Re: Study shows Ada tools ten times more costly

[dog.ee.lbl.gov!overload.lbl.gov!lll-winken.llnl.gov!taurus.cs.nps.navy.mi l!shimeall@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (timothy shimeall)]

In article <C784HG.5E0@world.std.com> srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian)
 writes:
>   In the January 1993 issue of Software Magazine, T. Capers Jones has a
>nice article titled "Equipping the software engineer"
...
>    One comment has some relevance to the issue of the Ada Mandate.  To
>quote (page 99):
...
>       Manufacturers and
>	military software developers often use tools priced at
>	more than $10 per function point.
>
>    This comment to some extent supports the contention that the Ada
>Mandate, by sheltering the Ada tools companies from competition, is distorting
>the marketplace and making use of Ada more expensive than other languages.
>(I assume in his study that for the most part, military software developers
>only are buying Ada tools).

Sorry, the data quoted does NOT support the conclusion Greg makes.
Consider that military software developers (compared to developers of
civilian software):
  + Are required to more thoroughly document their efforts
    (and tools need to support that documentation)
  + Are required to adhere to specific standards (and tools to 
    validate those standards are often specially-built to do so)
  + Are building software with longer lifespan (the A-6 flight
    software was originally written in the Vietnam War era ..
    and is still flying [albeit modified] today), so tools need
    to be held to higher quality standards
  + Are building larger software, so tools need to be built with
    fewer size constraints

So, disregarding these major tool cost drivers, Greg attibutes the higher
cost to the choice of language.

Sorry, the fact that Military software developers pay higher prices
for more thorough, capable and higher quality tools [perhaps targeted
at Ada] does NOT mean that all Ada tools are automatically more
expensive.  Greg should be more careful of the conclusions he draws.

Frankly, tools to do for C (to take an example) the types of analysis 
cannonically done for Ada are going to be MUCH more expensive, due
to the ambiguous syntax of C.  Consider my favorite C ambiguity:

void proc(p)
int ***p;
{
...
}
The first * in the declaration of p indicates that it is an in-out 
parameter.  The second indicates that the in-out parameter is a
single-dimenstioned array.  The third indicates that each array
element accesses an integer.
or
p is an in parameter for a three-dimensional array of integer
or
p is an in-out parameter for a two-dimensional array of integer
or
... (any other interpretations?)

Now consider the design of a tool that will perform bounds-checking
on p, prior to run-time.
				Tim
Disclaimer: I speak for NO organization, and especially am not a
spokesperson for the Naval Postgraduate School, the Navy, the
Department of Defense or the US Government.