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Join COBOL's Next Generation

Posted by timothy on from the enjoy-your-tab-diet-beverage-too dept.

jfruh writes "COBOL, it's finally becoming clear, isn't going away any time soon; there are far too many business-criticial applications written in it that work perfectly well for that to happen. This reality could be a career boon for IT staff. Need to learn the ins and outs of COBOL? Your employer may well pay for your training. Just getting started in IT? COBOL can provide a niche that gets you a first job."

11 of 276 comments (clear)

  1. Nothing does by geekoid · · Score: 4, Interesting

    what COBOL does as well as COBOL does it.

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    1. Re:Nothing does by Joce640k · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Keeping them employed until retirement age.

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    2. Re:Nothing does by Nerdfest · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I will also add that the reason it's so hard to get rid of is that most software written in COBOl tends to be a tangled mess that can't be easily split up and decoubled, replacing parts with more modern, usable languages. It tends to be an all or nothing venture. It has very little, if anything to do with it being the best language for the job.

    3. Re:Nothing does by solidraven · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Being verbose is often considered bad, yet languages like VHDL and Ada do it as well. The latter two combine it with a very strict syntax. As a result Ada and VHDL code that compiles/synthesizes has a larger chance of working on the first attempt. More keystrokes isn't exactly a problem. I'm not sure about you but my typing speed isn't the limiting factor in writing programs. The days of planning, flow diagrams, etc. are.

    4. Re:Nothing does by mwvdlee · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It sure does!

      On the other hand, I got out of COBOL programming after some ~12 years because the only thing COBOL does well is what COBOL has done thousands of times before.

      It's a boring platform to develop for; very few interresting (from a technical perspective) projects ever come along.
      Safe and secure life as a developer; yes. Actually enjoying your safety and security; no.

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    5. Re:Nothing does by tripleevenfall · · Score: 4, Funny

      You're about to find out. 2014 is going to be the Year Of COBOL On The Desktop.

  2. This. by mfwitten · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is why we can't have nice things.

  3. COBOL is... by erp_consultant · · Score: 4, Insightful

    not a lot of fun to program in. It's wordy, it's procedural...generally kind of boring. But...it's imbedded in so many mission critical systems. The ERP system that I work on is chock full of COBOL stuff, mainly in the Payroll processing modules. It works, it's really fast, and nobody wants to mess with it. Sure, you could rewrite it in Java or some other language but it represents risk that many companies are not willing to take.

    COBOL programmers are in big demand now and it's only going to grow. I'm not sure how many schools still teach COBOL but I suspect it's not many. So if you can put up with having a little less glamorous coding to do it's a great job opportunity.

  4. Re:Java = the next COBOL by gweihir · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And in how far is Java any less messed up than Cobol is? Java, as used by enterprises today, is an abomination.

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  5. COBOL is plainly superior... by istartedi · · Score: 4, Funny

    COBOL is plainly superior... from an evolutionary standpoint. It propagated and survived. Nevermind that it feeds on the souls of developers. That's irrelevant. Evolution only cares about propagation and survival.

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  6. Re:You Can Tell COBOL Was Designed By A Woman by seven+of+five · · Score: 5, Funny

    And a missing period gets you in a lot of trouble.