Ada User Community Input
The Ada Language
Ada is a general-purpose programming language designed specifically for the development and long-term maintenance of reliable software.
Ada is used commonly in safety critical systems such as aerospace, air traffic control, rail, and industrial automation.
Since the very beginning, the Ada language has been formally defined through a public standard. Originally as MIL-STD-1815, until it became international standard ISO/IEC 8652.
The Ada Rapporteur Group (ARG)
ISO/IEC 8652 is officially maintained by ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 22/WG 9. Comments from the general public are handled by WG 9's Ada Rapporteur Group (ARG). The ARG is responsible for addressing these comments, which often concern possible enhancements or errors in the Ada standard. The ARG considers these enhancements or errors for incorporation into future versions of the Ada standard.
A new way to engage the Ada user community
Historically the ada-comment mailing list has been used by members of the Ada community to identify problems or suggest enhancements.
This repository, in conjunction with a new website, has been created to simplify the process of providing Ada community input to the ARG, and to provide more visibility into the ARG process.
An accessible medium for discussion
This repository, when compared with the sister website, is geared towards supporting real-time discussions on proposed features or changes to the Ada language through Github's Issues feature.
Active issues can be browsed and discussed with broad accessibility and transparency.
Language Study Groups
Language Study Groups can be formed by the community to work transparently towards a formal proposal (Ada Interpretation/AI) for consideration by ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 22/WG 9's Ada Rapporteur Group (ARG).
It is encouraged that issues first be put to discussion as a Github Issue in this repository, to get feedback from the community, and possibly to identify any early issues, before forming a Study Group.
Anyone who wishes to form a Language Study Group to work towards a formal AI should submit a request through the official ARG web-form.
When a new Language Study Group is approved by the ARG, a Google Docs shared folder will be created. This folder should remain publicly readable, and should contain all working documents used by the Study Group to carry-out its work.
A list of active Study Groups can be found here.
How can I start?
The best way to get started is to browse open issues to get a sense of how issues are structured, and to see if you find any existing issues that interest you. Consider speaking with supporters within that discussion about proposing a Language Study Group to take the issue further.
If there is an issue that you have not found discussed, please be welcome to open a new issue. Try to give it a concise title, a succinct description, and an appropriate tag.
Ada Interpretations (AIs)
The ARG performs most of its work in terms of Ada Interpretations (AIs), which are documents that describe an identified issue with the Ada Reference Manual, or which propose enhancements to the Ada programming language. Such issues may be identified within the ARG itself, or may be identified by the wider Ada community. Historically the ada-comment mailing list has been used by members of the Ada community to identify problems or suggest enhancements.
Language Study Groups work towards the development of an AI that can be submitted to the ARG for formal consideration.
AIs that are being being active considered by the ARG will be posted in this repository in the AI format. This is great reference for language study groups to understand how AIs should be formed, and what they should contain.
As the ARG deliberates on open AIs, AIs will be updated with changes and additional discussion.
At the present time, AIs are being stored in the Rich Text Format, with an aim to eventually develop tooling to easily convert it into many formats. RTF was selected due to its maturity, stability, and generality. The ARG will continue to review the AI formats in the future.
An AI template can be found in the root of this repository.
Pull Requests
Please do not make pull requests to this repository! AIs shall be submitted as the final steps of a Language Study Group. New AIs will be added to this repository by the ARG from time to time.