Re: Availability of Ada Programmers

Re: Availability of Ada Programmers

[Michael J. Mangieri]

In article <3gu939$i7@news1.digex.net>, cstump@levtech.com wrote:

> In article 95Feb3123532@goldfinger.mitre.org, emery@goldfinger.mitre.org
(David Emery) writes:
> >There's also a quality issue here.  Sure, you can 'buy' C hackers by
> >the dozen, but is this necessarily a good idea?  One of the problems
> >in hiring C programmers is seprating the hackers from the well-trained
> >software engineers.
> >
> >An advantage to the "Ada culture" is that software engineering is
> >generally (albeit not always) accepted as an integral part of Ada.
> >This is just not true with the "C culture".
> >
> 
> I have been hearing this argument for years. I have worked in C and 
> Ada environments (and quite a few others) and the language has nothing
> to do with the quality. And, no, it is not a culture issue. It is
> a training/teaching issue. I have seen Ada programmers code garbage
> even after using the language for years and I have seen assembly and C
> programmers code well structured applications.
> 
> Sorry for the minor rant. I just hate that "<insert language here> culture" 
> argument.

OK. I have to put my 0.02 in on this. 

First of all, I agree that training is the main issue. Properly trained
personnel will alleviate many of the problems that leads to production of
poor code. However, it cannot be denied that Ada enforces good SE; C does
not. It is easy for the 'lazy' C programmer to hack-together code; much
more difficult for the Ada programmer to do so, lazy or not :)

I teach C, C++ and Ada, and by far, my students writing in Ada produce the
better code (in terms of sound SE principles and in the quality of the
code itself). Sure, there are those who create sloppy code in any language
(and I can show you some horrific Ada code), but by far, the reverse is
true.

When it comes to 'culture' arguments, I have to agree with David.

Mikey

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Re: Availability of Ada Programmers

[Jules]

In article <3h3hgg$8il@cronkite.seas.gwu.edu>,
	dobrien@seas.gwu.edu (David O'Brien) writes:
>
>I really wish management would realize they need to 1. hire software
>engineers, and not code-slingers, and 2. should then train that
>competent college grad in what ever language is to be used.  Remember
>only 20% of what is on a resume should be believed.  The number of
>applicants I have interviewed that claim to *KNOW* C (their emphasis)
>disgusts me.  When I ask them if C is pass by reference or pass by
>value, 70% of the time I get "pass-by-reference".  When I ask them to
>elaborate, they say because you pass pointers.  This is how well they
>know this language the *claim* to know.  Yes, we often pass pointers in
>C, but that pointer value is Pass-by-value.  If only they really
>understood the language.

I would argue that this is not a problem of mis-understanding the language,
but of mis-understanding the terminology/jargon associated with it.
In your example, the applicants knew what you had to do in the language -
they understood it from a practical point of view - but didn't understand
the terms you used when you asked the question.
-- 
/* Julian R Hall				csusb@csv.warwick.ac.uk
   
   Flames should be redirected to /dev/null - I don't know what
   I'm saying myself so don't expect it to make sense all the time!         */

Re: Availability of Ada Programmers

[Theodore E. Dennison]

cory@sanders.com (Cory Myers) wrote:
>
> One of the arguements that get made often in our company is that it is
> harder to get Ada programmers than C programmers and therefore we should
> either pay Ada programmers more or switch to C (where allowable).  I'd
> like to get any quantitative estimates about the availability of Ada
> programmers in general.  Does anyone have any idea of the percentage of
> college SW graduates who know C and the percentage that know Ada?  Does
> anyone have quantitative data about the training time required to learn
> Ada?  Thanks in advance.


Perhaps I'm missing something here. What exactly is the problem with
training the people you've got in Ada programming?

Sure, it will cost a bit up front. But you will only have to train
them ONCE. Just think of all the government Ada jobs you could 
HONESTLY bid for, once you have deveolped a good stable of Ada 
engineers!

Of course if you really want to pay Ada programmers way more than C
programmers, my e-mail address is:
   dennison@romulus.escmail.orl.mmc.com
:-)

T.E.D.