Re: 7E7 Flight Controls Electronics (COBOL Popularity)

["Warren W. Gay VE3WWG" <ve3wwg@cogeco.ca>]

Richard Riehle wrote:
> "Warren W. Gay VE3WWG" <ve3wwg@cogeco.ca> wrote in message
> news:Nplyc.52642$8k4.1169496@news20.bellglobal.com...
>>Richard Riehle wrote:
>>>"I R T" <rambam@bigpond.net.au> wrote in message
>>>news:oenv7hhc.fsf@pop-server.bigpond.net.au...
>>...
>>>Richard Riehle
>>
>>One of the areas that COBOL was very successful in (and still),
>>is providing the necessary facilities to perform business
>>functions. While it may seem trivial, the need to format
>>numeric values (particularly monetary values) in a picture
>>format is so prevalent, that it becomes a major pain to
>>use other languages that don't conveniently provide this.
> 
> You wrote this in reply to my note about the role of the
> DoD in the survival of COBOL.  The events of the time,
> mentioned in my earlier post, were such that IBM had
> a virtual monopoly in the computer business, much the
> way Microsoft has today.   At that time, the Federal
> Government was less inclined to accomodate that
> monopoly than is the current government.  Therefore, a
> lot of effort was made to ensure that all qualified bidders
> were able to compete for contracts.

I wasn't trying to refute/correct/amend the political
history as you have laid it out. I was only making a more
general comment on COBOL on the basis of its technical
merits, which may, as you seem to suggest, have had very
little to do with its acceptance. If that is what is
being said, I won't argue it.

To return to my earlier comment (in a general way),
much of today's software seems to overlook things
that are so essential for business use. Picture
formatting was one example of something that frequently
comes up. If I were to make a flying leap and
guess, I would say that neither Java, nor C# have
a standard routine to do this for the programmer
(someone please correct me if there is a 'standard
way' to do this in either/both of these).

> PL/I did not look like COBOL to COBOL programmers and it
> did not look like Fortran to Fortran programmers.  

In the early 70s, I was using an IBM-1130 with FORTRAN. We
also had a compiler known as SL/I (Student Language/I), which
was obviously a PL/I subset, though I did not know it at
the time. And yes, to a then FORTRAN programer, it sure
_DID_ look different (but I loved it at the time).

I personally didn't meet up with COBOL, until I met the
IBM-360.
-- 
Warren W. Gay VE3WWG
http://home.cogeco.ca/~ve3wwg