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You see Ada used in legacy code bases in aerospace and defense. A big problem, at least at an ex employer of mine, is that no young engineers have a desire to l

You see Ada used in legacy code bases in aerospace and defense. A big problem, at least at an ex employer of mine, is that no young engineers have a desire to learn Ada. It completely pigeonholds you to the aerospace/defense industry's legacy systems.

marssaxman 10y ago
That's been true for at least a quarter century, since I was a young engineer hearing Ada mentioned as another one of those fusty old legacy languages like FORTRAN or COBOL. Even if I'd felt any interest in trying it out, I had no access to any Ada compiler.
- jdboyd 10y ago
  Perhaps you didn't have access to an ADA compiler 25 years ago, but GNAT has been free and open source for about 20 years and part of GCC for more than 15. Of course, 20 years ago, ADA was already 15 years old, so no surprise that when it became accessible it was already branded fusty.
  - flomo 10y ago
    Even back in the 1980s, ada had a "stodgy government bondage & discipline language" reputation. At least among the hacker set, who back then was all about bit-banging the machine. I'd speculate that ada never received the big commercial push, like Sun Java received. There were no salesreps talking up ada on the golf-course to CIOs, and there weren't marketing people planting 'Ada is great' stories in the popular press. It always had "the pentagon made me use it" aura around it.
pjmlp 10y ago
It may be wrong, but from occasionally attending Ads talks at FOSDEM, I got the idea that at least in Europe in what concerns high integrity systems, Ada's has be slowly increasing. Also quite a few European universities do seem to teach it nowadays.
a_imho 10y ago
>no young engineers have a desire to learn Ada. I think this is akin to statements when companies say they have a shortage of developers. Of course they do when they offer no good incentives to join. Offer (above) market salaries and young people will flock to Ada.

marssaxman 10y ago

That's been true for at least a quarter century, since I was a young engineer hearing Ada mentioned as another one of those fusty old legacy languages like FORTRAN or COBOL. Even if I'd felt any interest in trying it out, I had no access to any Ada compiler.

jdboyd 10y ago
Perhaps you didn't have access to an ADA compiler 25 years ago, but GNAT has been free and open source for about 20 years and part of GCC for more than 15. Of course, 20 years ago, ADA was already 15 years old, so no surprise that when it became accessible it was already branded fusty.
- flomo 10y ago
  Even back in the 1980s, ada had a "stodgy government bondage & discipline language" reputation. At least among the hacker set, who back then was all about bit-banging the machine. I'd speculate that ada never received the big commercial push, like Sun Java received. There were no salesreps talking up ada on the golf-course to CIOs, and there weren't marketing people planting 'Ada is great' stories in the popular press. It always had "the pentagon made me use it" aura around it.

pjmlp 10y ago

It may be wrong, but from occasionally attending Ads talks at FOSDEM, I got the idea that at least in Europe in what concerns high integrity systems, Ada's has be slowly increasing. Also quite a few European universities do seem to teach it nowadays.

a_imho 10y ago

>no young engineers have a desire to learn Ada. I think this is akin to statements when companies say they have a shortage of developers. Of course they do when they offer no good incentives to join. Offer (above) market salaries and young people will flock to Ada.