Kerneels, keep your political commentary out of this, please. Rex
-----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU] On Behalf Of AbsKerneels Sent: Friday, September 20, 2013 10:17 AM To: IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU Subject: Re: Unused variables Hi, I agree.. anybody that thinks they need to remove unused variables in a Cobol program should rather RETIRE or vote for TED CRUZ. Kerneels On 9/20/2013 9:12 AM, John Gilmore wrote: > The idea of eliminating unreferenced variables in COBOL record > declarations is of course absurd, and fulminations against it are at > best otiose. It is always possible to construct quietist arguments > against change, any and all change; but this straw man is too > obviously so to very useful to careerist obstructionists. > > We are left with working-storage and local-storage declarations for > variables that then go unused. In many cases they were once used, but > maintenance changes have made them redundant. In any case they may be > eliminated safely, and they should be when an occasion to do so > arises. They are individually ugly; and they add to source-program > clutter, which is substantial in old COBOL programs. > > Whether a major undertaking, a formal project or the like, for their > elimination is jusitified is another, very different question. I > think not. All optimizing compilers eliminate dead code, sequences of > instructions that can never be executed, and dead variables, which are > never referenced. > > Some compilers and backends are better at these operations than > others. The current IBM C/C++ and PL/I backend, for example, detects > almost all aliasing schemes and even reflects these 'obscured' > references in its XREF output. The current COBOL compiler does a > modest but adequate job of this when full optimization is used. There > is therefore almost no resource-savings argument to be made for a > campaign to eliminate unreferenced variables; and further > bureaucratization of this particular programming milieu is highly > undesirable. > > John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN The information contained in this message is confidential, protected from disclosure and may be legally privileged. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient or an employee or agent responsible for delivering this message to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, distribution, copying, or any action taken or action omitted in reliance on it, is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by replying to this message and destroy the material in its entirety, whether in electronic or hard copy format. Thank you. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
