The Ada Resource Association is a self-supporting non-profit organization with two main objectives: to maintain the Ada language standard and infrastructure, and to promote and publicize Ada usage. Established in 1991, the ARA plays a critical role in networking the Ada community and keeping all software developers aware of Ada's technological advances and current usage. The ARA currently includes six major software tool vendors and developers: ACT Europe, Ada Core Technologies, Aonix, IBM Rational Software, Praxis Critical Systems, and SofCheck. The President of the ARA is Ben Brosgol from Ada Core Technologies.

Infrastructure support is essential to the continued vitality of the Ada language. The ARA meets that goal by sponsoring technical work on the maintenance of the ISO Ada standard and its companion conformance test suite. These efforts are currently bearing fruit with the emerging Amendments to the Ada 95 language. The additional capabilities will enhance Ada's role as a language of choice for high-reliability realtime applications, and increase its ability to work with other languages such as Java.

The ARA also promotes and publicizes Ada usage, especially applications that use ARA members' products and services. We maintain the highly rated website Ada News (http://www.adaic.org), where the software community finds the latest news on Ada, as well as success stories, technical papers, links on where to learn Ada, and jobs. The Ada News editor issues press releases monthly to over 500 high-tech editors and journalists on Ada-related developments, researches and write Ada success stories, and updates the website. The ARA also sponsors and staffs the SIGAda booth at such trade shows as the Software Technology Conference, the Embedded Systems Conference, and OOPSLA.

If your company markets Ada-related products or services then you can profit from ARA membership. In addition to the overall effects of the ARA's sponsored activities, such as a viable and evolving standard and general promotion of Ada as a language of choice, you will receive tangible benefits in several areas:

The ability to "piggyback" on the SIGAda booth at conferences is an especially significant money-saver. It means that you can get many of the benefits of exhibiting but without the expense and inconvenience of shipping and staffing a booth. Even if you have a booth at the conference, the SIGAda booths acts as a beacon for all Ada parties and will raise your profile as an Ada tool innovator.

For further information, please contact the ARA's Communications Director Ann Brandon.