Re: Ada's Slide To Oblivion ...

[Eric Merritt <cyberlync@yahoo.com>]

for those of us who do not live in san jose can you
post the content?

--- Richard Riehle <richard@adaworks.com> wrote:
> There was an article about software quality in last
> Sunday's
> San Jose Mercury News.   I wrote a letter to the
> editor in
> response to some of the assertions in the article.  
> The
> editorial page editor just contacted me and told me
> it would
> be in this Sunday's editorial section (Computing
> Section,
> probably).  I only mention Ada once, but it is a
> strong
> mention.  Will probably get some reaction from the
> people
> out there who use what I call "error-prone"
> languages in
> my letter.
> 
> Richard Riehle
> 
> Marin David Condic wrote:
> 
> > An interesting article. One could argue about the
> accuracy of the survey,
> > but it probably isn't that far off from reality.
> >
> > What I liked about it was that it was fair and
> balanced. It didn't smack of
> > the usual anti-Ada vitriol, nor was it filled with
> misinformation. The
> > criticism that Ada doesn't have as many tools as
> C/C++ is reasonably fair -
> > I think it is a better situation than the author
> seems to imply, but let's
> > face it: For just about any embedded board, you
> can get a C compiler thrown
> > in with the development kit & you won't find Ada
> riding along with it as an
> > alternate choice. (Although Gnat merging with gcc
> stands to help improve the
> > situation - but still people have to ask for it or
> nobody will bother.)
> >
> > The question about programmers being
> "intellectually lazy" may have a lot to
> > do with it. In order to do Ada development in a
> way that maximizes the
> > benefits and minimizes the time fighting with the
> compiler to get it right,
> > requires that you spend time up front thinking
> about the organization of the
> > system - what the relevant data types are, what
> information should be
> > hidden, etc. Embedded developers tend to be
> tinkerers who want to start
> > hacking some bootstrap code and keep adding things
> to it until it works.
> > Weeks of planning and diagram drawing and design
> meetings prior to writing
> > any code tends to not be the thing they got into
> the business to do. Never
> > mind that it might save months/years of debugging
> and produce a more
> > reliable system that improved customer
> satisfaction and reduced liability -
> > that's just not the mode of thought that feels
> comfortable to your average
> > embedded/C developer.
> >
> > The question at the end about the government being
> to blame for not sticking
> > to its guns is another interesting one. The
> government instituting "The
> > Mandate" (especially when compiler technology just
> wasn't there) probably
> > raised a lot of hackles over being "forced" to do
> something. (I *still*
> > think that had the government tried bribery
> instead of extortion, it might
> > have worked. If you were the program manager for
> some electronic whozits and
> > the government offered you a $100,000.00 bonus if
> only you could find a way
> > to get the project done in Ada, do you think your
> opposition to Ada would be
> > so strong?)
> >
> > Anyway, having had The Mandate, then abandoning it
> is worse than never
> > having The Mandate to begin with. Think about it -
> the perception is that
> > the government was admitting it made a mistake by
> mandating Ada, so the
> > contractors started abandoning it in droves.
> Standing there saying "No!
> > Really! I'm *NOT* saying Ada is a bad thing!!!!"
> doesn't matter. Actions
> > speak louder than words and perception often *IS*
> reality. ("Hey, the DoD
> > dropped Ada like a hot rock. We must have been
> right all along. Ada really
> > *did* suck!)
> >
> > The good news is that if people are writing
> thoughtful articles like this
> > and observing that Ada really does have benefits
> (despite lack of use) maybe
> > it might generate some renewed interest. The fact
> that they're writing about
> > it at all is a sign that Ada isn't a non-issue.
> IOW, "I don't care what they
> > say about Ada as long as they capitalize its name
> right!" :-)
> >
> > MDC
> > --
> > Marin David Condic
> > Senior Software Engineer
> > Pace Micro Technology Americas   
> www.pacemicro.com
> > Enabling the digital revolution
> > e-Mail:    marin.condic@pacemicro.com
> > Web:      http://www.mcondic.com/
> >
> > "Volkert" <Volkert.Barr@freenet.de> wrote in
> message
> >
>
news:b84db440.0201301508.1e3ea4b6@posting.google.com...
> > > found at Embedded Systems Programming:
> > >
> > > >Ada is the only language designed to
> > > >significantly reduce and maybe even
> > > >eliminate dumb programming errors. Did
> > > >it fall into disuse because we're
> > > >intellectually lazy?
> > >
> > > read more:
> http://www.embedded.com/story/OEG20020125S0098
> > >
> > > Volkert
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org
> http://ada.eu.org/mailman/listinfo/comp.lang.ada


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