Advantages

["Andrew Carroll" <andrew@carroll-tech.net>]

> ------------------------------
> Message: 5
> From: Marin David Condic <nobody@noplace.com>
> Subject: Re: Advantages
>
> I'm not sure what you want for statistical proof. In my experience
with
> writing low-level software in an environment where I don't have an OS,
I
[snip]

I don't doubt anything that you said.  You are more experienced with it
than I am!  I'm sure, as I know and you said, MANY of the answers I seek
can really only be obtained from experience.  If I asked "what features
of Ada provide the biggest advantages to writing system software?"  what
would you say?  So far two people mentioned the tasking features of Ada.
Great, I trust you!  What features of Ada make it easier to detect
pitfalls in parallel programming?  What features of Ada help with
debugging?

Have any tests been done to show that Ada tasking features are better
that other languages' "tasking" features if the model is the same?  If
so, where are the results?  How much better were the Ada tasking
features?

> Try to get two different CPUs synchronized across some communication
link or deal with some I/O device where timing or synchronization are
important to
> getting it right.
So if I did try, what features of Ada are going to help me?

> Its the uncertainty of when things are happening or the fact that
dozens of things are happening nearly all at once and corner conditions
can come up that are
> difficult to test and difficult to program around.
So your saying that the real time features of Ada help to remove the
"race condition" uncertainty and deal with corner conditions?

> I'm not saying someone can't do a better job with Ada - just that an
OS is *really hard* to make stable and secure and it isn't something
that can be done in a
> few weekends of coding and hope it will somehow be better.
What features of Ada help to make an OS stable and secure?  Bounds
checking?  Typing?  Rendezvous?  Protected Objects?

Andrew