Original-Received: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 10:28:34 
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From: Mark Elston <elston AT cave DOT arc DOT nasa DOT gov>
Date: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 10:28:32 -0800
To: djgpp AT sun DOT soe DOT clarkson DOT edu
Subject: Re: Ada and djgpp

I didn't know I was such a pioneer :-).

I have received quite a bit of mail lately about the GNAT product.  I
didn't realize there were so many people who wanted to use Ada along
with C++.

For those interested in GNAT you can download binary packages from
cs.nyu.edu:/pub/gnat.  There are DOS zip files that can be used with
djgpp.  I recommend unzipping them in a different directory, say /ada,
then copying the /ada/bin/gnat*.exe files to the /djgpp/bin directory
and gettting rid of the rest of /ada/bin since they are identical to,
but at a lower revision than, the current dgjpp exes.  I think that
lib/libc.a is also supplied, so get rid of it too (as well as any
other files you find that overlap without *adding* to the utility of
djgpp).  Then copy the rest of /ada/* to the /djgpp directory.  Now
run the tests and off you go.  gcc.exe knows about files ending in
.adb and .ads so it calls the proper compiler (gnat1.exe) for these
files.

If you look at sw-eng.falls-church.va.us there are several directories
of Ada related material (from Ada 83 to Ada 9X) including the Language
Reference Manual (LRM) and Annotated LRM.  Highly recommended.

I have not had time to do much more than run the tests but I expect
that in the next month I will do some more extensive testing (I hope).

I am not an Ada-Wise person (or an Ada Wise-Person for that matter).
I have used the language before and found it very useful in many
environments.  I prefer not to get into language flame wars (*hint*,
*hint*) especially since I am familiar with and use *several*
languages day-to-day (C, C++, Ada, Lisp, Perl, etc.).

I just wanted to pass on the information for anyone else who would
like to experiment with a very promising Ada 9X compiler.  I think it
is great that we have, in essence, first crack at a language -- even
before the commercial world jumps into the fray. (Of course the
standard has yet to be finalized, so the commercial world will
probably catch up soon after that happens).

Mark