good skills for
a programmer, which you can later apply to all programming languages.
I contend that an Ada programmer can adapt to pretty much any language
very easily, but the converse is not true.  If you start with Java,
the learning may at first seem easier but in fact you will learn less.
I guess it is up to you to decide which style suits you best.

There are intermediates between Java and Ada.  I would list just a few
languages here, but there are many more that you may want to explore.
From the most lax to the most strict:

C, Java, C++, Pascal, Modula-3, Ada.

If after reading this you are still interested in Ada, there is an
excellent book by John English, which is by the author's own words
"aimed (...) squarely at the beginning programmer learning Ada 95 as a
first language".  Here is the URL:
http://www.it.bton.ac.uk/staff/je/adacraft/.

Also look at the following portal sites, which will direct you to
additional resources:

http://www.adaic.com
http://www.adapower.com
http://www.adaworld.com

Hope this helps.

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.