Re: [GNU-COBOL] New to COBOL

["Justin C. Ferguson" <jferg@lusArs.net>]

When last we left our heros, they were speaking of:
> Perhaps by using C++ and designing a few cobolesque base classes?

	This is very similar to how Chad and Laura originally planned on 
	implementing the translator.

> It just seems to me that if COBOL functionality is, as is widely
> claimed,
> a proper subset of the functionality of so many other languages,
> throwing
> together a rough translator, instead of a compiler, would not be
> difficult,
> especially since I know (it was an aside in a lecture in AI class) that
> someone once wrote a full Common Lisp interpreter in dBase.

	The functionality is not the stumbling block, at the moment.  The
	functionality is the easy part.  The syntax is hard.  Very hard
	to get completely correct.   The problem that's being run into is
	that the grammar for COBOL is so complex none of the existing tools
	can handle it.  Tim Josling has done a lot of work on a preprocessor,
	which is an excellent start towards getting this done, but it 
	still leaves us a lot of difficult steps ahead.

> How do people get into COBOL programming?  It's never offered in schools

	Actually, it is offered in some schools... UMR, where several of
	us on the project went to school, even required it...

								JF

-- 
Justin Ferguson - Tech. Analyst/Geek of All Trades   jferg@lusars.net
http://www.lusars.net/~jferg/                            jferg@geeks.com
A hollow voice says "Plugh".                                   jferg@acm.org 

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