Re: Ada in colleges and universities.

["Björn Persson" <spam-away@nowhere.nil>]

Peter C. Chapin wrote:

> You are probably talking about a computer science program, true?

If I translate the terms right, yes.

> VTC 
> offers computer engineering technology. It's more like computer 
> engineering which, in turn, is more like electrical engineering than it is 
> like computer science. Our students get a lot of hardware courses, 
> including basic (and not so basic) electronics. The programming we are 
> preparing them for is low level stuff... device drivers, embedded systems, 
> specialized executives, etc. We tend to be relatively light on abstract 
> theory and heavy on the "practical" construction of systems.

I see. Then I can understand if you don't teach them functional 
programming. :-)

> If I suggest 
> that we reintroduce Ada in the curriculum I know the question will be: 
> "How much Ada is being used, relative to C, in the application domains we 
> focus on?" How should I best answer a question like that?

I think my best answer would be essentially what you already wrote in 
your earlier post - that if you expect that your students will write 
device drivers or embedded systems, then they will do enough programming 
that they will need to know good programming practice. And while Ada is 
better than C for teaching good programming practice, there's also a 
point in comparing languages. I'd say you're not a good programmer until 
you've tried at least two different languages, because only then will 
you be able to see the weaknesses in a language. (And C and C++ don't 
count as different languages in this case. Starting with C and 
proceeding to C++ is more like starting with the basic parts of Ada and 
introducing generics, tasks and tagged types later.)

-- 
Björn Persson

jor ers @sv ge.
b n_p son eri nu