Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Gregory Aharonian]

Mike,
	Each time you post this, I keep on thinking "Yea, well mine's
longer".  If I posted a list of similar C/C++ projects, it would be
50 times larger for projects with a similar range of sizes. (That's
what I meant :-)
	It's about time the DoD funded an honest survey of programming
language demographics to see how well Ada is doing.  It won't because
the DoD knows that Ada is dead outside the Mandated world because of
its policies.  Sad way to defend the country.

Greg
-- 
**************************************************************************
 Greg Aharonian
 Source Translation & Optimization
 P.O. Box 404, Belmont, MA 02178

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[cis.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!agate!sp]

In article <SRCTRAN.93Jun3233419@world.std.com> srctran@world.std.com (Gregory 
Aharonian) writes:
>Mike,
>	Each time you post this, I keep on thinking "Yea, well mine's
>longer".  If I posted a list of similar C/C++ projects, it would be
>50 times larger for projects with a similar range of sizes. (That's
>what I meant :-)

Yo! I didn't intend to get into a contest over who's was longer. Several
people asked for the list, I gave it to them. That's all.

Mike

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Richard Conn]

One thing I've discovered is that Mike's list will probably never be
complete.  Companies simply do not want to disclose any information
they don't have to, especially in today's climate, which may give a
competator a competative advantage if he has any kind of insight into what
is going on internally.  Behind the scenes, I've seen many commercial
Ada success stories that I can't talk about (proprietary nondisclosure).
I'll wager there are many, many more.

Rick

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Michael Feldman]

In article <1993Jun5.152022.12888@linus.mitre.org> m23588@mwunix.mitre.org (Ric
hard Conn) writes:
>One thing I've discovered is that Mike's list will probably never be
>complete.  Companies simply do not want to disclose any information
>they don't have to, especially in today's climate, which may give a
>competator a competative advantage if he has any kind of insight into what
>is going on internally.  Behind the scenes, I've seen many commercial
>Ada success stories that I can't talk about (proprietary nondisclosure).

I think it would be great if you could get permission from these companies
to reveal that they are using Ada, and only that. Or something in the
form of one of my 2-line listings. Maybe they would agree; you'll
never know till you try.

Another alternative that would not violate nondisclosure would be to
sanitize the project down to "a major bank has written its ATM system
in Ada" or something similar. Even that would help to dispel the myths.

>I'll wager there are many, many more.

Talking to the compiler vendors leads me to believe this. On the other 
hand, they have a vested interest in a bit of hyperbole now and then.
('Course on the net, we NEVER indulge in hyperbole :-) :-) :-))

Mike Feldman
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael B. Feldman
co-chair, SIGAda Education Committee

Professor, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
School of Engineering and Applied Science
The George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052 USA
(202) 994-5253 (voice)
(202) 994-5296 (fax)
mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Internet)

"The most important thing is to be sincere, 
and once you've learned how to fake that, you've got it made." 
-- old show-business adage
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[cis.ohio-state.edu!math.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wupost!wuarchive.wus]

mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes:

>In article <1993Jun5.152022.12888@linus.mitre.org> m23588@mwunix.mitre.org (Ri
chard Conn) writes:
>>One thing I've discovered is that Mike's list will probably never be
>>complete.  Companies simply do not want to disclose any information
>>they don't have to, especially in today's climate, which may give a
>>competator a competative advantage if he has any kind of insight into what
>>is going on internally.  Behind the scenes, I've seen many commercial
>>Ada success stories that I can't talk about (proprietary nondisclosure).

>I think it would be great if you could get permission from these companies
>to reveal that they are using Ada, and only that. Or something in the
>form of one of my 2-line listings. Maybe they would agree; you'll
>never know till you try.

>Another alternative that would not violate nondisclosure would be to
>sanitize the project down to "a major bank has written its ATM system
>in Ada" or something similar. Even that would help to dispel the myths.

Good point, Mike, but one problem is that even a tiny snippet like
that can be added to another snippet and so on to the point where
the entire picture is formed.  I have actually seen it go to the point
where a marketeer for company X parked outside the building used
for contractor interviews by the government, counting the number of
people coming and going, noting (when he knew) what company they
represented, noting how long they were interviewed, and all sorts of
things.  The marketeer for company Y was also in the same parking lot
doing the same thing.

Consequently, proprietary nondisclosure can, and has, covered
everything.

Rick

-- 
====================================================================
Richard Conn, ASR and PAL Manager  |  conn@wuarchive.wustl.edu

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Michael Feldman]

In article <conn.739334028@wuarchive.wustl.edu> conn@wuarchive.wustl.edu (Richa
rd Conn) writes:

[stuff deleted]
>
>Consequently, proprietary nondisclosure can, and has, covered
>everything.

Naturally. But the suggestion was only that the question be asked.
There may be companies that really don't need to keep their use of Ada
a secret _per se_, they just never thought to publicize it.

It's worth a shot, I think.

Mike

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Gregory Aharonian]

Mike,
	I have a suggestion for you.  Go thru the help wanted ads looking
for companies hiring Ada programmers.  Usually from the job description
you can tell what the company is doing with Ada.  In theory, this method
should be quite effective in finding non-Mandated applications.  Hiring
patterns have long been an important indicator of corporate behavior for
a variety of business practices.  They might not say publicly what they
are doing, but they have to hire people to do the stuff, and their hiring
ads must make sure the employee's language background matches the project.

   But Mike, and Lloyd, and all you other true believers of Ada, if you
make such a detailed survey, you will find the ratio of C/C++ to Ada jobs
to be fifty to one.  Which is probably a measure of Ada use in the
non-Mandated world.  If you make the survey.  If you care.





-- 
**************************************************************************
 Greg Aharonian
 Source Translation & Optimization
 P.O. Box 404, Belmont, MA 02178

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[agate!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!cis.ohio-state.edu!ne]

In article <SRCTRAN.93Jun6214314@world.std.com> srctran@world.std.com (Gregory 
Aharonian) writes:
>
>[deletia regarding programming jobs in want ads]
>
>   But Mike, and Lloyd, and all you other true believers of Ada, if you
>make such a detailed survey, you will find the ratio of C/C++ to Ada jobs
>to be fifty to one.  Which is probably a measure of Ada use in the
>non-Mandated world.  If you make the survey.  If you care.
>
I care.  Just checked yesterday's paper (Houston Chronicle):
	Ada: 15 (!)
	C/C++: 80  (Hmm, where did that 50:1 ratio go?)
	FORTRAN: 63
	COBOL: 172

Damn good thing I've got a COBOL book in my dusty ol' library! :-)

As a casual note, most of the COBOL work was with "Big Iron".  FORTRAN
was generally with VAXes.  C/C++ was VAX, PC, Workstations.  The Ada
jobs were nonspecific (and not for lack of space, it appears).  

Draw your own conclusions.

-- 
-Comments above aren't neceessarily the opinion of the SEI, AJPO, or CAE-Link-
David Weller  |  Have you hugged your DRAGOON lately?
----I'm the Ultimate International Masochist: I speak Ada AND Esperanto!-----

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Tucker Taft]

In article <SRCTRAN.93Jun3233419@world.std.com> 
  srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes:

>Mike,
>	Each time you post this, I keep on thinking "Yea, well mine's
>longer".  If I posted a list of similar C/C++ projects, it would be
>50 times larger for projects with a similar range of sizes. 

Actually, I think it would be doing the public a service if
someone would publish a similar list, but restrict it to C++.

My suspicion is that if one looks at large, long-lived, reliable
systems, one will find that Ada is being chosen for such systems
at least as often as other languages.  Almost all air-traffic
control systems are being implemented in Ada these days.
Certainly a lot of telecommunications is in C/C++, largely because
of the historical dominance of AT&T and Unix in that realm, but 
even in telecommunications Ada is being chosen (e.g. by NTT in Japan).

The fact is that when reliability, maintainability, and overall quality are
prime factors, companies are less swayed by how inexpensive are
the PC compilers for a given language.  It would certainly be great
if Ada compilers were less expensive, but in a large, long-lived system,
the cost of the compilers is dwarfed by the cost of development
and maintenance.

I suspect that if someone tries to put together a list of large,
long-lived, reliable systems being built in C++, (s)he will find
it is hard to produce a list much longer than the correponding Ada
list, for much the same reasons -- there aren't that many such
systems around, many companies keep these things to themselves, and
older languages like Fortran, Cobol, and assembly language are still 
being heavily used.

It would be useful to see such a list because it will help people
make more objective assessments of which language to choose
when facing the development of similar systems.  The major goal
of Ada relative to other languages is the production of reliable
systems, and so any information on the development of reliable systems
in any language would be very appropriate for posting to comp.lang.ada.

S. Tucker Taft  stt@inmet.com
Intermetrics, Inc.
Cambridge, MA  02138

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Michael Feldman]

In article <SRCTRAN.93Jun6214314@world.std.com> srctran@world.std.com (Gregory 
Aharonian) writes:
>
>	I have a suggestion for you.  Go thru the help wanted ads looking
>for companies hiring Ada programmers.  Usually from the job description
>you can tell what the company is doing with Ada.  In theory, this method
>should be quite effective in finding non-Mandated applications.  Hiring
>patterns have long been an important indicator of corporate behavior for
>a variety of business practices.  They might not say publicly what they
>are doing, but they have to hire people to do the stuff, and their hiring
>ads must make sure the employee's language background matches the project.

Hey, Greg.  Lighten up. EVERYTHING does not have to be an occasion for
a pi**ing contest. A number of people asked, both privately and publicly
for a copy of my list, so I posted it for everyone. Who said it was
supposed to be a comparative measure? It is merely a list, which I
believe to be the most complete list of non-defense Ada projects in
existence. I am not making value judgments or comparisons. Each reader
can use her judgment as to whether this list shows "enough" projects,
"too many", or "too few."

Every now and then, it's nice to give people access to a few _facts_,
uninterpreted. Net readers are big boys and girls (mostly boys, at it
happens...), and I don't need to beat them over the head with a sermon
all the time.

>   But Mike, and Lloyd, and all you other true believers of Ada, if you
>make such a detailed survey, you will find the ratio of C/C++ to Ada jobs
>to be fifty to one.  Which is probably a measure of Ada use in the
>non-Mandated world.  If you make the survey.  If you care.

Tell you what, Greg. You do the C/C++ one. I've done my share. Actually,
I'm rather tired of being labeled. You and I have exchanged a lot of
opinions, publicly and privately. Neither you nor anyone else is in
the dark about where I come down on the state of the Ada "market", the
DoD's support for same, and the vendors' support for same. I don't
like being flamed publicly for volunteering my time to collect facts.
Get a life.

Enough.

BTW-don't flame me for shortening my sig. I got flamed when it was "too long."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael B. Feldman -  co-chair, SIGAda Education Committee
Professor, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
The George Washington University -  Washington, DC 20052 USA
202-994-5253 (voice) - 202-994-5296 (fax) - mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Internet)
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Charles H. Sampson]

In article <C89Crv.5ux@inmet.camb.inmet.com> stt@spock.camb.inmet.com (Tucker T
aft) writes:
>In article <SRCTRAN.93Jun3233419@world.std.com> 
>  srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes:
>
>>Mike,
>>	Each time you post this, I keep on thinking "Yea, well mine's
>>longer".  If I posted a list of similar C/C++ projects, it would be
>>50 times larger for projects with a similar range of sizes. 
>
>Actually, I think it would be doing the public a service if
>someone would publish a similar list, but restrict it to C++.

     I second this request.  When I make public presentations on OO con-
cepts, I always state that we don't have much of a track record on the use
of inheritance and polymorphism in large, critical, systems.  (My point is
to try to rein in some of the premature -- in my opinion -- unbounded en-
thusiasm for these techniques, not a criticism of the techniques them-
selves, which I admit look promising.)  I'm more concerned each time I say
this, expecting to be shot down by some knowledgeable C++ fan in the audi-
ence, but nobody's done it yet.  A list of major C++ projects would be
interesting.

     Of course, there's the usual problem of verifying that a project is
truly C++, not just C being passed through a C++ compiler.

                              Charlie

Re: Non-defense Ada applications - answering several requests

[Jim Adcock]

In article <1993Jun10.010844.25571@nosc.mil> sampson@nosc.mil (Charles H. Samps
on) writes:

|list of major C++ projects would be

|interesting


1) Get a copy of the Computer Select Database.  [I notice the company
is offering free trial copies [the database is CD-ROM based]]

2) Select "Section: Software Product Specifications"

3) Select "Find: C++"

Behold!  A list of 734 commercially available software packages written
in C++, including some of the best known names in the software industry.