On 9/15/21 11:52 AM, Steve Litt wrote:
Gavin Flower said on Wed, 15 Sep 2021 13:49:39 +1200
Hi Michael,
[snip]
COBOL has strange verbs like 'move corresponding' that could
accomplish complicated tasks in a few lines but you have to be
careful that you knew what you were asking for!
MOVE CORRESPONDING is awesome, and a heck of a lot less dangerous than doing
your own memory management in C!!
In our site that was banned as being too dangerous.
And how about the 'lovely' ALTER GOTO construct???
Children don't try to use these constructs at home, as even
experienced adults get burnt using them!
I never Cobolled professionally, but took 3 semesters of Cobol and
Santa Monica Community College in Santa Monica, California USA. They
taught us move corresponding, I used it, it was handy. I'd use it again
if I were a Cobol professional.
As far as alter, in 1981, before I became a programmer, I asked my
Cobol Programmer friend if there was anything you could put in a
program that would get you fired. He said yes, the alter statement :-).
In my 3 semesters of Cobol, I never once used the Alter statement.
Jump tables are great in scripting languages which let you embed a variable
in a variable name. Naturally, you must be careful; explicit variable names
always help...
--
Angular momentum makes the world go 'round.
