Re: Proposed PAR for trial use standard

John Michael Williams (jwill@pacbell.net)
Thu, 27 May 1999 21:34:35 -0700

Bailey, Stephen A (Steve) wrote:
>
> I am personally still struggling to understand the benefits of doing the SID
> work separate from the OOVHDL work. And, if I extend it just a bit further,
> we could include the system-level enhancement activities for VHDL 200x. The
> most concrete thoughts I have seen on system-level enhancements pertain to
> higher level inter-process communication mechanisms which is central to SID
> and implicit in method invocation (messages).
>
> My motivation is to try to maximize the resources we have while also
> developing something that users will find very valuable and compelling.
>
> Therefore, I'd like to recommend that we once again explore the possibility
> of combining the 3 separate efforts in an attempt to significantly move VHDL
> forward. I am not making this recommendation so that VASG can control it.
> I frankly think it would be better to keep it as a separate group, but only
> one group and not 3.
>
> -Steve Bailey
> Chair, IEEE VASG
> > ...

No strong objection to a combined effort, but I suggest the OO
enhancements be kept separate as part of the resulting standard: I
think they should be written as as a discrete set of extensions.

My question would be in terms of usability: We have many thousands
of designers using VHDL as-is (1987, 1993+); should we distribute
OO improvements throughout the standard, like Easter eggs; or,
should the OO enhancements be in a separate
chapter or appendix of some sort?

My thinking, with noone elses corrective insight, is that the latter
would be preferable. This is assuming that VHDL design entry
will be quite different for designers with a full set of OO
tools, and that random mixing of styles (structure and object, say),
might be counterproductive.

Perhaps, a separate document might be provided, suggesting
way(s) to use the new stuff with or without certain constructs
of the old?

-- 
                         John
                     jwill@pacbell.net
                     John Michael Williams