[Info-vax] Writer advice requested

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 16-11-2010 06:05, Jan-Erik Soderholm wrote:
> On 2010-11-16 01:29, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> On 15-11-2010 18:37, Jan-Erik Soderholm wrote:
>>> On 2010-11-16 00:02, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>>> On 15-11-2010 16:07, Richard B. Gilbert wrote:
>>>>> On 11/15/2010 3:49 PM, Jan-Erik Soderholm wrote:
>>>>>> On 2010-11-15 20:28, Richard B. Gilbert wrote:
>>>>>>> On 11/15/2010 1:06 PM, Rob Brown wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Fri, 12 Nov 2010 at 18:52 -0000, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> What's wrong with COBOL?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> A cross between Assembler and English, with all the
>>>>>>>> disadvantages of
>>>>>>>> both.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> COBOL is okay in its place! Its place, however, is not where I
>>>>>>> want to
>>>>>>> work. It was my first high level language (Computer Programming
>>>>>>> 101 &
>>>>>>> 102
>>>>>>> from the University of Virginia).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> FORTRAN IV was my second language, self taught, from D.D.
>>>>>>> McCracken's
>>>>>>> "Introduction to FORTRAN IV Programming. FORTRAN was what paid the
>>>>>>> bills
>>>>>>> for many years.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> So COBOL would not be OK even if it "paid the bills" ?
>>>>>> It does for me so I guess I like COBOL... :-)
>>>>>
>>>>> Hey! Pay me and I'll write COBOL. Though I expect I'll have to
>>>>> re-learn
>>>>> it. I'm sure that the language has changed a great deal since 1968!
>>>>> There have been how many revisions to the standard in the last 42
>>>>> years?
>>>>
>>>> The standards are 68, 74, 85 and 2002.
>>>>
>>>> So the standard has definitely evolved.
>>>>
>>>> But the 74 and 85 revisions was minor.
>>>>
>>>> I am not familiar with COBOL, but my guess would be that very
>>>> few COBOL programs actually use the new 2002 features.
>>>>
>>>> (and if we talk VMS then I don't even think HP COBOL supports 2002)
>>>
>>> And the applications I support where written in the 80's... :-)
>>> Here is one of the apps with the longest time between the oldest
>>> and the newest version still on-disk :
>>>
>>> > dir DKA200:[xx.yy]zzzz.COB
>>>
>>> Directory DKA200:[xx.yy]
>>>
>>> zzzz.COB;9 27/35 22-JUL-2003 12:51:52.04
>>> zzzz.COB;8 26/35 5-SEP-1997 15:25:53.74
>>> zzzz.COB;7 26/35 19-MAR-1985 16:55:21.00
>>>
>>> And the header says :
>>>
>>> ENVIRONMENT DIVISION.
>>> CONFIGURATION SECTION.
>>> SOURCE-COMPUTER. VAX-11.
>>> OBJECT-COMPUTER. VAX-11.
>>> DATA DIVISION.
>>>
>>> Today it runs on a Alpha DS20e and a DIFF on the files
>>> shows that there where no platform related changes
>>> to the source from the 1985 version to today.
>>
>> :-)
>>
>> > That is what forward/backward compatibility means, right ? :-)
>>
>> I see it more as the benefits of a stable environment.
>>
>> You could have changed OS 3 times and programming language
>> 3 times since then.
>
> Well, before the VAX 11/750 version, the same code runed on a
> IBM mainframe. I think I still have the tools (COM files) to
> automaticly change some minor syntacticaly differences between
> the IBM and the VAX COBOL versions...
>
> Right now, the thought (not *my* thought) is to move these
> applications (or rather what they do) into JD Edwards
> (now owned by Oracle).

The end of an era.

And in a not so far future you will be migrating from JDE to
"Fusion".

Arne