The difference is that COBOL found a large user base - finance - that has great need and deep pockets. DoD has deep pockets but always goes for the lowest bidder. Many times S/W costs are not even considered until after the winner gets the contract. > -----Original Message----- > From: Brashear, Phil [SMTP:[log in to unmask]] > Sent: Monday, July 29, 2002 12:15 PM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Re: What's Ada's life expectancy? > > As for COBOL (related, but not quite on topic), members of the COBOL > Standards Committee are talking about a revised test suite, and I'm told > that several COBOL vendors are interested in third-party certification. > That suggests that COBOL is still quite active. > > Phil > > Philip W. Brashear > Software Quality Assurance > EDS Corporation > Voice:+1.937.237.4510 > FAX: +1.937.237.4660 > [log in to unmask] > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Michael Feldman [mailto:[log in to unmask]] > Sent: Monday, July 29, 2002 2:23 PM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Re: What's Ada's life expectancy? > > > Said Stephe, > > > > Other languages have well outlasted their predicted lifetimes; look at > > COBOL. Ada Core Technologies is making money and growing; no reason to > > think that will change. > > > > -- > > -- Stephe > > > I think Ed Colbert was, in his original post, referring to new starts. > Obviously Ada will be around in "legacy" (sub-)systems for a long time > to come. > > Yes, we discovered in the Y2K mess that there was a lot of COBOL out > there. But those Y2K COBOL programmers were dragged out of retirement > (and paid very well for a short time) to work on it. That doesn't say > much about whether COBOL is really in active use, or whether there > are any new starts to speak of. (I don't know whether there are - > do you, Stephe?) > > OK, back to Ada. Is anyone aware of new starts that weren't committed > to years ago? As you probably know, I try to keep abreast of this, > and report it in > http://www.seas.gwu.edu/~mfeldman/ada-project-summary.html. > I haven't seen anything in quite a while; OTOH I haven't done much > active research on it recently. > > I have not had a tip on a substantive addition to this list in two > years or so, maybe even longer. (The latest revision date is 6/22/02, > but that was only to fix a couple of dead links.) > > Anyone have anything to offer? > > Cheers, > > Mike Feldman