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COBOL Will Outlive Us All
jfruh writes "Here's an old computer science joke: What's the difference between hardware and software? If you use hardware long enough, it breaks. If you use software long enough, it works. The truth behind that is the reason that so much decades-old COBOL code is out there still driving crucial applications at banks and other huge companies. Many attempts to replace COBOL applications flopped in the 1980s and '90s, and we're stuck with them for the foreseeable future — but the Baby Boomers who wrote all that code are now retiring en masse."
I hate it. Stupidest language of all time. I'm trying to convert all these crap programs to nicely done RPG IV, but its a Don Quijote task. I hate the fact, that file access can only be done in 50 lines of code. String operations are total nonsense, ever tried to get a string rightaligned? RPG file access via chain is done in 5-6 lines including the definition of the file and rightalign via evalr().
All of this has happened before and will happen again...
The real problem with COBOL is that, as Larry Wall has pointed out, you can't write poetry with it. There just isn't any good poetry that starts out with IDENTIFICATION SECTION.
The one thing I do miss about COBOL is easy access to fixed-point numeric processing. This seems like a no-brainer, but it is still missing from nearly every language.
Engineering and the Ultimate
There once was an IDENTIFICATION SECTION
Preceding a formula that defied all reflection.
Using all the chem-lab's powers,
it ran longer than four hours,
To make pills that promoted erection!
RPG vs COBOL!!!
Fight! Fight!
Canes and walkers allowed... No punching the kolostamy bag.