loftus@wpllabs.UUCP (William Loftus) (04/02/91)
I have an interesting problem: I'm currently working for a client who
wants a device driver written in Alsys Ada on the 386 PC that controls an
IEEE488 board. I took a C device driver an rewrote it in Ada. Only
problem is that in doing so I've introduced some unknowns into what was
a simple task (i.e., translating C to Ada) and have not produced a full
working device driver. The unknowns are (1) the Ada runtime system, (2)
the Farlap extender, and (3) protected mode.
Interestly, only the Alsys tech rep was willing to help me. The IEEE488
rep and the farlap rep both punted stating that the translation of the C to
Ada must be the problem (even though both admitted having no knowledge of
Ada). I find most of the tech reps unwilling to work with anyone doing Ada
work. Also, of interest is the complexity of the Ada solution compared to
the C solution. The Ada introduces the possibility of problems from things
other than language features (i.e., side-effects of the runtime system and
use of other underlying tools). I'm sure that these effects are well
known and are being taken into consideration by Ada 9X, but is anyone
working on contacts at major companies that will aid Ada work with their
products?
--
William Loftus (215) 668 3661
WPL Laboratories, Inc. UUCP: loftus@wpllabs.UUCP
P.O. Box 111 ARPA: loftus!wpllabs@prc.unisys.com
216 Wynne Lane
Penn Valley, PA 19072 Ada and Unix Software Consultants