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Major Banks and Parts of Federal Gov't Still Rely On COBOL, Now Scrambling To Find IT 'Cowboys' To Keep Things Afloat (reuters.com)
From a report on Reuters: Bill Hinshaw is not a typical 75-year-old. He divides his time between his family -- he has 32 grandchildren and great-grandchildren -- and helping U.S. companies avert crippling computer meltdowns. Hinshaw, who got into programming in the 1960s when computers took up entire rooms and programmers used punch cards, is a member of a dwindling community of IT veterans who specialize in a vintage programming language called COBOL. The Common Business-Oriented Language was developed nearly 60 years ago and has been gradually replaced by newer, more versatile languages such as Java, C and Python. Although few universities still offer COBOL courses, the language remains crucial to businesses and institutions around the world. In the United States, the financial sector, major corporations and parts of the federal government still largely rely on it because it underpins powerful systems that were built in the 70s or 80s and never fully replaced. And here lies the problem: if something goes wrong, few people know how to fix it. The stakes are especially high for the financial industry, where an estimated $3 trillion in daily commerce flows through COBOL systems. The language underpins deposit accounts, check-clearing services, card networks, ATMs, mortgage servicing, loan ledgers and other services. The industry's aggressive push into digital banking makes it even more important to solve the COBOL dilemma. Mobile apps and other new tools are written in modern languages that need to work seamlessly with old underlying systems. That is where Hinshaw and fellow COBOL specialists come in. A few years ago, the north Texas resident planned to shutter his IT firm and retire after decades of working with financial and public institutions, but calls from former clients just kept coming.
Every year I see articles about how COBOL programmers are in high demand and companies are scrambling to hire them. But I learned COBOL and liked it and regularly keep my eye out for COBOL jobs. In the past 15 years I have seen a grand total one one COBOL placement within 1,000 miles. I call BS on the article, the local job boards are all for Java, C++, mobile languages and PHP. Not a COBOL position in sight.
I started programming in COBOL in 1978. I spent a decade or so on IBM mainframes with COBOL and 370 assembler.
I never referred to anything as a COBOL file. There were many types of file and database structures on IBM mainframes. While many simple systems used fixed record formats it wasn't nearly always the case.
The FILE section of a COBOL program allowed for varying record sizes:
FD file-name
RECORD IS VARYING IN SIZE FROM small-size TO large-size DEPENDING ON size-variable.
WORKING-STORAGE SECTION.
77 size-variable PIC 9(5).
The language also allows for the redefinition of record layouts so the type of data and what is to be done with it can be determined at run-time.
> The only barrier to entry preventing some millenial from learning COBOL is the lack of consistent jobs maintaining COBOL code
Actually, no. There are plenty of jobs at unexciting companies for long term full time COBOL programmers. The company I work for, for example is constantly looking to backfill retiring COBOL programmers in one of the financial divisions. To be honest, if I had to do life over again I'd seriously consider picking up COBOL 25 years ago as the wage and job security at those big companies for that position are great - no offshore outsourcers do COBOL, and even if they could, many of the systems involved are sensitive financial systems so outsourcing that could be a big legal minefield so no company wants to risk it. Plus the added little bonanza of the whole Y2K thing where COBOL programmers were making INSANE money in the year leading up to it - like $200/hr insane. In 1999 dollars as well.