Ada technology: current status and cost impact

It is noted that relatively few commercial practitioners have embraced Ada, chiefly because of the lack of efficient compilers and the high initial cost of using it. The results of efforts to address these concerns are summarized. Several Ada compilers targeted to different commercial microprocessors have been benchmarked. This benchmarking activity included obtaining the execution time as well as the memory requirements of Ada compilers and comparing them with compilers for traditional languages like Pascal. In order to determine the cost impact of using Ada, a model has been developed from first principles. The model predicts the cost of using Ada compared to other high languages encompasses the developmental phase as well as the maintenance phase. The model is further refined to include the impact of reusing software. On the basis of these data, it is concluded that Ada technology has matured enough to be used in the embedded environment and can represent a potential cost savings compared to other languages over the entire life cycle