Re: ADA Popularity Discussion Request

[Marin David Condic <nobody@noplace.com>]

Again, more good news. Vector and matrix math included as a standard 
annex of some form would add functionality & help encourage people to 
make use of Ada. Personally, I think there is enough grist for the mill 
in the area of mathematics that there could be a lot more than just 
vector and matrix functionality added. As the item you cite observes, 
the packages can be implemented in "pure" Ada and hence should pose no 
problems to adoption.

I'd disagree where it says: "Providing secondary standards has not 
proved satisfactory because they are not sufficiently visible to the 
user community as a whole." Maybe historically, and to a point. The 
question is "Would people use a secondary standard if it was blessed by 
Ada and included with most/all compilers?"

Perhaps people have avoided "secondary standards" because they aren not 
viewed as "sufficiently standard"? They ask "Can I count on this to be 
portable to some other implementation?" If it comes with most/all 
implementations, then the answer is "Yes". If its just someone's blob of 
code out there somewhere with no "official" standing and it is their 
problem to insure it works on their platform/compiler then they may 
avoid it out of fear that it will cost too much or take too long to deal 
with it themselves & opt for their own implementation because they at 
least understand and control it.

One might also ask if the "secondary standards" are "good" standards? 
I've seen lots of standards that were so overly complex that people have 
difficulty understanding how they work and what to do with them. It is 
critical that they be sufficiently clear, easy to use and well 
documented or the burden of trying to utilize them is less than that 
needed to roll your own.

MDC


Georg Bauhaus wrote:
> 
> The next standard may provide some more:
> http://www.ada-auth.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/AIs/AI-00296.TXT?rev=1.17
> 
> 
> -- Georg


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