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=-2.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,6511c3dc6e1155c9 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.fjserv.net!oleane.net!oleane!teaser.fr!enst.fr!melchior!cuivre.fr.eu.org!melchior.frmug.org!not-for-mail From: "Alexander E. Kopilovich" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: GWindows and David Botton Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 08:19:52 +0400 (MSD) Organization: Cuivre, Argent, Or Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: lovelace.ada-france.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: melchior.cuivre.fr.eu.org 1097036414 33992 212.85.156.195 (6 Oct 2004 04:20:14 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@melchior.cuivre.fr.eu.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 04:20:14 +0000 (UTC) To: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org Return-Path: In-Reply-To: ; from Stephen Leake at 05 Oct 2004 18:40:36 -0400 X-Mailer: Mail/@ [v2.44 MSDOS] X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new-20030616-p10 (Debian) at ada-france.org X-BeenThere: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.4 Precedence: list List-Id: "Gateway to the comp.lang.ada Usenet newsgroup" List-Unsubscribe: , List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:4770 Date: 2004-10-06T08:19:52+04:00 Stephen Leake wrote: > There was a distinct feeling that the Ada community in general would > benefit from going forward with only _one_ thick Windows binding, > because that would enhance the level of support for that binding (both > in terms of user experience and developers fixing problems and adding > features). Don't you think that essentially the same feeling tells that it must be better for society if it has exactly one political party, and not two or three? And that it is wrong for essentially the same reasons. You have to choose between that determinism and popularity. If you choose determinism that stop lamenting about being unpopular. Such determinism may be very effective in some aspects, but it can be popular for short time only (and this time was over long ago for Ada), because broad community faces too broad spectre of problems and circumstances. But if we descend from those general speculations to more specific essentials, we can notice, that while CLAW is an example of thick Ada binding in its purpose, the proclaimed purpose of GWindows/GNAVI is essentially different. The latter seems to strive to be not just another classical Ada binding, but a Delphi-like thing (if you never tried Delphi then you probably can't imagine what it means) - a tool with which your program binds to rich objects, and that binding is not just to some API, but explicitly involves ontology of those objects... so, it may be seen as a binding at ontological level (at least partially). I can't say that I believe that GWindows/GNAVI have bright perspective - I have some doubts about it (and some of them relate to Ada language itself), but the purpose is surely very attractive (whether it is attainable - this is another matter). And I'm sure that even if GWindows/GNAVI succeed and reach the level of Delphi 2/3 there still always will be a good place for some classical Ada binding for Win32 - such as CLAW. Alexander Kopilovich aek@vib.usr.pu.ru Saint-Petersburg Russia