From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,21960280f1d61e84 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: How come Ada isn't more popular? References: <1169531612.200010.153120@38g2000cwa.googlegroups.com> <20070123211651.c0d43695.tero.koskinen@iki.fi> <87zm89tpk7.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org> <4q4pqgmdwo.fsf@hod.lan.m-e-leypold.de> <1169719988.972296.121430@a75g2000cwd.googlegroups.com> <4iauh.1157694$084.1040745@attbi_s22> From: Markus E Leypold Organization: N/A Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 23:38:23 +0100 Message-ID: User-Agent: Some cool user agent (SCUG) Cancel-Lock: sha1:vFEZAoG4k6ScXp3Nm6ExNh/Ux1I= MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii NNTP-Posting-Host: 88.72.211.238 X-Trace: news.arcor-ip.de 1170023617 88.72.211.238 (28 Jan 2007 23:33:37 +0200) X-Complaints-To: abuse@arcor-ip.de Path: g2news2.google.com!news2.google.com!news3.google.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!newsfeed00.sul.t-online.de!t-online.de!newsfeed.freenet.de!news.unit0.net!newsfeed.arcor-ip.de!news.arcor-ip.de!not-for-mail Xref: g2news2.google.com comp.lang.ada:8663 Date: 2007-01-28T23:38:23+01:00 List-Id: writes: > As I have often noted in this forum and elsewhere, I often wonder why someone > who chooses to develop software in a language that is error-prone would expect > a software system that is error-free. But I think that "they" don't expect a software system that is error free. Generally the probability of errors is just one factor contributing to the overall cost of a project. Other factors are the cost of having to re-implement already existing libraries or software, the cost of having to maintain teams for more than one language, support fees for tools, the cost of not having some tools for this language, the cost of hiring for "unusual" languages, the cost of not having a garbage collection etc. I think that it is this point of view that makes decisions against Ada for some other language at least understandable, even if you would have decided differently. As I have said repeatedly (probably in in those posts lost to the black hole) the decision against Ada is perhaps something you can lament, but to call it irrational is, IMHO, irrational. One has to understand the motives of other peoples decision to be able to influence them. Of course calling them just ill-informed (as some post in this thread do, not necessarily yours) helps to feel secure in ones own position, but it doesn't help towards changing other peoples position. > Although a language, by itself, cannot guarantee a system that is > error-free, one would expect an outcome that requires less debugging > time and would have fewer defects than with a language that is > error-prone. Language is only one factor from many that influence the "bug" rate in the final product. The bug rate on the other side is only one if many factors that make up the overall cost. I'm not surprised that "error proneness" doesn't prove to be the final decisive argument in the favor of some language in all not even in the majority of cases. It is just the economy of software development and the customers priorities (hello you people here using Word -- why don't you use TeX which _definitely_ has less bugs? -- see what I mean?) which decide on which kind of development is finally paid for. See the state of Ada as a summary of the state of demand by the market for certain software attributes. > While C++ may have some capabilities not found in other languages, it is still > a poor choice for software where dependability is important. Exactly: "Where dependability is important". Which is not in consumer software, most embedded software (who cares if MP3 players or mobiles crashes now and than) etc. > It is not a language well-suited to safety-critical software. On > the other hand, I am impressed with a lot of the design elements of > C#. It still fall short of being ideal for safety-critical > software, but it is an improvement over C++ and Java. Exactly. Which will make it (as much as I'm sorry to condone anything Microsoft had their grubby hands in) probably one of the languages for the future as far as consumer software, ticket vending machines, etc. Regards -- Markus PS: You didn't, I think, answer my question, why you don't think Java is type safe ... ?