rharwood@east.pima.edu (06/25/91)
In article <SRCTRAN.91Jun24191603@world.std.com>, srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes: > > If Ada is so great, and the US government is spending so many billions > on Ada software development, why is the marketplace for Ada tools and > libraries non-existent? > I just received in the mail today the Summer '91 issue of "The Connection" > a directory of software development tools and products distributed by > "Programmers Connection (North Canton, OH) 800-336-1166)". They distribute > pretty much any programming tool for PCs, Suns, Macs and Vaxes, though most of > their products are for PCs. > The bulk of their products are language compilers, language tools and > language libraries. In the Summer '91 issue, I made the following rough count > of products by major languages: > Ada - 10 > Assembly - 32 > Basic - 65 > C - 289 > C++ - 111 > Clipper - 38 > Cobol - 15 > Fortran - 53 > Modula-2 - 11 > Pascal - 56 > I'd hardly consider Programmer's Connection a valid pulsebeat of international software engineering tool usage. "Most of their products are for PCs" makes the bulk of your other religeous arguments suspect. All your table shows ME is that ANYONE can make a piece of software and call it a "C tool." Look instead at a cross-section of job opportunities in computer programming. Yes, I concede C/C++ is the big winner. But PASCAL programmers are NOT in demand. Oh, there is a demand for TURBO PASCAL programmers, but that's not the same! The PC programmer market is VERY different from the large-scale and embedded system market. Ray
srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) (06/25/91)
If Ada is so great, and the US government is spending so many billions
on Ada software development, why is the marketplace for Ada tools and
libraries non-existent?
I just received in the mail today the Summer '91 issue of "The Connection"
a directory of software development tools and products distributed by
"Programmers Connection (North Canton, OH) 800-336-1166)". They distribute
pretty much any programming tool for PCs, Suns, Macs and Vaxes, though most of
their products are for PCs.
The bulk of their products are language compilers, language tools and
language libraries. In the Summer '91 issue, I made the following rough count
of products by major languages:
Ada - 10
Assembly - 32
Basic - 65
C - 289
C++ - 111
Clipper - 38
Cobol - 15
Fortran - 53
Modula-2 - 11
Pascal - 56
By product, I counted either software tools (such as metric analyzers) or
libraries of source code (such as windowing libraries). I made similar
counts in programming magazines (Journal of Object Oriented Programming,
Computer Language, and Dr. Dobb's Jounral, and got similar relationships).
For some reason, the software market does not think that there is much money
to be made with Ada products, and probably for reasons that have nothing to
do with the technical efficiency of the language.
This scarcity of Ada products has some serious side effects - the apparent
small demand of any Ada products pushes up the price of those Ada tools that
are marketed. Companies entering new software development projects are going
to lean towards those languages for which there are many tools and companies
offering projects, even if the language is lower in quality (i.e. I might not
think C or C++ is perfect, but I do like the wide variety of tools available).
Companies developing new software tools are going to lean towards those
languages where it is clear that money can be made.
For all of these side effects, the ratio of C/C+ products to Ada products,
being great now, and probably greater in the future, will be a strong
deterrent to the acceptance of Ada, no matter how convincingly one argues
that Ada is a better language.
What makes this table weirder is that the number of Ada products should at
least match the number of Pascal libraries, since a lot of the Pascal
libraries could be run through R&R Pastran Pascal-to-Ada converter. Since
Programmers Connection makes it fairly easy to include new products in their
directory, and accept a variety of packaging conditions for projects, it
is strange that so few (i.e. zero) Pascal library companies are not even
bothering to provide Ada versions.
For some reason, something about the DoD and large defense contractors makes
it hard for small companies to develop and market new software products. As
long as this condition remains so (and as long as this problem continues to
experience the apathy of everyone from AJPO down to the lowly Ada software
engineer), Ada will remain a cult, niche language, no matter how great the
language is (or will be with 9x improvements). It amazes me that no one in
the Ada community seems to be concerned that there are so few companies
that can survive making Ada tools and libraries, given the billion dollars
plus going into Ada software development.
It also doesn't help that in the multi-billion dollar commercial MIS world,
someone very big is sending a message that Ada has no role in their future
software engineering plans.
Gregory Aharonian
Source Translation & Optimizationchuck@brain.UUCP (Chuck Shotton) (06/25/91)
In article <SRCTRAN.91Jun24191603@world.std.com>, srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes: > > If Ada is so great, and the US government is spending so many billions > on Ada software development, why is the marketplace for Ada tools and > libraries non-existent? > I just received in the mail today the Summer '91 issue of "The Connection" > a directory of software development tools and products distributed by > "Programmers Connection (North Canton, OH) 800-336-1166)". They distribute > pretty much any programming tool for PCs, Suns, Macs and Vaxes, though most of > their products are for PCs. > The bulk of their products are language compilers, language tools and > language libraries. In the Summer '91 issue, I made the following rough count > of products by major languages: [Specious arguments, stuff deleted] If you've been around the industry for a while, you'll remember the history of the Programmer's Connection. They started out life as a source for C-related products for PC users and really haven't changed. Basing your entire argument on the catalog from one vendor dedicated to PC-based C programmers is not very convincing. If you are interested, I can send you a list of over 200 vendors of Ada compilers and related design and development tools. See how many C performance analyzers you find in that list. The (probable) reason why you don't see many small companies selling Ada-related tools to large aerospace companies is that most small (PC-oriented) companies don't understand the development problems facing these large companies and are unable to target their products to them. There ARE several small firms in the CASE and engineering tool arena that successfully compete in the verticle aerospace market. It IS interesting to note how many of the employees of these "small" companies once worked for the large ones (and thus understand the problem)... ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Chuck Shotton Internet: cshotton@girch1.med.uth.tmc.edu UUCP: ...!buster!brain!chuck "Your silly quote here." AppleLink: D1683 MacNet: shotton
larryc@poe.jpl.nasa.gov (Larry Carroll) (06/25/91)
Ada is failing (or not succeeding as fast as some other languages) because compilers for it are much more expensive than those for other languages. C (& now C++) is so popular because C compilers were free or inexpensive during the last half of the 70's & most of the 80's. The same has been true of C++ -> C interpreters & now C++ compilers for the last few years.
larryc@poe.jpl.nasa.gov (Larry Carroll) (06/25/91)
And Ada is "failing" because C has been around a long time, so there's a much larger pool of programmers, thus more people writing tools, & more people as a market for those tools. (Which reminds me, I haven't seen all that many good debuggers for Ada.)
dik@cwi.nl (Dik T. Winter) (06/25/91)
In article <1991Jun24.185845.1@east.pima.edu> rharwood@east.pima.edu writes: > In article <SRCTRAN.91Jun24191603@world.std.com>, srctran@world.std.com > (Gregory Aharonian) writes: ... > > Ada - 10 ... > > Cobol - 15 ... > ... > "Most of their products are for PCs" makes > the bulk of your other religeous arguments suspect. This also explains why Cobol so scarce. (Even nowadays most computer cycles are burned with Cobol programs.) -- dik t. winter, cwi, amsterdam, nederland dik@cwi.nl
jcardow@afit.af.mil (James E. Cardow) (06/25/91)
srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes: > If Ada is so great, and the US government is spending so many billions >on Ada software development, why is the marketplace for Ada tools and >libraries non-existent? > Ada - 10 > Assembly - 32 > Basic - 65 > C - 289 > C++ - 111 > Clipper - 38 > Cobol - 15 > Fortran - 53 > Modula-2 - 11 > Pascal - 56 >It also doesn't help that in the multi-billion dollar commercial MIS world, >someone very big is sending a message that Ada has no role in their future >software engineering plans. Interesting arguement. I just have one question. Given the volume of Cobol in the world (good, bad, or whatever), what does your argument say about the socialization of Cobol? I would like to think the world is converting to other languages, but I'm afraid all that I can draw from you tables is that the market in the PC world, in terms of volume of unit sold (not dollars) is for small end tools, especially in light of your last comment on the multi-billion dollar commercial MIS world.. Jim Cardow, Capt, USAF Air Force Institute of Technology Instructor in Software Engineering Professional Continuing Education Program E-mail: jcardow@blackbird.afit.af.mil
khb@chiba.Eng.Sun.COM (Keith Bierman fpgroup) (06/25/91)
>... > language libraries. In the Summer '91 issue, I made the following rough count > of products by major languages: > Ada - 10 > Assembly - 32 > Basic - 65 > C - 289 >... I think it is overly simplistic to count the number of products .... in a mature ecosystem, there is little competition within a given niche. there are lots of other reasons to object (as pointed out, the sample is PCs only, etc.) -- ---------------------------------------------------------------- Keith H. Bierman keith.bierman@Sun.COM| khb@chiba.Eng.Sun.COM SMI 2550 Garcia 12-33 | (415 336 2648) Mountain View, CA 94043
warren@eecs.cs.pdx.edu (Warren Harrison) (06/26/91)
In article <SRCTRAN.91Jun24191603@world.std.com> srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes: > > I just received in the mail today the Summer '91 issue of "The Connection" >a directory of software development tools and products distributed by >"Programmers Connection (North Canton, OH) 800-336-1166)". They distribute >pretty much any programming tool for PCs, Suns, Macs and Vaxes, though most of >their products are for PCs. Programmer's Connection has traditionally focused on the MS-DOS marketplace. They have only recently started listing UNIX/VMS tools, and even then, mostly from their MS-DOS tool suppliers. I don't think Ada is too popular in the MS-DOS market (anybody out there doing significant Ada development under MS-DOS?). Another reason you'll find few Ada tools (so far) in the catalog is based on pricing. The Connection (as well as most other such suppliers) insists on approximately a 50% discount off the retail price - most vendors used to doing direct sales, haven't set their prices to accomodate a 50% discount, so they are understandably reluctant to use dealers. The rule of thumb you have to use if you want this kind of distribution channel is figure out what you need out of the product to make a profit, and double it so you can quote a list price that will still make you a profit after a 50% cut (you can sell it for less, but the *list price* has to be up there - consider all the "special offers" Borland, Microsoft, etc. make - they still make a profit at that price, but at 50% of that price, which is what the distrbutors want, they go belly up in no time). As the Ada market matures (actually as the companies learn the mass market game), we can expect to see more Ada toolsets being listed in distributor catalogs. ========================================================================== Warren Harrison warren@cs.pdx.edu Center for Software Quality Research 503/725-3108 Portland State University/CMPS
jls@netcom.COM (Jim Showalter) (06/26/91)
> If Ada is so great, and the US government is spending so many billions >on Ada software development, why is the marketplace for Ada tools and >libraries non-existent? Because nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public? (P.T.Barnum) Because a great number of people have a knee-jerk reaction to anything the DoD (or Big Government) ever does, facts be damned? Because the DoD has been rather idiotic in its approach to broadening acceptance and use of the language by not spending some sliver of those billions of dollars to subsidize purchases of Ada compilers and tools by schools, endowing chairs of software engineering at universities, etc etc etc? > The bulk of their products are language compilers, language tools and >language libraries. In the Summer '91 issue, I made the following rough count >of products by major languages: > Ada - 10 > Assembly - 32 > Basic - 65 > C - 289 > C++ - 111 > Clipper - 38 > Cobol - 15 > Fortran - 53 > Modula-2 - 11 > Pascal - 56 One should always be careful to normalize data, lest one mistake an apple for an orange. First of all, Ada is generally still used more on large projects than small ones, since it is on larger projects that its inherent support for large-scale software engineering really shines over other languages that lack such features (any language supports conditional tests, but how many support macro-scale decomposition and enforcement of interfaces?)--to quote P.J.Plauger, convener and general secretary of the ANSI C standards committee: "Above 100,000 lines, you probably should be writing in Ada.". Give this large-project focus, it is not tremendously surprising to me that PC tools for Ada are few and far between. One might well ask the counter-example: how many tools for C++ for large projects are available? Last year the answer was: 0. Secondly, there is no indication in the above counts as to the QUALITY of the tools available. Third, perhaps some of those other languages NEED more tools than Ada. Lint and its enhancements certainly comes to mind... >For some reason, the software market does not think that there is much money >to be made with Ada products, and probably for reasons that have nothing to >do with the technical efficiency of the language. Again, the programming-in-the-SMALL software market isn't investing much in Ada products. Check out the programming-in-the-large market sometime. >Companies entering new software development projects are going >to lean towards those languages for which there are many tools and companies >offering products, even if the language is lower in quality (i.e. I might not >think C or C++ is perfect, but I do like the wide variety of tools available). AH! I've been just WAITING for someone to make this point for months, since I have a few thoughts on this. The issue comes down to short-term vs long- term gain. In the short term, the greater availability of tools for, say, C++ (and the seemingly easier migration path from C to C++) might well lead to a decision to use C++. But what are the LONG-term consequences of making that decision? If an organization is truly committed to making substantial improvements in its software development process, starting out with the implicit objective of doing so without spending any money or making any waves is pretty short-sighted. I know of many organizations that have tried to upgrade their software development process, and the ones that were the most successful were the ones that treated succeeding at it as a STRATEGIC corporate objective, worthy of time, money, attention from all levels of management, and even the pain of the transition. The ones who accomplished the least significant results were the ones who invested in tools and training only begrudgingly, clung to old standards and practices, refused to allow key people to spend the TIME it takes to learn a new paradigm, etc etc etc. -- *** LIMITLESS SOFTWARE, Inc: Jim Showalter, jls@netcom.com, (408) 243-0630 **** *Proven solutions to software problems. Consulting and training on all aspects* *of software development. Management/process/methodology. Architecture/design/* *reuse. Quality/productivity. Risk reduction. EFFECTIVE OO usage. Ada/C++. *
g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu (George C. Harrison, Norfolk State University) (06/27/91)
In article <1991Jun25.175925.6730@csv.viccol.edu.au>, dougcc@csv.viccol.edu.au (Douglas Miller) writes: > In article <SRCTRAN.91Jun24191603@world.std.com>, srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian) writes: >> >> If Ada is so great, and the US government is spending so many billions >> on Ada software development, why is the marketplace for Ada tools and >> libraries non-existent? Just maybe it doesn't need to be "existent" - there is so much standard Ada support available that selling tools and libraries are almost REDUNDENT. >> I just received in the mail today the Summer '91 issue of "The >> Connection" [ETC.] >> [ETC.] > On a related point, would it be true to say that Ada has built in features > that obviate the need for many auxiliary tools? Comments anyone? Thanks for saying this. IMHO Ada has many of the features that are available in the C tools that are advertised. > I would be more concerned about a lack of Ada compatible libraries, as one > of the objectives of Ada was to encourage a software component industry. Many Ada compilers either come with extensive libraries or these libraries are available from via FTP or downloads. Isn't it wonderful to work on a STANDARD language?? [post flames here] George C. Harrison, Professor of Computer Science Norfolk State University, 2401 Corprew Avenue, Norfolk VA 23504 Internet: g_harrison@vger.nsu.edu Phone: 804-683-8654