From: arne@vajhoej.dk   
      
   On 12/1/2025 5:46 PM, bill wrote:   
   > On 12/1/2025 4:02 PM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:   
   >> On 12/1/2025 8:37 AM, Dan Cross wrote:   
   >>> I got the impression Waldek was referring to updating programs   
   >>> written to old versions of COBOL to use facilities introduced in   
   >>> newer versions of COBOL, though perhaps I am mistaken.   
   >>>   
   >>> Regardless, this raises an interesting point: the latest version   
   >>> of COBOL is, I believe, COBOL 2023.  But that language is rather   
   >>> different than the original 1960 COBOL.  So even simply updating   
   >>> a COBOL program is akin to rewriting it in another language.   
   >>   
   >> The Cobol standard has been continuously updated over   
   >> the decades. But very few are using the new stuff added   
   >> the last 25 years.   
      
   > Not really true. The only thing COBOL professionals have, for   
   > the most part, refused to use is the OOP stuff.  Some of the   
   > other changes that are within the COBOL model were very welcome   
   > additions.  Like EVALUATE.  Got rid of a lot of multiple page   
   > IF-THEN-ELSE monstrosities.   
      
   EVALUATE came with COBOL 85. That is not within the   
   last 25 years.   
      
   New features within last 25 years besides OOP include:   
   * recursion support   
   * unicode support   
   * pointers and dynamic memory allocation   
   ^ XML support   
   * collection classes   
      
   Have you seen COBOL code using those?   
      
   Arne   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)