Lesson 1 - Intro to COBOL Programming

Common Business Oriented Language

What does COBOL stand for?

1959

When was COBOL developed?

CODASYL committee

Who developed COBOL?

1960

When were the first COBOL compilers released?

American National Standard Institute

What organization created the COBOL standards?

first ANSI standard version

What happened in 1968?

second version for efficiency

What happened in 1974?

Enhanced versatility and structure

What happened in 1985?

Object oriented features added

What happened in 2002?

Method overloading introduced

What happened in 2014?

Business, banking, insurance, and government systems

Where is COBOL still widely used?

Simple, portable, and maintainable

What are the strengths of COBOL?

Wordy, rigid format, and not for scientific use

What are the weaknesses of COBOL?

Backbone of mainframe computing

What role does COBOL play in mainframe computing?

96%

Approximately what percentage of ATM transactions run on COBOL?

80%

What percentage of in-person transactions does COBOL power?

71%

What percentage of Fortune 500 companies depend on COBOL?

60 million

How many hospital patients receive care through COBOL systems?

500 million

How many mobile phones connect directly or indirectly to COBOL applications?

2K

How many containers are managed by COBOL?

20K

How many retirement plans are managed by COBOL?

Over 1 billion

How many new lines of COBOL code are written each year?

Financial services

What major industry heavily relies on COBOL?

Abend

An unexpected or abnormal termination of a program due to a problem in code or data.

Syntax

A system-defined standard that should be followed when coding COBOL statements like MOVE, IF, and PERFORM.

Character String

A set of characters used to name something.

Statement

An individual instruction or command in COBOL, such as MOVE, ADD, and DISPLAY.

Sentence

A group of COBOL statements ending in a period.

Paragraph or Routine

A set of statements coded together to perform a task; it can be executed using PERFORM.

Section

A set of paragraphs coded together; it can be executed using PERFORM.

Division

A major part of a COBOL program, such as IDENTIFICATION, ENVIRONMENT, DATA, and PROCEDURE.

Separator

Characters used to separate strings, such as spaces and commas.

Delimiter

Used to specify the start or end of a string, such as single or double quotes.

Condition

An expression that results in TRUE or FALSE and determines the program flow based on its return value.

Variable or Data Item

A data name used to hold a value for processing in the program.

Constant

A variable that has only one value throughout the execution of the program.

Figurative Constants

System-defined keywords that have predefined values.

Literal

The value assigned to a variable.

Scope Terminator

A COBOL reserved word that specifies the end of specific COBOL statements.

Arithmetic Expression

The coding form of arithmetic calculations; a combination of two or more variables with arithmetic operators.

Physical File

The actual file that contains data in the form of records.

Logical File

A name used in the program that refers to the actual physical file.

Array or Table

A set of similar elements arranged in sequential order that can be accessed by their position; also called a Table in COBOL.

Binary Search

An algorithm used on sorted arrays that repeatedly divides the array into two parts to quickly find an element.

Compiler

A utility that converts source code from a high-level language into object code or machine language.

Load Module

An executable component of a program generated by the compiler.

Identification division

The first division of a COBOL program that contains information about the program and its author/programmer.

Environment division

The division that describes the types of hardware where the program is written and executed.

Configuration division

The section in the Environment Division that defines the source and object computer.

Input and output section

The section in the Environment Division that defines the logical and physical files used in the program.

Data division

The division that contains the FILE SECTION and WORKING-STORAGE SECTION.

File section

The section in the Data Division that declares the logical input and output files used in the program.

Working storage section

The section that declares all the variables to be used in the program.

Procedure division

The division where the program logic is developed. The division that contains user-defined sections, paragraphs, clauses, and statements.

Coding sheet

Specifies from where each statement coding should start and how it differentiates from other statements.