Path: csiph.com!v102.xanadu-bbs.net!xanadu-bbs.net!usenet.blueworldhosting.com!feeder01.blueworldhosting.com!border2.nntp.dca1.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!news.iecc.com!.POSTED!nerds-end From: Ivan Godard Newsgroups: comp.compilers Subject: Re: A Plain English Compiler Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2014 15:07:23 -0700 Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Lines: 15 Sender: news@iecc.com Approved: comp.compilers@iecc.com Message-ID: <14-10-011@comp.compilers> References: <06-02-122@comp.compilers> <06-02-125@comp.compilers> <14-10-005@comp.compilers> <14-10-008@comp.compilers> <14-10-009@comp.compilers> NNTP-Posting-Host: news.iecc.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: miucha.iecc.com 1414517241 80655 2001:470:1f07:1126:0:676f:7373:6970 (28 Oct 2014 17:27:21 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@iecc.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2014 17:27:21 +0000 (UTC) Keywords: Cobol Posted-Date: 28 Oct 2014 13:27:21 EDT X-submission-address: compilers@iecc.com X-moderator-address: compilers-request@iecc.com X-FAQ-and-archives: http://compilers.iecc.com Xref: csiph.com comp.compilers:1396 On 10/27/2014 12:25 PM, Kartik Agaram wrote: >> John said (back in 2006) "You can certainly chop English down to >> a small unambiguous subset, but then you've just reinvented Cobol" > [COBOL has an undeserved poor reputation largely among people who've > never used it. Yes, it's wordy, deliberately so, and its facilities > for control structure are weak by modern standards, but it invented > the structured data we now take for granted in languages like C and > C++ and has a wider range of datatypes than most of its successors. > For its time and its intended application it was a huge success. > -John] Agreed. COBOL is the Rodney Dangerfield of languages; it don't get no respect. It's really organized around name/value pairs (think MOVE CORRESPONDING), but with a much nicer syntax than raw XML.