Re: Future with Ada

[Eric Merritt <cyberlync@yahoo.com>]

> It doesn't cost any money, you can use it with your
> mouse,
> but you first have to do what you have to do for
> efficient
> use of _any_ decent IDE: read a few pages of
> documentation.
> 
> The thing is called  Ada mode for Emacs + GNAT ali
> files.
> You are not surprised, are you?

Ah, but one of the reasons the this discussion is
taking place is to attract new Ada programmers. Emacs
is a very unsexy thing, its multitude of commands and
somewhat cryptic use (from a new users perspective)
make it extreamly unfriendly for the first month or
so. This is bad for the language as a whole as it
requires a fair amount of commitment to learning the
editor even before a user really gives the language a
chance to prove itself. 

Personally I find emacs distasteful in the extreme, I
just don't tend to think in the way emacs requires.
Don't get me wrong, I realize the emacs is extremely
productive I just don't like it. I think allot of
programmers in my age group (mid-late twenties) feel
the same way. Most that I know started out in IDEs and
though we can use the command line and editors like
emacs well we generally don't choose to. It may be
that  this IDE becomes an entry point for Ada and
later in the learning process students realize the
power of emacs and move to that environment. In any
case, a good professional quality IDE will never hurt
Ada and can only help it.

At the moment I have been using code forge which has
good support for Ada and is not terribly expensive.
Its not quite as nice as an Ada dedicated IDE would be
but fits the bill for now.

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