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: 103376,42490cad53ee37fa X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news1.google.com!news3.google.com!newshub.sdsu.edu!cyclone1.gnilink.net!spamkiller.gnilink.net!gnilink.net!trnddc07.POSTED!8aa85562!not-for-mail From: Michael Card Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: NOACE- End of the road for Ada? References: User-Agent: MT-NewsWatcher/3.4 (PPC Mac OS X) Message-ID: Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 13:42:34 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 129.44.207.47 X-Complaints-To: abuse@verizon.net X-Trace: trnddc07 1110462154 129.44.207.47 (Thu, 10 Mar 2005 08:42:34 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 08:42:34 EST Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:9038 Date: 2005-03-10T13:42:34+00:00 List-Id: In article , "Alexander E. Kopilovich" wrote: > Think about China. Guess, which complex and purposeful software is easier to > investigate, modify/adapt, port to other equipment/environment etc. - that is > written in Ada or that in C++ and/or Java? > > Imaging yourself being a mainland Chinese and working in some military outfit > and periodicaly receiving USA military software source code (which comes from > the sources certainly unknown to you). What would you prefer in this position > - Ada source code or C++/Java source code? > > Then, even for your own (not stolen) code, you'll never have a choice of a > programming language - it will be prescribed to you, and those who choose it > inevitably will look at the world leader and follow it - then you'll get > what the world leader choose... but without many auxiliaries and various > supports that those working for the former have. Alexander- Are you postulating here that the US DoD is deliberately choosing programming languages that promote obfuscation for the purpose of thwarting Chinese intelligence operations? If I have understood you correctly, that strikes me as a rather far-fetched premise. Whenever I have searched for the justification for these decisions, what you hear is stuff like "we want to use what everyone in the commercial world is using because it's easier to find programmers." It's rather a fad-chasing mentality, which seems strange given what we're talking about building. I find it hard to believe the use of C/C++ actually saves money vs. Ada no matter how many C++ programmers are on monster.com. Does anyone know of any actual cost data that supports the "fad-du-jour language X is cheaper than Ada due to availability of programmers" argument? -Mike