49
votes
What did the DoD think Fortran lacked?
FORTRAN was, at the time(*1), lacking almost everything, from string handling to all I/O beside reading numbers from cards or tape. Heck, not even integer size was guaranteed across machines.
No real ...
- 213k
35
votes
Accepted
What did the DoD think Fortran lacked?
The meeting that defined the requirements of the new language took place on May 28–29, 1959. Charles Phillips prepared a memo several months later summarizing the decisions made at that meeting. ...
- 8,549
29
votes
Accepted
Did COBOL have an English-like "or" operator?
The language defined in the original COBOL report from 1960 did indeed (see section 3.2.2). A normal “compound condition” consisted of a series of “simple conditions” (relations) separated by AND and ...
- 3,465
29
votes
Accepted
What is a good COBOL specification to target when aiming to support ~75% or more of mainframe and minicomputer software bases?
[Preface: While the basic question may seem to be off-topic, as it's about today's use of COBOL, I like to see it as asking in help to educate about COBOL. The noble effort to keep the language alive ...
- 213k
27
votes
Accepted
References for the complexity of the COBOL language
No, COBOL is not complex and didn't require complex compilers.
At least not for COBOL up to 74 (*1) which was the standard at the time of introduction of micros (mid 70s to late 80s). From the ...
- 213k
25
votes
Accepted
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
TL;DR:
Which components or facilities were the biggest obstacle to porting typical COBOL applications?
Simply that there were not many applications that made sense to be ported to (desktop) micros. ...
- 213k
20
votes
References for the complexity of the COBOL language
I would highly recommend Jean E. Sammet’s “Early History of Cobol” for this. She was the chair of two of the committees that developed COBOL, and served on a third.
(If I might take a moment here to ...
- 8,549
16
votes
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
COBOL applications have not typically been ported from mainframes to micros because they rely on two features that micros typically lack.
Throughput COBOL applications often need to process large ...
- 9,290
15
votes
References for the complexity of the COBOL language
If you want to catch a glimpse of the implicit complexity of COBOL, I suggest taking a quick run through these GnuCOBOL syntax diagrams.
The reason that COBOL is complex is that COBOL is not simply a ...
- 12.2k
15
votes
Did COBOL have an English-like "or" operator?
COBOL also has Level 88 conditions. Not quite what you are asking, but related.
For example:
01 WS-FRUIT PIC X(20).
88 APPLE VALUE "Apple".
88 BANANA VALUE "Banana&...
- 3,264
7
votes
Accepted
COBOL and processing card files directly
Processing card input is among the most basic functions COBOL had to provide to get a hold in data processing - computers were meant to be integrated and improve existing card procedures.
Now, reading ...
- 213k
7
votes
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
Different things happened.
One, when mainframes were replaced, their applications were replaced with new applications written in modern languages for the new platforms. Many a IBM mainframe have been ...
- 12.2k
6
votes
References for the complexity of the COBOL language
Four major language developments of the 1950's were Fortran, COBOL, Lisp, and Algol. Comparing just Fortran and COBOL, one could say Fortran was adapted for scientific data processing while COBOL was ...
- 6,118
6
votes
Did COBOL have an English-like "or" operator?
You can do
if a = 'orange' or 'apple' or 'banana'
in COBOL, it translates as
if a = 'orange' or a = 'apple' or a ='banana'
You need to be careful when doing this as it does not always work the way ...
- 161
5
votes
Accepted
Will there have to be a concerted effort to train new developers for legacy systems?
A facetious response is to point out Betteridge's Law, i.e. the answer to your question is "no".
There is nothing fundamentally different about COBOL and/or other legacy systems that ...
- 10.8k
5
votes
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
Not sure what you really asked.
I was an IBM SE back then.
Cobol is a compiled language.
So you need a compiler for it.
The compiler needs an operating system.
The operating system needs a mainframe ...
- 67
4
votes
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
I'd venture to say that it was neither of the things you mention; I think it was what IBM termed "access methods" ...
- 41
4
votes
Accepted
Row locking on RM/COBOL-85
I'm going to start by saying this was a long time ago, so my memory may fail me. And I did not use RM/COBOL, but I programmed for nearly 20 years starting in the mid 80's, migrating COBOL code from ...
- 3,264
3
votes
References for the complexity of the COBOL language
There was nothing very complex about COBOL and I taught it to many people from the business who had no mathematical or technical background. The original statement here is simply wrong; there were ...
3
votes
References for the complexity of the COBOL language
TL;DR Early business computers were decimal-based reducing run time requirements. The structure of COBOL: division, section, paragraph, etc., allowed programs to be compiled in parts. COBOL source ...
- 323
3
votes
COBOL and processing card files directly
Could possibly (also) have meant control of the card reader.
Some card readers had multiple output bins and you could read a card, do a short computation, and then programmatically select which bin to ...
- 6,119
3
votes
Accepted
What was machine-specific about Honeywell FACT?
This is a partial answer at best, and guesswork as well.
Jean Sammets's Programming Languages: History and Fundamentals -- another book everyone here needs -- has a very brief section on FACT, pp327-...
- 33.5k
3
votes
Did COBOL have an English-like "or" operator?
COBOL has an EVALUATE statement that takes the first form (need to use ALSO for multiple conditions).
EVALUATE TRUE ALSO TRUE
WHEN WS-A = 'ORANGE' OR 'APPLE' OR 'BANANA' ALSO ANY
DISPLAY 'A FRUIT.'
...
- 389
2
votes
What was the most critical supporting software for COBOL on IBM mainframes?
IMS is more of an runtime environment and transaction system than a
data base.
I'll have to disagree on that one. IMS is/was a non-relational database (hierachical, if I correctly recall my grad ...
- 21
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