TechBrief: Cobol - still doing the business

Mon Jan 04 09:40:54 GMT 2010 Nick Bray, Micro Focus

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Integrating technology from 50 years ago with the 21st century is no easy task.
One can't, for example, readily sync an iPod with a gramophone, upload a documen
t to a typewriter or text a friend from a phone box. Yet much of the technology
that underpins the day-to-day running of our financial system is inextricably li
nked to an innovation which celebrates its fiftieth anniversary this year.
In 1959, the Pentagon laid down the guidelines that would form the basis of Cobo
l (COmmon Business-Oriented Language). While such a prominent building will no d
oubt have played host to more momentous conferences, few, if any, will have gone
on to have such a marked influence on the future of business technology. Over t
he following decades, Cobol developed an almost ubiquitous relationship with ent
erprise IT. As financial corporations and government departments increased their
reliance on digital information, underpinning the IT infrastructures of virtual
ly every major organisation were large, reliable Cobol-based applications.
As a result, Cobol is everywhere, yet is largely unheard of among the millions o
f people who interact with it on a daily basis. Recent research shows that peopl
e in the UK interact with Cobol at least 10 times every working day. Yet, despit
e using the technology so often, only 18% of those surveyed had ever actually he
ard of it. The same research in the US shows the average American relies on Cobo
l even more, at 13 times every day. The majority of Cobol interactions can be at
tributed to financial transactions, from using a cash machine, booking a holiday
or billing the calls on your mobile phone. Its reach is so pervasive that it is
almost unthinkable to go a day without it.
The statistics that surround Cobol attest to its huge influence upon the busines
s and financial world. There are over 220 billion lines of Cobol in existence, a
figure that equates to around 80% of the world's actively used code. There are
estimated to be over a million Cobol programmers in the world today. Most impres
sive perhaps, is that 200 times as many Cobol transactions take place each day t
han Google searches - a figure that puts the influence of Web 2.0 into stark per
spective.
Every year, Cobol systems are responsible for transporting up to 72,000 shipping
containers, caring for 60 million patients, processing 80% of point-of-sales tr
ansactions and connecting 500 million mobile phone users. Cobol manages our trai
n timetables, air traffic control systems, holiday bookings and supermarket stoc
k controls. And the list could go on.
Despite the advent of new technologies, computing languages and platforms over t
he last 50 years, many core banking systems still run on Cobol. Why? Because it
still works. Simple as that. But what made Cobol such a success in the first pla
ce? Why, despite doomsayers confidently predicting its demise for the past 30 ye
ars, does it continue to proliferate? The simplest answer to this question is ju
st that: simplicity. Ever since the idea was hatched five decades ago, Cobol aim
ed to provide a common standard for programmers based on the use of plain Englis
h, simplifying coding for developers and businesses alike. Cobol programmers app
reciate this, not to mention the fact that it is a better guarantee of employmen
t than almost any other IT specialism.
The versatility of Cobol has also played a part in its abundance and longevity.
Applications first developed to run on IBM System 700 mainframes are now being r
eadied to move onto an Amazon or Microsoft cloud computing platform. Cobol's pro
pensity for modernisation is unparalleled, making it not only effective but also
cost-effective. In 2009's turbulent economic climate, modernising existing Cobo
l systems is an attractive prospect for CIOs looking to do more with less'.
Perhaps most crucially though, Cobol systems dating back a number of decades sti
ll exist today because of the immense investment of hours and resources which ha
ve been spent on them during this time. Because of their longevity, these system
s have evolved with the business, and become crucial corporate assets in their o
wn right. Given the competitive advantage these bespoke systems provide, they ar
e far more than just a cost on the balance sheet. Put simply, if Cobol systems c
an continue to perform business-critical tasks efficiently and reliably, then th
ere is no reason why they may not continue to do so for another fifty years.
So is there no end in sight for Cobol's supremacy? Is the language which has so
dominated the last five decades of computing set to continue to do so for the ne
xt half century? Having shrugged off the over-hyped threat of the Millennium Bug
with consummate ease, it would seem the main risk facing Cobol in the 21st cent
ury is finding and training enough professionals to maintain all 220 billion lin
es.
Recent research has shown that less than a third of CIOs (29%) believe they are
recruiting enough core IT assets specialists. Whilst IT leaders have grasped the
value of these vital software assets and realised that modernisation is a cheap
er and less risky strategy than replacement, finding sufficient numbers to fulfi
l this need is proving increasingly difficult. With many computer science studen
ts opting to learn web 2.0 skills, and many of those who are proficient reaching
retirement age, Cobol's success and longevity are almost proving a hindrance to
its long-term survival.
Ensuring Cobol remains a crucial part of the IT skills set must be a key priorit
y for business, government and academia alike over the coming years, as the effe
cts of a serious shortage could be disastrous. The cost of re-writing Cobol prog
rams is estimated at around $25 per line. With over 200 billion such lines in ex
istence, it doesn't take a mathematician to work out that this would be a heavy
cost for business to bear, let alone the disruption to operations caused by leng
thy re-write programmes.
The need for skills is all the more apparent given that Cobol has reached yet an
other critical juncture in its evolution. The advent of Cloud computing is the l
atest step which the language will have to take if its influence is to continue
in the 21st century, yet one that it seems equal to.
Cobol applications have continually shown their ability to adapt to new platform
s, and the emergence of the Cloud should prove no different. While the Cloud has
the potential to revolutionise the way information technology is delivered, it
is the applications which run on these platforms which will continue to perform
the functions most valuable to the business. While new platforms may come and go
, these core systems maintain their role at the very heart of the business. Desp
ite being written off as defunct on countless occasions, Cobol and the applicati
ons which run on it continue to play a huge role in enterprise computing. From r
elatively humble beginnings, Cobol has become the code which has defined the dig
ital age, and a world without Cobol would be quite unrecognisable from the one w
hich we know today.
Cobol emerged at the very birth of the computer industry so it is no surprise th
at the financial sector - as one of the first industries to embrace the benefits
of computers - is an prolific Cobol user. Yet despite numerous other languages'
attempts to steal its crown over the last half century, none have proved to be
as well-suited to their tasks as Cobol.
In a time when the rate of technological and business change appears to increase
by the day, it seems remarkable that the technology which underpins the majorit
y of the world's financial systems is now fifty years old. However, to those who
work closely with Cobol, it is much less of a surprise.
Nick Bray is chief financial officer at Micro Focus