Re: Mainstream Ada

[Kilgallen@SpamCop.net (Larry Kilgallen)]

In article <3C78943B.9030600@mail.com>, Hyman Rosen <hyrosen@mail.com> writes:
> Richard Riehle wrote:
>> At present, functional requirements overshadow non-functional
>  > requirements in the world of commercial software. That is,
>  > features are easier to sell than quality.
> 
> You know we usually fight over Ada vs. C++ issues, but I think
> I'm going to take Ada's side here. I don't like Ada all that
> much, but it's mostly for stylistic reasons. I believe, however,
> that an Ada programmer can pound out features just as well, and
> just as quickly, as a Java or C++ programmer. Are you really
> suggesting that commercial software developers who choose Ada
> will have to forego adding features to their software? That's
> not going to do much for Ada advocacy!

I am not Richard, but I agree with the quoted segment.  The point
I see is that language choice can be orthogonal to the quest for
features.  So long as features are the only concern of a vendor,
one can relegate language choice to an afterthought.  A typical
approach is to look at the employment pool will say that you can
get a nominal C++ programmer much more readily than a nominal Ada
programmer.  Companies without a particular concern for quality
will gravitate to those who appear to be in greater number and
choose the "popular" language.  Programmers equally unqualified
in either language will declare themselves as belonging to the
more "popular" language.  And certainly as a C++ advocate, you
must agree that a lot of nominal "C/C++" programmers are "C"
programmers in disguise.

So it is not that developers who choose Ada need to forgo features.
Rather, it is that developers who choose features over quality
have no particular incentive to choose Ada.  Those nasty checks
will get in the way of time-to-market.