From: arne@vajhoej.dk   
      
   On 12/1/2025 8:23 PM, bill wrote:   
   > On 12/1/2025 6:50 PM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:   
   >> 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?   
   >   
   > I have seen and used pointers but not in production code as at 75   
   > I am not finding many places that want me to work.  :-)   
   >   
   > XML isn't really anything to do with the language it's a file   
   > format. Probably has no place in the language itself.   
      
   They did:   
      
   ISO/IEC TR 24716:2007, Information technology -- Programming languages,   
   their environment and system software interfaces -- Native COBOL Syntax   
   for XML Support   
      
   I have no idea what it does, so I don't know if it makes any sense.   
      
   > UNICODE the same thing.  It could be done fairly easily with a library   
   > but isn't really anything that COBOL had to have as a part of the   
   > language.   
      
   Good unicode support require support in both language and   
   basic RTL.   
      
   As an example (I am not claiming that it is good support!!) see C++:   
      
   std::string   
   std::wstring   
   std::u16string   
   std::u32string   
      
   "ABC"   
   L"ABC"   
   u8"ABC"   
   u"ABC"   
   U"ABC"   
      
   > Wouldn't classes fall under OOP.   
      
   Classes is part of OOP that was added in Cobol 2002.   
      
   Collection classes was added in:   
      
   ISO/IEC TR 24717:2009, Information technology -- Programming languages,   
   their environments and system software interfaces -- Collection classes   
   for programming language COBOL   
      
   I have never seen it used and I do not know how they work. But if it is   
   like collection classes in most other programming languages, then it   
   is predefined container classes for list, map/dictionary etc..   
      
   Arne   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)