From: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!ARPAVAX:CAD:teklabs!tekid!rogerw
Newsgroups: net.jokes
Title: COBOL joke, round 3
Article-I.D.: tekid.66
Posted: Mon Jun 14 11:16:22 1982
Received: Wed Jun 16 02:02:00 1982


Regardless how useful COBOL might  be  for  data  processing
needs,  one  of  the original claims for the language turned
out to be a real joke [and most of us who make our living as
programmers can be thankful].

     When it originally was developed, COBOL was supposed to
be  a  language  that  was  programmed in *natural English*;
*anyone* who could write a  memo  could  program  in  COBOL.
Whereas  most  any language from SNOBOL to PASCAL uses some-
thing of the form C = A + B [ or :=, or some relatively sim-
ple  replacement  operator],  COBOL  originally only had the
more natural English expression, ADD A TO B GIVING C,  which
is  of  course  the  way  real humans, speaking their native
tounge, would say things.

     I'm told in the early sixties the word  was  that  pro-
grammers  would  all soon be replaced, because all a manager
would have to do is say, ``Betty, take a memo to my computer
...''

     Ha, ha ...
                          Roger Wells (teklabs!tekid!rogerw)