On Mon, Sep 28, 2015 at 11:00 AM, Grinsell, Don <dgrins...@mt.gov> wrote:
> Scott, that's easy. They obviously want more money to modernize and they > needed an easy scapegoat. I'd like to know more about how COBOL is > inherently less secure than a modern language subject to the plague of > hacks that beset the distributed environment. Our state agencies regularly > go to our legislature asking for money to replace their antiquated and > vulnerable COBOL systems even though those systems have been reliably and > securely doing their intended jobs. Inevitably the new systems are the > ones that get in the newspaper. > I do know that part of the problem is that the younger programmers just don't _KNOW_ COBOL. And so, naturally, they don't get a job which requires it. And they also "talk up" whatever language that they do happen to know, while often talking down all others. Especially in the case where that language started long ago and is thus "obviously" obsolete. Most younger programmers also "talk up" their favorite frameworks, such as Angular.js instead of JQuery.js. Me, I like to know lots of languages. Historic mainframe: Fortran, PL/I, HLASM, REXX, & even COBOL. or UNIX such as PERL, Python, shell scripting (BASH mainly), AWK. Or the truly weird: APL One, invalid, argument against COBOL is that you can't learn it "on my own, at home". I've implemented GNU COBOL on Fedora Linux (100% cost free). I then downloaded about 30 of my company's batch COBOL. Over 90% compiled perfectly (couldn't run any due to lack of VSAM data on Linux). Most of the ones which failed to compile actually had language errors that the IBM compiler accepted and so the compiler warnings were ignored. We even had one programmer write a HTTP server (the domino version) CGI in COBOL. And it was used by an application on a Windows server to get data from a VSAM file. Of course, we have better ways to do that now, so that entire project died out, replaced with a vendor interface product. > > Hmm...I just noticed the quote my kookie jar picked for this email. It > seems appropriate. > > -- > > Donald Grinsell > State of Montana > 406-444-2983 > dgrins...@mt.gov > > "The power of accurate observation is often mistaken for cynicism by those > who have not got it." > ~ George Bernard Shaw > > -- Schrodinger's backup: The condition of any backup is unknown until a restore is attempted. Yoda of Borg, we are. Futile, resistance is, yes. Assimilated, you will be. He's about as useful as a wax frying pan. 10 to the 12th power microphones = 1 Megaphone Maranatha! <>< John McKown ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
