🚀 go-pugleaf

sdwhitel@socs.uts.edu.au (92075151 s d whiteley) writes:

>Yes I agree Cobol is inefficient.... but that also leaves me wondering why
>it is used in *alot* of sites where major processing is required? If all
>these new languages are so viable then why hasnt industry switched to it??
>Cause their benefits do not (yet) overcome their costs perhaps?

This is because Universities are perpetuating the evil of COBOL by turning
out graduates that can program it. If there wasn't anyone to maintain the
code, it would become rather expensive and companies would be forced to
change.

However, that ol' University COBOL machine just keeps grinding - the end
result of which is that COBOL didn't die in 1974 like it was supposed to
and now there's an object oriented COBOL. Where will it end?

In the meantime, I make no bones about the fact that I am ashamed that
I have ever programmed in COBOL (even though it was only at Uni), and
in fact, it does not even appear in my professional resume as a language 
with which I am conversant.

On a related topic that was brought up in someone elses previous post,
the excuse that you are able to learn C in a subject at UTS is really no excuse
at all. There is one elective subject (Systems Programming) in which the
language is taught. Given the relative importance of C against COBOL in
the CURRENT marketplace, this is clearly unacceptable. With regard to C++, 
well, if you want to learn it I can recommend a good book.



regards...                                                 
Chris Keane.                    State Bank NSW             ph. +61 2 259 4459
Unix Systems Administrator     (Group Treasury)      chris@rufus.state.COM.AU
Famous Gravitational Joke: It must have been density that brought us together

...and (almost) ex-student of UTS...