HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: obry@flash.bellcore.com (Pascal Obry)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Subscribe
Date: 15 Oct 92 21:07:41 GMT
Organization: /u/obry/.organization


> Please subscribe me for this newsgroup

I'am sorry, but what this mean ?

Thanks,
Pascal.
--

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  `` inheritance is surely a good answer, but who knows the question ? ''
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
From: pattis@cs.washington.edu (Richard Pattis)
Subject: The importance of PC products for Ada in Education
Summary: this just in
Keywords: Turbo
Organization: Computer Science & Engineering, U. of Washington, Seattle
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 92 00:36:05 GMT

I was just informed today that the most widely selling Pascal textbook, which
comes in a Standard and Turbo version, this year for the first time sold more
in Turbo than Standard.

Rich Pattis

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Richard E. Pattis			"Programming languages are like
  Department of Computer Science	 pizzas - they come in only "too"
    and Engineering			 sizes: too big and too small."
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
From: dlc@ddsdx2.jhuapl.edu (Dave Collard x7468)
Subject: Re: Assy/Ada SLOC ratio;What's an Ada SLOC?
Organization: Johns Hopkins University
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 92 12:14:32 GMT

In <9210092044.AA05113@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu> byrley@NTSC-RD.NAVY.MIL ("Paul Byrley") writes:

>Two questions:
>First, what do you experts count for Ada SLOC?  I thought total
>semicolons but now am hearing "semicolons EXCEPT for ...".  I
>would appreciate opinions from lots of people who have Ada
>experience.  I will send summary out to net when results are in.

Using semicolonss, 

  A := (Flags => (1 => True,
                  2 => False,
                  3 => True,
                  4 => False),
        Coord => (X => Sqrt(F(N)),
                  Y => Cos(Whatever),
                  Z => Compute_Z),
        Left  => Compute_Left_Expression,
        Right => Compute_Right_Expression,
        Name  => Build_Name,
        Etc   => Continue_Aggregate_Assignment);

is ONLY ONE LINE OF CODE!!!???!!!

while
  A.Flags(1) := True;
  A.Flags(2) := False;
  A.Flags(3) := True;
  A.Flags(4) := False;
  A.Coord.X := Sqrt(F(N));
  A.Coord.Y := Cos(Whatever);
  A.Coord.Z := Compute_Z;
  A.Left := Compute_Left_Expression;
  A.Right := Compute_Right_Expression;
  A.Name := Build_Name;
  A.Etc := Continue_Aggregate_Assignment;

is many lines of code!
yet, the first is quite a bit better, requires at least
as much work, and is what experienced Ada developers do.
You cannot forget some of the record this way.

IMHO, any method that depends on semicolons for counting
lines of code is pretty useless.

--Thor
collard@capsrv.jhuapl.edu
dlc@ddsdx2.jhuapl.edu
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
From: stella@glg.ucs.dec.com (STella)
Subject: Documentation Survey for DEC's Compilers
Followup-To: poster
Reply-To: stella@glg.ucs.dec.com (STella)
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 92 04:08:29 GMT

The documentation professionals who write both hardcopy and online information
in support of Digital's compilers would like your opinion.  The purpose is to 
improve how we provide product information to programmers who use our compilers.

We value your opinion and are eager to hear from you.  We will acknowledge all
respondents and send a compilation of the survey's results to all who respond.

Please return this survey to stella@glg.ucs.dec.com.


Thanks and Regards,

John E O'Neil, Documentation Supervisor	oneil@casdoc.enet.dec.com 
Mike Etzel, Fortran 
Barbara Bishop, Ada
Ron Johnson, Pascal
Neil Savage, C++
John Paolillo, C


		QUESTIONNAIRE
                -------------

What programming languages (and what percentage of time are they used?)
does your organization use? 

__ Ada  __ C  __ Cobol  __ C++  __ Fortran  __ Pascal  __ Other(please specify) 


How much mixed-language programming do you do, and what languages do you use?


Do you port programs from one system to another? If so, which systems?


In support of your programming activities, how much do your programmers
depend on finding reference and tutorial information from HARDCOPY books? 

____ 100% of time  ____ 75% of time  ____ 50% of time  ____  25% of time
____  Other


How much do your programmers depend on finding reference or tutorial 
information from ELECTRONIC or ONLINE information sources?  

____ 100% of time  ____ 75% of time  ____ 50% of time  ____ 25% of time
____ Other


What is the biggest improvement that can be made in providing reference
and tutorial information in either online or hardcopy format for compilers?


In 1993, what percent of programmers at your site do you expect will be
primarily using:

___ % Workstations  ___ % PCs connected to window servers  ___ % PCs standalone
___ % Character cell terminals


There are certain ways to find information, such as the table of contents,
the index, alphabetical listings, and so on.  However, all of these put
the burden of finding information on the end user.  What can you suggest
that makes finding information easier and faster?


What software vendor stands out as having superior quality, accuracy and
usability in the reference and tutorial information it provides with the
programming languages it sells?  

Would you care to comment on what is important, and what to avoid, in the
software industry? For example, is Windows NT from Microsoft an 
important platform for the future?  Is an immediate and heavy investment in 
object-oriented programming a must?


Can you envision multimedia information in support of compilers?  For example, 
simply click to see a full motion video lecture on the exact nature of a
particular error message.  Or click again to get an animated overview of a
compiler's new features.


Can you comment on any of the reference or tutorial information that
accompanies any of Digital's compilers?
From: rlk@VisiCom.COM (Bob Kitzberger)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Assy/Ada SLOC ratio;What's an Ada SLOC?
Date: 15 Oct 92 21:33:36 GMT

smccoy@dw3g.ess.harris.com (Scott McCoy) writes:

>In the past, I've used 'every non-blank, non-comment line is
>a LOC'.  Note that this method is highly depend upon programming
>and formating style.  I know that.  But it's a simple way to
>count, and if you're consistent, then the data can be meaningful.

I agree that for most seat-of-the-pants uses this LOC definition is
sufficient.  IMHO, algorthmic complexity far overshadows SLOC in terms
of important metrics, which McCabe et. al try to address.  However
McCabe's complexity measures, if I remember correctly, don't take into
account the complexity of the problem domain, so flight control
software that uises the same depth of loops, nesting of IF statements,
etc. as an accounting program will be deemed equal in complexity.

For entertainment, here's a simple awk script to count non-blank, 
non-comment lines.  Don't make million-dollar decisions based on it ;-)

	.Bob.


#!/bin/nawk  -f

BEGIN		{ cmnt = 0; sloc = 0; blnk = 0; }

/^[ \t]*--/	{ cmnt++; next; }
/^[ \t]*$/	{ blnk++; next; }
/^*$/		{ sloc++; next; }

END		{ 
		  printf("Comment lines: %5d\n", cmnt);
		  printf("Blank lines:   %5d\n", blnk);
		  printf("SLOC       :   %5d\n", sloc);
		  printf("-----------------------\n");
		  printf("Total lines:   %5d\n", cmnt+sloc+blnk);
		}
----------------
Bob Kitzberger          VisiCom Laboratories, Inc.
rlk@visicom.com         10052 Mesa Ridge Court, San Diego CA 92121 USA
                        +1 619 457 2111    FAX +1 619 457 0888
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
From: tim@deakin.OZ.AU (Tim Cook)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Advise to Programmer Wannabee (was #299)
Date: 9 Oct 1992 10:51:21 +1000
Organization: Deakin University
NNTP-Posting-Host: mimas.cc.deakin.oz.au

BUSHMAN@MITECMAIL.CCSCNET.AF.MIL writes:

>In article <1992Oct1.105159.8145@brt.deakin.edu.au), someone (they didn't sign
>message)

That someone was quite probably one Doug Miller.

>Now we both know that Ada is not the best language to use for accounting
>programs.  COBOL would be much better for this.  But it too (at least the
>newer versions) are also big.  But he would at least be learning the
>language that he will find out in the field once he graduates from Purdue
>University.  From Scott's original message, it didn't really sound to me that
>he wanted to become a programmer.  I got the impression that he wanted to be
>an accountant that knew some programming also.

If this is really the case, he would be best off leaving general-
purpose programming languages alone and concentrating on Lotus 1-2-3.

>Don't get me wrong, you could write some very good accounting programs in
>Ada. Ada can do it. But is anybody out there actually doing this? I think
>not. They are using things like COBOL. Why? Because COBOL was designed for
>this purpose.  It does stand for COmmon Business Oriented Language, or did
>they change it?  I mean, it was designed for things like accounting.

Yes, you could say COBOL was designed for things like accounting.
Unfortunately, it was not designed for things like programming.

>I also agree that COBOL is an old language and that it uses some old ideas.
>But have you looked at the latest versions?  They have released (or
>getting ready to release) things like Object Oriented COBOL, CASE Tools for
>COBOL, etc. COBOL is evolving. It is not the old show it used to be in the
>70's.

This is probably where many would shoot holes in my argument, as I
have not seen any new COBOL since COBOL 85, which IMHO made a pathetic
attempt to update COBOL to about late-70's standard.  Given that any
new COBOL would probably be based largely on old COBOL, any new COBOL
is likely to remain an abomination.  You know what the success of
COBOL-generating CASE applications says to me?  It says "we have to
use COBOL, but please, please don't force us to write COBOL code".  I
wonder why that has happened...

>Let's put things back into perspective, quit this bickering, and go on with
>our business.  We are all professionals here.  Ada is a good language, some
>would even say that is a great language, but it is not the language to end
>all languages.  It too has some "quarks".  All languages do.  There are
>applications out there that are better solved by languages other than Ada.

I would strongly argue, however, that accounting is not necessarily
one of them; certainly not if you restrict "languages other than Ada"
to COBOL (and similar efforts).

Is anyone else out there tired of COBOL dogma?
From: pat@summit.opus (pat gioannini)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Ada's (in)visibility in the engineering community
Date: 8 Oct 92 14:30:11 GMT
	<1992Oct5.195015.128@fcom.cc.utah.edu>
Organization: /home/pat/.organization


>
>   Since there is no comp.lang.advocacy group.  (There should be.)  Since this
>   subject (leaking the story about an operating system having been written in
>   Ada) was brought up in this group, which prompted my reply.  And since the
>   question was asked (or more correctly, demanded).  Here is my reply:
>
>   To answer this question, we must first understand what is meant by "real-time"
>   as used in the English language.  (The schwa (upside-down 'e') is represented
>   by '@', macron (overline for pronounciation) is represented as an '_' before
>   the letter, and the centered dot is represented by '*'.)
>
>   "The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language -- 3rd Edition",
>   1992 (hyphenated versus non hyphenated):
>
>	   re*al time (r_e'@l, r_el) n. Computer Science.  1. The actual time
>	   in which a physical process under computer study or control occurs.
>	   2. The time required for a computer to solve a problem, measured
>	   from the time data are fed in to the time a solution is received.
>
>	   re*al-time (r_e'@l-t_im', r_el'-) adj. Computer Science.  Of or
>	   relating to computer systems that update information at the same
>	   rate as they receive data, enabling them to direct or control
>	   a process such as an automatic pilot.
>
>   "Webster's II Riverside University Dictionary", 1984:
>
>	   real-time n. Computer Sci. 1. The actual time in which a physical
>	   process under computer study or control occurs.  2. The time
>	   required for a computer to solve a problem, measured from the time
>	   data are fed in to the time a solution is received.
>
>   "Collins English Dictionary", 1985 (A British English dictionary):
>
>	   re*al-time adj. denoting or relating to a data-processing system
>	   in which a computer is on-line to a source of data and processes
>	   the data as it is generated.
>
>   Note: none of the above definitions specifies any requirements for "real-time".
>   However, they all heavily imply that speed is VERY important in "real-time".
>   In "Ada Versus C++: A Business Case Analysis" (this should be an acceptably
>   biased souce of information for this group), says that C and C++ both
>   score higher (are faster) in run-time speed.
>
>   However, contrary to common English usage, the same report says that Ada has
>   a better real-time score.  This apparent contradiction can most easily be
>   resolved by concluding that Ada has a definition for "real-time" which differs
>   from common English usage.


My conclusion for the inconsistancy of the definition of real-time  is 
that the these dictionaries are incorrect, probably
because this definition was not written by real-time programmers.

A better source for a definition would be a text book or even
advertisments for real-time operating systems.
--
pat gioannini
pat@psl.nmsu.edu
From: bortzmeyer@CNAM.CNAM.FR (Stephane Bortzmeyer)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Any RPC for Ada?
Keywords: Ada RPC
Date: 9 Oct 92 11:18:11 GMT
Organization: cnam

In article <199209281909.AA03969@cnam.cnam.fr>, bortz@CNAM.CNAM.FR writes:
> I'm looking for any information/pointers about implementations of RPC
> (Remote Procedure Call) in/for Ada. I'm specially interested in Unix 
> solutions.

Thanks for all those who replied. I got two free packages for my two
queries: one RPC to interoperate with existing C RPC programs and one
completely new and purely Ada. Here is a summary:

David Emery <emery@d74sun.mitre.org> sent me a short set of packages
("no warranty") to interface Ada with Sun's RPC (also called ONC) for
the Verdix compiler (but it should be easily adapted). This is a rather
thin binding. It seems to be able to interoperate with C programs.
Unfortunately, I wasn't able yet to compile it. May be Verdix changed
the appendix F?

Steve Case <scase@planet8.sp.unisys.com> developed an Ada interface to
XDR, Sun's library to deal with data format problems, a layer under the
RPC. I didn't test it. There is another XDR binding with the previous software.

Karl A. Nyberg <karl@grebyn.com> and William M. Hodges
<hodges@stars.boeing.com> pointed me toward SA-E's RPC, a free toolkit
to write RPC with Ada. I didn't try it yet, but it's well documented.

and, as you saw on this newsgroup, Bob Kitzberger <rlk@VisiCom.COM>
indicated that TeleSoft has an implementation of RPC. I don't know yet
if it can interoperate with programs written with other languages/compilers.

Time to launch another thread: should an Ada RPC be compliant with
existing RPCs (and, in this case, should it be implemented by a binding
or a rewriting?) or should it be a completely new system?

Stephane Bortzmeyer           Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers	
bortzmeyer@cnam.cnam.fr       Laboratoire d'Informatique
                              292, rue Saint-Martin			
tel: +33 (1) 40 27 27 31      75141 Paris Cedex 03
fax: +33 (1) 40 27 27 72      France	

"C'est la nuit qu'il est beau de croire a la lumiere." E. Rostand
From: mjl-b@minster.york.ac.uk
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Novice question: What's a "binding"
Date: 15 Oct 92 10:15:52 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of York, England

In article <1992Oct13.225642.25188@nosc.mil> psm@nosc.mil (Scot Mcintosh) writes:
>I'm just getting familiar with Ada and there is a mystery I'm trying to
>clear up: what is meant by "bindings"? I see the term appearing as a
>noun, as in: "We supply X Windows bindings for Ada". My inference is
>that they are what I have thought of in the past as libraries. Before
>making a fool of myself in front of someone important, I figure I had
>better ask. (Oops, not that you people aren't important: I mean
>someone like a *customer*). If my inference is correct, how did
>this term happen to be selected instead of the more common (I think)
>"libraries"?

I've always taken "binding" to mean "interface to a library written in a
language other than Ada". Hence X bindings for Ada are an interface to the C
X libraries (actually, it gets more complex than this due to X callbacks --
but I digress :-) ).

I'm sure that someone will correct me if I'm wrong :-)


>Scot McIntosh
>Internet: psm%helios.nosc.mil@nosc.mil

Mat

| Mathew Lodge                      | "A conversation with you, Baldrick,     |
| mjl-b@minster.york.ac.uk          |  and somehow death loses its sting..."  |
| Langwith College, Uni of York, UK |  -- Blackadder II                       |
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
From: osstlm@eua.ericsson.se (Tomas Lundstrom)
Subject: Object Database for Ada
Keywords: ODBMS, database, EAR
Reply-To: osstlm@eua.ericsson.se
Organization: Ellemtel Telecom Systems Labs, Stockholm, Sweden
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 10:09:50 GMT

ODBMS with Ada language binding
-------------------------------

EasyDB is an Object Database Management System that provides a 'true database'
solution, i.e. it does not rely on a particular programming language for
data definition or data manipulation.

Currently we are adding a language binding to Ada (C and C++ are currently available)
which will ship Q2 1993.

A description of the system has been posted to comp.newprod and eunet.newprod.

For further information, please contact Renee Sjostedt, Jaan Haabma or Per-Arne 
Gussander at Objective Systems SF AB on:

	phone: +46 8 703 45 30, fax: +46 8 750 80 56,
	E-mail: base-open-request@os.se


Product Summary

	EasyDB releases 3.1 product highlights are summarized in:

*	Multi-user system with network distributed storage - can be scaled down 
	to single-user and single-host configurations.

*	Strong modeling system (both graphical and textual). Dynamic schema 
	evolution.

*	Well integrated language bindings. Static or dynamic name resolution. 
	Multimedia support.

*	Safe and easy to use conflict handling throughout the system.

*	Support for Configuration Management.

*	Powerful distribution mechanism. Network topology independent.

*	Technology independent layers.

*	High performance. Short and long-lasting transactions.



/Tomas Lundstrm, Objective Systems
From: sidou@litsun.epfl.ch (Dominique Sidou)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Problem with inefficiency and records with variant parts
Date: 7 Oct 92 12:03:37 GMT
Distribution: comp
Organization: Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne


First, I want to reformulate the problem, I think it
was not enough precise in my first post:

Suppose:

PACKAGE qwe IS 

  subtype t1 is Integer;
  type t2 is array(1..1000) of Integer;
  type t3 is array (1..1000) of Boolean;

  subtype st is integer range 1..3;

  type t (s : st := 1) is record
    case s is
      when 1 => c1 : t1;
      when 2 => c2 : t2;
      when 3 => c3 : t3;
    end case;
  end record;

  procedure fillt1(v1 : in out t1);
  procedure fillt2(v2 : in out t2);
  procedure fillt3(v3 : in out t3);
  procedure fillt(v : in out t; s : in st);

END qwe;

package body qwe is

  procedure fillt1(v1 : in out t1) is
  begin
    v1 := 1;
  end fiilt1;

  procedure fillt2(v2 : in out t2) is
  begin
    for i in v2'range loop
      v2(i) := 2;
    end loop;
  end fillt2

  procedure fillt3(v3 : in out t3) is
  begin
    for i in v2'range loop
      v3(i) := true;
    end loop;
  end fillt3;

  procedure fillt(v : in out t; s : in st) is
  begin
      -- ?? How can I Do ??
      -- to cast v to v(s) and then call
      -- the corresponding filling procedure
      -- without any copy of a structure of
      -- type t2 or t3.
    case s is
      when 1 =>
	v := (s => 1, c1 => 0);
        fillt1(v.c1);
      when 2 =>
        v := (s => 2, c2 => (others => 0)); -- useless copy to avoid !!
        fillt1(v.c2);
      when 3 =>
	v := (s => 3, c3 => (others => false)); -- useless copy to avoid !!
        fillt1(v.c3);
    end case;
  end fillt;

end qwe;

I think now the problem is well formulated.

Precisions:
1: I know that if my components were
references it would be easy. But i have to deal
with static structures.

2: Working with Verdix Ada 6.0.3 on Sun4/SunOs 4.1.1

Thanks in advance for any ideas,

/DS.

Sidou Dominique, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne,
DI-LIT-INN138, Ecublens, CH-1015 Lausanne, Suisse
tel: 693.26.48. e-mail: sidou@litsun.epfl.ch
--

Sidou Dominique, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne,
DI-LIT-INN138, Ecublens, CH-1015 Lausanne, Suisse
tel: 693.26.48. e-mail: sidou@litsun.epfl.ch
From: rknazik@x102a.harris-atd.com (knazik bob)
Subject: MS Windows GUI tools
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 18:06:21 GMT
Reply-To: rknazik@x102a.ess.harris.com (knazik bob)    
Organization: Harris Corporation GSS, Melbourne, Florida

  Area there any decent GUI tools which generate Ada code for PCs
  running under MS Windows ?  I have a project that I can develop
  in either C++ or Ada, but I would like to use a GUI generator tool.
  I'd like to use Ada for the project, but it hinges on the GUI tool.
  Any information would help.
                               Thanks
                                  Bob Knazik
                                  rknazik@x102a.ess.harris.com

Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
From: firth@sei.cmu.edu (Robert Firth)
Subject: Re: Problem with inefficiency and records with variant parts
Organization: Software Engineering Institute
Distribution: comp
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 13:34:32 GMT

In article <SIDOU.92Oct7130337@litsun.epfl.ch> sidou@litsun.epfl.ch (Dominique Sidou) writes:

>  procedure fillt2(v2 : in out t2) is
>  begin
>    for i in v2'range loop
>      v2(i) := 2;
>    end loop;
>  end fillt2

Change this to 

	Function Fillt2 return t2 is
	begin
	    return t2'(others => 2);
	end;

>        v := (s => 2, c2 => (others => 0)); -- useless copy to avoid !!
>        fillt1(v.c2);

and change this to

	v := (s=>2, c2=>Fillt2);

Any reasonable optimising compiler should be able to reduce this to
a single copy into the correct component of the LHS, especially as
the base type of the array is unconstrained.

Hope that helps.
Newsgroups: comp.lang.tcl,news.answers
From: Bud Bach <bachww@rtsg.mot.com>
Subject: Re: Planning for Tcl 7.0
X-Xxdate: Thu, 8 Oct 92 17: 52:54 GMT
Organization: Motorola, Inc
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1.1d9
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 22:52:34 GMT

In article <1992Oct8.143420.1947@cpu.com> Gerald W. Lester,
gwlester@cpu.com writes:
>	How about the recent discussion (it was on tk but..) on adding a file
>handler.  That is, being able to set up a procedure to automatically get
called
>when input is ready on a file.

Yes!
Newsgroups: comp.lang.tcl
From: Bud Bach <bachww@rtsg.mot.com>
Subject: Re: Planning for Tcl 7.0
X-Xxdate: Thu, 8 Oct 92 17: 51:37 GMT
Organization: Motorola, Inc
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1.1d9
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 22:51:13 GMT

In article <1992Oct8.143420.1947@cpu.com> Gerald W. Lester,
gwlester@cpu.com writes:
>	How about the recent discussion (it was on tk but..) on adding a file
>handler.  That is, being able to set up a procedure to automatically get
called
>when input is ready on a file.

Yes!