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GAP Member Projects
The following are some examples of how Ada is being used in Academic projects and courses by GAP members around the world.
Robotics Demonstrator for Safety-Critical & Real-Time Systems
University of Adelaide Australia
A project team from the University of Adelaide was tasked with creating a demonstrator utilising safety critical programming techniques as part of their final year project.
Utilising the latest release of the GNAT for Mindstorms product, their robot supports the Ravenscar profile and is targeted at the ARM 7 based Mindstorms NXT platform.
Fischertechnik Robotic Arm using LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (Madrid, Spain)
Here is a video made by students at UPM. A Fischertechnik robotic arm solves the classic problem of Hanoi towers.
There is a robotic arm, a home-made board for interfacing sensors, electric motors, an FPGA board with a LEON2 processor and 16 digital I/O. The application is programmed in Ada using GNATforLEON/ORK+ (i,e, using also the Ravensacr Profile) that executes as a partition of XtratuM hipervisor. In a similar way as IMA or ARINC-653 partitions.
Real-Time control of a Model Railway System
Western Washington University (Bellingham, Washington, US)
At Western Washington University, students are using Ada in senior capstone projects on real-time control of a model railway system. To assist in understanding the complexities of that system, WWU faculty member Martin Osborne has developed a simulator that runs virtual trains on a virtual layout identical to the physical layout in the lab, including all switches and sensors. Use of the simulator during problem analysis has helped students understand the factors to be considered in system specification. In later project stages, the simulator assists in design verification and in more extensive software testing than would be practical with the physical system.
Real-Time System Development in Ada using LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (Madrid, Spain)
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid finds the LEGO MINDSTORMS kit and the GNAT GPL Edition for MINDSTORMS an ideal platform to allow students of embedded & real-time systems analyze, develop and implement a real-time system in Ada.
Battling Robots: European Robotics Cup
Telecom ParisTech (Paris, France)
Telecom Robotics’ mission is to provide a robotics-focused forum where students can learn, share knowledge, and innovate. To help realize this goal, the group competes in the European Robotics Cup.
ECHO: A Practical Approach to Formal Verification
University of Virginia (USA)
At the University of Virginia, Ada lies at the core of a comprehensive approach to creating software for safety-critical applications. Dr. John Knight and his student, Xiang Yin, have created a practical approach to formal verification called Echo.
Serafina Autonomous Mini Submersible
The Australian National University (Canberra, Australia)
At the Australian National University (ANU), Ada plays an integral part in teaching and research, at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Dr. Uwe Zimmer has been using Ada, with the GNAT technology on Linux, Windows, Mac, and Embedded MPC5554, in two major courses.
Arctic Sea Ice Buoy and CubeSat Projects
Vermont Technical College (USA)
Under the direction of Professors Carl Brandon and Peter Chapin, students at Vermont Technical College are using AdaCore’s GNAT development environment along with Praxis’ SPARK tools on two NASA-sponsored programs with large software components.
Dasher! – A Racing Robot in Ada
Mälardalen University (Västerås, Sweden)
Under the direction of Professor Lars Asplund, graduate students at Mälardalen University are designing, building and programming the Dasher robot in a project that is pushing the limits of robotics technology. The software is being developed with AdaCore’s GNAT toolset on Wind River Systems’ VxWorks real-time operating system.
Computer Science Dept switches to Ada for More Effective Learning
Western Washington University (Bellingham, Washington, US)
In 2004, the faculty of the Computer Science department at Western Washington University conducted a comprehensive review of the undergraduate curriculum. At the heart of their considerations was the choice of programming language for the introductory programming courses. The faculty agreed that their current choice, C++, was not effective because students were spending so much of their time and intellectual effort on the idiosyncrasies of the language and much less time on problem solving and scalable programming practices.
After much discussion, the department decided to change to Ada.
Ada for Data Structure and Software Engineering Fundamentals
University of Northern Iowa (USA)
The University of Northern Iowa, in Cedar Falls, Iowa, US, was one of the first institutions to join this program, with Prof. John McCormick as the university representative. Signing up for GAP was a natural decision for UNI and for Prof. McCormick, since he has been using Ada and GNAT in Computer Science courses there since 1997.
Different Development Paradigms Within a Single Language
University of Stuttgart (Germany)
At the University of Stuttgart, Ada is the first programming language taught to incoming students of Computer Science, Software Engineering, Mathematics, Automation Technology, and several other disciplines as part of their year-long introduction to practical Computer Science and to programming.
Ada Helps Students Achieve Programming Literacy
Kean University (USA)
Ada was already in use at the university, with the GNAT environment, and Prof. Wittenberg wanted to have the latest toolset available not only for the contest, but also for the Comparative Programming Languages Course in which Ada is currently taught.