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=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Path: eternal-september.org!reader01.eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!aioe.org!.POSTED.j3DRw3Xk9GUutuLmG5BWZA.user.gioia.aioe.org!not-for-mail From: russ lyttle Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Ada in command / control systems Date: Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:50:20 -0500 Organization: Aioe.org NNTP Server Message-ID: References: <2199b15b-d704-403f-a6c4-00fab29792d5@googlegroups.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: j3DRw3Xk9GUutuLmG5BWZA.user.gioia.aioe.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Complaints-To: abuse@aioe.org User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:60.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/60.4.0 Content-Language: en-US X-Notice: Filtered by postfilter v. 0.9.2 Xref: reader01.eternal-september.org comp.lang.ada:55655 Date: 2019-02-25T08:50:20-05:00 List-Id: On 2/25/19 3:24 AM, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: > On 2019-02-25 07:51, Jesper Quorning wrote: >> >> Why is Ada not used on industrial programmable logic controllers (PLC) >> platforms? > > Because the PLC marked is dominated by vendors pushing their vendor-lock > solutions, e.g. Siemens. > > Another reason is the customers lacking elementary programming and > software design skills. They are usually technicians and electrical or > mechanical engineers. > >> In the IEC 61131-3 standard, the language 'structured text' is >> defined. The language looks like the poor man's Ada. >> >> I have not worked with structured text, but with SCL (Structured >> Contol Language) for Siemens S7-300 / 400/1200/1500. It looks like >> there are elements of Ada in it. > > Is it a joke? > >> Should industrial programs not be Ada's wheelhouse? > > Possibly, if Ada community would pay attention to the emerging market of > single board computers used at home. > > In about 5-10 years so-called industrial solutions will be swept away by > cheap hardware and hobby software coming from the home automation toy > projects. These will be far worse than awful SPS, who could think that > worse were possible? But the force of mass market is overwhelming. SPS > et al will suffer the same fate as workstations did. > Languages like VHDL and SCL do borrow a lot from Ada. I've noticed that it is much more difficult for C/C++ programmers to learn VHDL or SCL than Ada programmers. But, as you say, the Ada community seems to be ignoring the areas where these languages are applied. There is some support for STM (thanks Simon Wright) but has anyone tried to write an Ada program for an AT Tiny? Have you noticed how many *.py files are in the Ada_Drivers_Library? Or how horrible gnat is on memory management? Another point, having an OS written in Ada would make qualification of software much much easier. No need to qualify C/C++ or Python. In my case an Ada equivalent of Minix-1 or uCOS (first version published in Embedded Systems) would be very handy.