Foreword
This document is the Annotated Ada Reference Manual.
The International Standard for the programming language Ada is ISO/IEC
8652:2023(E). The International Standard is derived from the Ada Reference
Manual, with various non-normative changes. In particular, the International
Standard numbers clauses differently, omits the annotations and paragraph
numbers, eliminates the Acknowledgments, and modifies various front matter
such as the Title page and the Foreword.
Discussion: New ISO requirements necessitated
changing the numbers of all of the numbered clauses and subclauses in
the International Standard. The Ada Reference Manual retains its traditional
numbering of clauses and subclauses as it is common for existing material
(both printed and electronic) to refer to subclauses just by number.
The Ada Working Group ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 22/WG 9 is
tasked by ISO with the work item to interpret and maintain the International
Standard and to produce Technical Corrigenda, as appropriate. The technical
work on the International Standard is performed by the Ada Rapporteur
Group (ARG) of WG 9.
AXE Consultants produces the Ada Reference Manual
in consultation with the ARG, along with drafts of other documents as
needed. ISO/IEC documents often list the individual changes that need
to be made to the text of a Standard, rather than simply updating the
document. As such, an International Standard is often found in several
parts, while the Ada Reference Manual is always a single document.
In June 2016, WG 9 approved a tentative schedule
for the preparation of an Amendment or Revision to the International
Standard, with a delivery no earlier than 2018. In July 2019, WG 9 approved
an additional review and prototyping period for this revision, extending
the delivery to no earlier than late 2020. The draft standard was delivered
to WG 9 in July 2021, and the Standard was published as ISO/IEC 8652:2023
in May 2023. This edition is informally known as
Ada 2022.
Since the completion of Ada
2022, work has continued on Ada, both to correct errors and to add enhancements.
A Corrigendum to correct errors and add missing rules was submitted to
standardization in June 2025; it was rejected for process reasons and
replaced by an Amendment with similar contents as well as several minor
enhancements in December 2025. As of this writing it is unknown whether
standardization will succeed. In addition,
there has been no determination of when or in what form other changes
(including many enhancements) will be issued. However, it is valuable to have all of the changes available in one place.
Thus, we've created this draft update, which
for the purposes of this document, we'll call Ada 202y consolidated
edition.
This version of the Ada Reference Manual shows the
current state of Ada 202y. As Ada 202y is still
under development, features are still subject to change 2022 including the
changes made by Amendment 1.
Significant changes in this
consolidated edition are as follows:
Many new aspects and attributes
are defined.
{
AI22-0056-1}
Automatic construction of functions as provided
for null extensions is now optionally available for most type extensions.{
AI22-0057-1}
Rounding attributes similar to the ones long available
for floating point types are added for fixed point types.{
AI22-0109-1}
{
AI22-0111-1}
Clarified that both user-defined literals and container
aggregates can be of class-wide types, and described what happens when
they do have such types.Many corrections and clarifications
have been made to the original edition of Ada 2022.
Ada 2005 and 2012 Editions sponsored in part by Ada-Europe
