In the early 1990s, DDC-I worked on redesigning the compiler system for the wide-ranging Ada 95 revision of the language standard. They used a new object-based programming design and still adhered to a formal methods approach as well, using VDM-SL. The work was done under sponsorship of the European Community-based Open Microprocessor Initiative's Global Language and Uniform Environment -project (OMI/GLUE), where DDC-I's role was to create a compiler targeting the Architecture Neutral Distribution Format (ANDF) intermediate form, with the intention of bringing Ada 95 to more platforms quickly. As part of this work, DDC-I collaborated with the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency in expanding some of ANDF's abilities to express semantics of Ada and the fast-growing programming language C++. Work in Ada-specific areas, such as bounds-checking elimination, was done to get optimal run-time performance.
The Ada software environment was originally thought to be a promising market.
But the Ada compiler business proved to be a difficult one to be in. During this time, 1987–97, a U.S. government mandate for Ada use was in effect, albeit with some waivers granted.
Many of the advantages of the language for general-purpose programming were not seen as such by the general software engineering community or by educators. The sales situation was challenging, with periodic small layoffs. Despite consolidation among other Ada tool providers, DDC-I remained an independent company.
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In any case, DDC-I was an enthusiastic advocate of the Ada language, for use in the company and externally. A paper one of its engineers published in 1993 assessed Ada 95's object-oriented features favorably to those of C++ and attracted some attention. Work was done in conjunction with Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems and the U.S. Air Force to improve the ability for developers to debug highly optimized Ada generated code.
At the same time, the firm attempted to expand and augment its product line. The RAISE toolset was available, as was Cedar, a design tool for real-time systems. Also offered was Beologic, a tool to develop and run state/event parts of applications, that had been licensed from Bang & Olufsen and integrated with the Ada compiler system.
The biggest effort was in the direction of C++. DDC-I began offering 1st Object Exec, a C++-based real-time operating system intended for direct, object-level support of embedded applications. Despite considerable efforts during 1993–94, 1st Object Exec failed to gain traction in the marketplace.
The one area where Ada did gain a solid foothold was in real-time, high-reliability, high-integrity, safety-critical applications such as aerospace.
Based on its experience with Honeywell and other customers, DDC-I acquired expertise in the mapping of Ada language and runtime features to the requirements of safety-critical certifications, in particular those for the DO-178B (Software Considerations in Airborne Systems and Equipment Certification) standard, and provided tools for that process.
Such applications continued even after the Ada mandate was dropped in 1997.
For instance, in 1997 the firm was awarded a joint contract with Sikorsky Aircraft and Boeing Defense & Space Group's Helicopters Division to develop software to be used in the Boeing/Sikorsky RAH-66 Comanche.
In March 1998, DDC-I acquired from Texas Instruments the development and sales and marketing rights to the Tartan Ada compilers for the Intel i960, Motorola 680x0, and MIL-STD-1750A targets.
Support for mixed language development was added in 2000 with the addition of the programming language C as part of DDC-I's mixed-language integrated development environment for SCORE (for Safety-Critical, Object-oriented, Real-time Embedded). Leveraging the ANDF format, the DWARF standardized debugging format, and the OMI protocol for communicating with target board debug monitors, SCORE was able to provide a common building and debugging environment for real-time application developers. Support for Embedded C++ was added to SCORE in 2003, by which time it could integrate with a variety of target board scenarios on Intel x86 and Power PC processors. The C and Embedded C++ compilers for ANDF came from a licensing arrangement for the TenDRA Compiler (later DDC-I became the maintainer of those compilers). Subsequently, Ada 95 support for the older 1750A and TMS320C4x processors was added to SCORE.
Products
Deos is a time and space partitioned real-time operating system (RTOS) that was first certified to DO-178B DAL A in 1998. Deos contains several patented architectural features including enhancements for processor utilization, binary software reuse and safe scheduling for multi-core processors. Deos users have the ability to add on optional ARINC 653 personality modules designed to fit different application needs. Deos supports the processors ARM, MIPS, PowerPC, and x86, and is supported by popular SSL/TLS libraries such as wolfSSL. It was listed as one of the Hot 100 Electronic Products of 2009 by EDN magazine.
HeartOS is a POSIX-based hard real-time operating system, designed for small to medium embedded applications including safety-critical types. It supports ARM, PowerPC, x86 and other 16-bit and 32-bit processors. It is configurable without the POSIX interface layer for memory-constrained systems.
OpenArbor is an Eclipse-based integrated development environment for C, Embedded C++, and Ada application development. It was announced in 2007.
SCORE is a mixed-language set of integrated tools for safety-critical, object-oriented, real-time embedded software applications, supporting Ada, C, and Embedded C++ applications for a variety of embedded architectures.
Legacy Ada 83 and JOVIAL compiler system products also continue to be supported.
