From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,3ea3f3c185df1b1c X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII Path: g2news1.google.com!news3.google.com!newshub.sdsu.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!nntp-server.caltech.edu!attla2!attla1!ip.att.net!bos-service1.raytheon.com!dfw-service2.ext.ray.com.POSTED!53ab2750!not-for-mail Message-ID: <41E5BEBD.A3C7BBD8@raytheon.com> From: Jerry Petrey X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.79 [en]C-CCK-MCD CSC;Raytheon (Windows NT 5.0; U) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Will the World ever see something beyond GNAT 3.15p? References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2005 17:20:13 -0700 NNTP-Posting-Host: 147.24.201.186 X-Complaints-To: news@ext.ray.com X-Trace: dfw-service2.ext.ray.com 1105575693 147.24.201.186 (Wed, 12 Jan 2005 18:21:33 CST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2005 18:21:33 CST Organization: Raytheon Company Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:7703 Date: 2005-01-12T17:20:13-07:00 List-Id: Bernd Specht wrote: > > Well, but isn't this the speciallity of Ada? Always talk, but never do? If > you ask for Ada for xy you get replies like: "Build it from the sources", > "Use a Ada to C", "Pay for development, then you will get" ... (bla bla) > > And if you state that you work (e.g.) with C because there is no Ada > compiler for your environmemt, then you get only replies "you are very > stupid *not* to use Ada ..." (ha ha). > > Ada community seems full of advocats, but technicians are missing. > > Those wise guys always stating that you have to read thousands of documents > and working years on things you are not interessted in, then build your own > toolchains, are responsible for decreasing Ada-use. Bernd, I�m afraid you are right. I think Ada is the best language for most applications today except for the lack of support and tools. I have been using it exclusively for the last 15 years and have been fortunate to find good paying jobs using it but the handwriting is definitely on the wall for this to come to an end. We have enough big programs at Raytheon using Ada to keep me busy until I retire in a few years but none of our new programs will even consider using Ada. Most of our new engineers either have never heard of it or consider it a relic from the past and want nothing to do with it. Like some of the other posters said � when you�re looking for a compiler for a certain language, you want to have some complete, well supported and easy to use choices � not have to build them yourself. GNAT was at least close to what was needed but ACT seems to have abandoned the public releases � which means even fewer new users will have an easily obtained, modern Ada compiler to try out and thus even fewer applications will use Ada. If the Ada vendors can�t make good, reasonably priced Ada toolsets available to individual engineers, where do they think their future customers are going to come from? I think the suggestion for some GNAT Pro users to make the latest release available would be step in the right direction but a lot of work is needed if we are going to save Ada. I saw the same thing happen to Forth, which I liked and used back in the 80�s. Jerry --------------------------------------------------------------------- -- Jerry Petrey - Senior Principal Systems Engineer -- Navigation (GPS/INS), Guidance, & Control -- Raytheon Missile Systems - Member Team Ada & Team Forth -- NOTE: please perform appendectomy on email address before replying ---------------------------------------------------------------------