Re: GnatBench (from GPL edition)

On Wed, 2 Apr 2008 22:20:53 -0500, "Randy Brukardt"
<randy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"John McCabe" <john@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:str7v39teoa2rielnfrivc290751v3g8uu@xxxxxxxxxx
"Randy Brukardt" <randy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
...
If you think this is ugly,
you should see the GUI distributed with Janus/Ada...it *is* a Windows 3.1
look, and it is nowhere is nice as this. :-)

That would be interesting to see, but there aren't any screenshots on
your website, and the main Janus/Ada 95 page hasn't been updated since
2001 according to the bit at the bottom.

Umm, our website is intended to convince people to buy Janus/Ada, not to
convince them not to. ;-)

LOL :-), but won't people just think "oh - that hasn't been updated
since 2001, they probably don't actually sell it any more!"

The whole site is going to get an overhaul after the next release of
Janus/Ada comes out, but there isn't much point in updating it to show off
non-existent tools...

Very true.

I understand the market pressures, but on a practical basis, I don't
understand the big deal about bloated IDEs anyway. Everything that is
worthwhile in an IDE is language and compiler-specific anyway (debuggers,
error messages, syntax, symbol browsing, project management), so what can
this empty framework actually accomplish?

Essentially it's a template, at least the Java development environment
is. It provides a means for companies to produce a fully integrated
IDE without having to go through the rigmarole of producing it from
scratch. Much of the foundation is already there, you just have to
provide your specific bit and plug them.

What rigmarole? With a decent windowing toolkit (or even with Claw ;-),
there isn't much to putting together a decent editing app.

Well, yes, editing is pretty much a piece of cake these days, but it's
fitting all the different, possibly disparate bits together that takes
the efforts, and this is where the Eclipse framework simplifies things
(at least, that's what I understand as I've not had the chance to
actually use it to do that sort of thing - I'm just a user, not a
developer).

And the rest of
it is going to be very language- and implementation-specific. My
understanding is that that pretty much the entire Eclipse IDE resides in its
plugins, so developing them is just as complex as developing a whole IDE.

Well not quite as complex as once you understand the Rich Client
Platform and the whole framework, and you have the Java Development
Tools to set an example, I believe it's easier. You only have to
concentrate on the bits that are important to your application.

Moreover, you have to develop them in a subpar programming language (IMHO -
and in any event I don't know it anywhere near as well as I know Ada). So
what's the gain? It mainly seems to be a marketing checkbox to me.

I agree with the subpar language thing, but from a marketing point of
view, if you want to get into a market that is currently Java based,
or C++ on Unix then there is a good chance you will find they already
use Eclipse. If you and a competitor both sell Ada compilers, but your
competitor has plugged in to Eclipse and you haven't, given no other
significant differences in functionality between your products, I
would suggest your competitor has the upper hand. Just look at who's
involved in the Hibachi project - Aonix are effectively leading it
with DDC-I and AdaCore having significant input, and supposedly OC
Systems and Green Hills are expected to contribute.

To some extent the way all
the components fit together is fixed so, to the user, programming in
one language is much like programming in any other. You have, however,
ways in which you can provide very compiler specific information if
you like, by producing views to display it. I think it's brilliant
personally. My productivity would be improved if I were able to use
purely Eclipse (I am working in a multi-language environment) because
I would only need to learn to use one IDE.

Fine enough. But I'm really not very interested in multi-language
programming. Lest I appear to be losing my mind, let me explain a bit.

<..snip..>

You seem to be too much of an idealist to me. Yes, in an ideal world,
the chances are that Ada is the most appropriate language for most
software to be developed in, but the world is far from ideal.

Now, I realize that it's unlikely that many of us are going to be able to
build all-Ada bare machines. (The fact that people have turned to using
real-time executives to provide the same services that Ada already does has
always mystified me; a bare machine Ada should do as well or better than
your typical RTOS.) But my preference is to spend some effort up front
wrapping any foreign code into the best designed Ada interfaces that you can
get, and then (hopefully) never look at it again. That was the main driving
reason for developing Claw, and that has worked out pretty well (could have
been better, I suppose, but that's always true).

While that's true to some extent, I don't believe the "never look at
it again" part is feasible - things move on underneath you. E.g. the
Win32 stuff that I believe Claw wraps has moved on a bit since I first
heard of Claw, which means you need to follow those developments and
update your wrappers, or risk being obsolete. Basically any code that
you wrap could change at any time to make your wrappers, if you don't
follow those changes, just not work. This is especially true for
wrappers to open-source software in my experience.

Anyway, I *hope* I'm not crazy. I realize I could make more money by giving
up on building decent programs and following the herd. But I hope that there
still is some value to doing the right thing. (Based on yesterday's election
results here in Wisconsin, it appears that there isn't. Maybe I'm just
old-fashioned in that way.)

You're not crazy, just too much of an idealist (meant in a nice way
:-)

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: GnatBench (from GPL edition)
    ... Things would be much better if there was an Ada OS. ... worthwhile in an IDE is language and compiler-specific anyway (debuggers, ... IDE without having to go through the rigmarole of producing it from ... you have to develop them in a subpar programming language (IMHO - ...
    (comp.lang.ada)
  • Re: Programming language for children
    ... can introduce an IDE. ... Putting Eclipse in front of a beginner is a lost cause. ... just said it's not a suitable tool for beginners, ... Having actually taught introductory programming to children, ...
    (Ubuntu)
  • Re: netbeans - or - Eclipse
    ... > Inviting comments about the free IDEs Eclipse and Netbeans ... > If you are using one of the two - have you tried the other IDE? ... Eclipse, and I'm unlikely to change again. ... The debugger is pathetic; I ...
    (comp.lang.java.softwaretools)
  • Re: Brian Moelk guesses (wrongly) that Delphi is Going to be Killed
    ... The main point I made is that Borland *must* support ... > VS.NET in their ALM strategy, ... magnitude worse by ceding them the IDE as well. ... > I recognize there are differences between Eclipse and VS.NET. ...
    (borland.public.delphi.non-technical)
  • Re: Eclipse embedded development woes, req feedback
    ... However, IMHO, Eclipse is an absolute POS. ... except where using the debugger was absolutely necessary. ... everything" IDE. ... However, I just use it as an editor, I don't do windows ...
    (comp.arch.embedded)