[Tutor] languages

[Alan Trautman]

>
> Cobol is still the most widely used language for new projects
> according to a 2001 study I saw (Computing Weekly and Infoworld
> joint survey)
>

|and neither of these changes my comment -- it *SHOULD* be dead but old
coders 
|who (should) know better keep it around (-:

Why? It's still by far the fastest easiest way the parse text indexed based
records. It's syntax is cruel to non-native (probably Midwestern) English
speakers but for those of us who meet that criteria its easy. It does not
have a powerful GUI interface (I have not tried Fuji's Visual COBOL, too
much money) but if you need to update, sort or append records it is one of
the easiest as you don't waste huge amounts of time making classes or
structures and the like. Oh yeah the need for coding sheets is gone but they
taught me a lot in the day.

Ok rant over  :-)
Don't try to use a tool for what it is not meant for is really the message.
Any that hang around for any length of time must do something well it when,
usually an exec, decides it should do something else it gets a bad
reputation COBOL being the scapegoat of the 90's.

Alan