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- Path: azure.dstc.edu.au!crawley
- From: crawley@dstc.edu.au (Stephen Crawley)
- Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.edu
- Subject: Re: C/C++ knocks the crap out of Ada
- Date: 13 Mar 1996 06:01:37 GMT
- Organization: CRC for Distributed Systems Technology
- Message-ID: <4i5oc1$ee8@azure.dstc.edu.au>
- References: <JSA.96Feb16135027@organon.com> <4hhred$1rn@sun152.spd.dsccc.com> <4i19mg$vkt@azure.dstc.edu.au> <4i4cf2$crm@sun152.spd.dsccc.com>
- Reply-To: crawley@dstc.edu.au
- NNTP-Posting-Host: foxtail.dstc.edu.au
-
- In article <4i4cf2$crm@sun152.spd.dsccc.com>,
- Kevin Cline <kcline@sun152.spd.dsccc.com> wrote:
- >In article <4i19mg$vkt@azure.dstc.edu.au>,
- >Stephen Crawley <crawley@dstc.edu.au> wrote:
- > >This is not a problem that can be blamed on the Ada language but on
- > > a) late development of standardised Ada bindings and
- > > b) unwillingness by Verdix to implement the standard when it
- > > arrived, maybe as an indirect consequence of a)
- >
- >I wasn't trying to place blame; I'm trying to explain to Ada advocates
- >why most PC and UNIX software developers were (and still are)
- >uninterested in Ada, despite the well-known pitfalls in C development.
- >
- >In fact there were several serious flaws in the Ada-83 language
- >that made development of hosted applications in Ada-83 more difficult
- >than developing them in C or C++.
-
- I can accept that your Ada-83 compiler had flaws that made development
- difficult for you. But you'll need to provide some specifics before I
- can accept that Ada language flaws made development in Ada more
- difficult than in C / C++. [Note: language flaws ... not compiler
- flaws.]
-
- > >It is unreasonable to expect any validation suite to find all cases
- > >where a compiler diverges from the standard. Arguably the ACVC tests
- > >should be / have been more extensive though.
- >
- >The existence of the validation process is often given as an
- >advantage of Ada over C and C++. Now you are admitting that
- >validation is a political process, and has almost no technical value.
-
- No I am not "admitting" anything of the sort. I'm simply restating
- the well known fact that testing proves the presence of bugs not the
- absence of bugs. Please don't put words into my mouth.
-
- > >With the arrival GNAT, the commercial vendors have some real
- > >competition in terms of compiler quality. If they don't come up to
- > >scratch, they are liable to lose market share.
- >
- >There never seemed to be enough licensees to allow the compiler
- >vendors to create a decent product in the early 90's; has this
- >changed, or will GNAT be the only game in town? That's not
- >necessarily bad; I like public-domain software.
-
- I don't know if it has changed. But if it hasn't changed, then we can
- expect to see the exit of some commercial vendors from the Ada
- compiler marketplace. [I agree with you that this is not necessarily
- a bad thing.]
-
- On the other hand, the advent of GNAT seems to have generated a lot
- of interest in Ada that may have the effect of increasing the volume
- of commercial sales.
-
- >>There are emerging public domain X and MOTIF bindings for Ada that
- >>(assuming they are available with GNAT sometime soon) are IMO likely
- >>to become defacto standards.
- >
- >Emerging? Available soon?
-
- Read this:
-
- http://lglwww.epfl.ch/Ada/Resources/Bindings.html
-
- looking for the material on Ada X11 / MOTIF bindings.
-
- I'm afraid most of your opinions on the usefulness of Ada are based on
- outdated information.
-
- >>Yes. But given recent (though belated) standardisation activities and
- >>the increasing influence of the GNU / FSF movement in the Ada
- >>community, one would hope that this should be less of a problem in the
- >>future.
- >
- >I agree; within five years I predict the DoD mandate will be quietly
- >repealed (or largely ignored) and Ada will go the way of APL.
-
- I disagree that you agree with me :-).
-
- While I wouldn't be surprised if the Ada Mandate was dropped (I think
- it has outlived its usefulness), I think that Ada is starting to take
- off ... largely as a consequence of GNAT and the GNU / FSF influence,
- and of the increasing number of University courses that use Ada as the
- primary teaching language.
-
- >>Note that the CORBA standard language bindings for Ada are expected to be
- >>formally approved at the OMG board meeting that happens on March 20th (for
- >>memory)
- >
- >I hope they are better than the abominable C++ bindings.
-
- You old grizzle pot, you :-)
-
- Seriously, if you want to find out, look at this:
-
- http://conf4.darpa.mil/corba-ada/95-5-16.V1-1.ps
-
- -- Steve
-
-