Concurrency In Ada

A major feature of the Ada programming language is the facilities it provides for concurrent programming. Alan Burns and Andy Wellings provide here a thorough and self-contained account of concurrent programming in Ada, and so show users, even beginners, how to harness the full power of the whole language. After giving an overview of the non-concurrent features of Ada, the authors proceed to examine in detail the uses of concurrent programming and the inherent difficulties in providing inter-process communication. The Ada tasking model is then introduced; the way it deals with these and related matters is explained in a number of separate chapters, covering system programming, real-time issues, distribution, object-oriented programming and re-use. This is the first book which deals with concurrent features in the new Ada standard, and it offers practical advice to the programmer needing to use it for embedded systems, while those interested more broadly in the development of programming languages will find many otherwise inaccessible issues probed in depth. It will thus be of value to professional software engineers and advanced students of programming alike; indeed, every Ada programmer will find it essential reading and a primary reference work. For the paperback edition the authors have made revisions throughout the text, updating and correcting where appropriate.

Ada is the only ISO-standard, object-oriented, concurrent, real-time programming language. It is intended for use in large, long-lived applications where reliability and efficiency are essential, particularly real-time and embedded systems. In this book, Alan Burns and Andy Wellings give a thorough, self-contained account of how the Ada tasking model can be used to construct a wide range of concurrent and real-time systems. This is the only book that focuses on an in-depth discussion of the Ada tasking model. Following on from the authors' earlier title Concurrency in Ada, this book brings the discussion up to date to include the new Ada 2005 language and the recent advances in real-time programming techniques. It will be of value to software professionals and advanced students of programming alike: indeed every Ada programmer will find it essential reading and a primary reference work that will sit alongside the language reference manual.

The concept of concurrency presents a real difficulty to many programmers. In this book Dr Burns introduces the topic and shows how the Ada programming language, which had as a main design specification that it should contain the features necessary for concurrent programming, deals with it. The need to produce software that models inherent parallelism is important in many applications, including embedded real time systems, process control and general purpose multi-processor system software. Although for many other applications of Ada, knowledge of the Tasking Model is not necessary the full power of the language can only really be obtained if this model is understood.

Exploring how concurrent programming can be assisted by language-level techniques, Introduction to Concurrency in Programming Languages presents high-level language techniques for dealing with concurrency in a general context. It provides an understanding of programming languages that offer concurrency features as part of the language definition. The book supplies a conceptual framework for different aspects of parallel algorithm design and implementation. It first addresses the limitations of traditional programming techniques and models when dealing with concurrency. The book then explores the current state of the art in concurrent programming and describes high-level language constructs for concurrency. It also discusses the historical evolution of hardware, corresponding high-level techniques that were developed, and the connection to modern systems, such as multicore and manycore processors. The remainder of the text focuses on common high-level programming techniques and their application to a range of algorithms. The authors offer case studies on genetic algorithms, fractal generation, cellular automata, game logic for solving Sudoku puzzles, pipelined algorithms, and more. Illustrating the effect of concurrency on programs written in familiar languages, this text focuses on novel language abstractions that truly bring concurrency into the language and aid analysis and compilation tools in generating efficient, correct programs. It also explains the complexity involved in taking advantage of concurrency with regard to program correctness and performance.