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The complete version of the report is now available on-line on the National Academy Press Website.

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The Computer Science and Telecommunications Board (CSTB) of the National Research Council, Committee on the Past and Present Contexts for the Use of Ada in the Department of Defense was formed to respond to a request from the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Command, Control, Communications, and Intelligence) to review the Defense Department's policy on the use of the Ada programming language. The committee has completed the study and has presented the results of its deliberations to the Department of Defense and the public at briefings in October, November, and December, 1996. A copy of the presentation made at Tri-Ada '96 is found below. The final report, Ada and Beyond: Software Policies for the Department of Defense, will be available in early February.


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Slide Contents

Study Summary
Outline
Recommendations
Rationale I
Rationale II
Study Charter
Study Approach
Study Overview
Committee Membership
Study Committee Background
Data Sources

Past and Present Contexts
Outline
Ada in General
Ada and DoD
DoD Goal: Information Dominance
Ada Today: Overall Demand for Programmers
Ada Today: DoD Weapon Systems Software
Programming Languages (PLs) and Software Engineering (SE)
Programming Language Comparisons
Language Feature Comparisons
Programming Language Features Critical to Warfighting SW
Technical Comparison of
Language Comparisons: Empirical Data
Development Error Rates

Ada Business-case Analysis
Outline
Ada Business-case Analysis
Determinants of National Competitive Advantage
DoD Software Applications Areas
Cost Factors I
Cost Factors II
Quality Factors
Socio-Technical Infrastructure
Conservative Economic Analysis

Findings and Recommendations
Outline
Findings and Recommendations #1
Findings and Recommendations #2
Findings and Recommendations #3
Findings and Recommendations #4
Software Engineering Plan Review Content
Software Engineering Plan Review Process
Software Engineering Plan Reviews
Findings and Recommendations #5
Recommended Ada Investment Elements
Findings and Recommendations #6
Draft Revision of DoD
Recommended DoD Ada Policy

Analysis of Alternatives
Outline
Analysis of Alternatives
Summary of Alternatives
Ada Requirement; No Ada Investment
Ada Investment; No Ada Requirement
Phase-Out of Ada
Conclusions of Study
Implications of Study for DoD

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