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The Model-View-Controller (MVC) paradigm was developed in conjunction with the Smalltalk programming language to provide the programmer a semi-automated means to create graphical user interfaces for Smalltalk applications. This paper presents the implementation of an MVC framework using Ada 95. Features of our implementation include an extensible architecture for supporting new platforms, event-driven behavior, and a novel registrationbased broadcast notification mechanism. We show how several of the new Ada 95 language features are used to build the framework. In addition, we compare at length the differences between the classical Smalltalk MVC implementation and our Ada 95 implementation, and find that the Ada framework offers the application developer a number of advantages.

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Undergraduate students of Computer Science or Software Engineering must become familiar with imperative programming languages, due to the extensive use of these languages in industry. Perhaps the two most interesting imperative languages, from a technical standpoint, are Ada and C++, as these two languages include a number of modern features and enjoy widespread popularity. We argue that a four-year undergraduate curriculum in Computer Science which emphasizes imperative programming languages benefits from a thorough coverage of Ada in the first two years, while deferring the direct use of C++ until the junior year. The argument is supported by an overview of the technical features of Ada and C++ which both aid and hinder the learning of software development skills.

Test system designers are comfortable with the concepts of precision and accuracy with regard to measurements achieved with modern instrumentation. In a well-designed test system, great care is taken to ensure accurate measurements, with rigorous attention to instrument specifications and calibration. However, measurement values are subjected to representation and manipulation as limited precision floating-point numbers by test software. This paper investigates some of the issues related to floating point representation of measurement values, as well as the consequences of algorithm selection. To illustrate, we consider the test case of standard deviation calculations as used in the testing of Infrared Focal Plane Arrays. We consider the concept of using statistically-based techniques for selection of an appropriate algorithm based on measurement values, and offer guidelines for the proper expression and manipulation of measurement values within popular test software programming frameworks.