Re: California's COBOL payroll system

FYI,
From IBM-MAIN (with LOTS of follow-up comments there)
> --
> Bill Klein
> wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
> "john gilmore" <john_w_gilmore@MSN.COM> wrote in message
> news:BAY104-W220CC4A942A5E8BACA5EB7C67A0@phx.gbl...
>>I like David Farber's (of course impolitic) 'vacuum tubes' analogy.
>>
>> From this morning's New York Times:
>>
>> But the California controller, John Chiang, says the state's payroll system -
>> which uses a programming throwback known as Cobol, or Common
>> Business-Oriented Language - is so antiquated it would take months to make
>> the changes to workers' checks.
>>
>> "In 2003, my office tried to see if we could reconfigure our system to do
>> such a task," Mr. Chiang told a State Senate committee on Monday. "And after
>> 12 months, we stopped without a feasible solution."
>>
>> David J. Farber, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University,
>> said using Cobol was roughly equivalent to having "a television with vacuum
>> tubes."
>>
>> "There are no Cobol programmers around anymore," Mr. Farber said. "They
>> retired centuries ago." John GilmoreAshland, MA 01721-1817USA
>> __________________________________________________ _______________
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>
>

In article <Kmrmk.414459$I42.352285@fe04.news.easynews.com> ,
William M. Klein <wmklein@nospam.netcom.com> wrote:
>FYI,
> From IBM-MAIN (with LOTS of follow-up comments there)
>> --
>> Bill Klein
>> wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
>> "john gilmore" <john_w_gilmore@MSN.COM> wrote in message
>> news:BAY104-W220CC4A942A5E8BACA5EB7C67A0@phx.gbl...
>>>I like David Farber's (of course impolitic) 'vacuum tubes' analogy.
>>>
>>> From this morning's New York Times:
>>>
>>> But the California controller, John Chiang, says the state's payroll system -
>>> which uses a programming throwback known as Cobol, or Common
>>> Business-Oriented Language - is so antiquated it would take months to make
>>> the changes to workers' checks.
>>>
>>> "In 2003, my office tried to see if we could reconfigure our system to do
>>> such a task," Mr. Chiang told a State Senate committee on Monday. "And after
>>> 12 months, we stopped without a feasible solution."

From the same article, found at
<http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/06/us/06computer.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx= 1218101211-jeBNu6hwz1VBhJM/dAJmug>

--begin quoted text:

Mr. Farber said California was not alone in having out-of-date systems —
or handy excuses.

"It's old technology, and you can’t find a repairman who knows how to fix
it," he said. ?It also a neat way of figuring how not to get your salary
cut."

Even before his remarks to the Legislature, Mr. Chiang, a Democrat, had
made no secret of his dislike for the order by Mr. Schwarzenegger, a
Republican, saying he would refuse to follow it even if the state’s
computers could handle the job. The governor, in turn, has threatened to
sue Mr. Chiang to force the pay cuts, saying Mr. Chiang was violating a
2003 California court decision mandating that state employees take minimum
wage if the Legislature does not pass a budget.

--end quoted text

DD

On Aug 7, 5:33*am, docdw...@panix.com () wrote:
> In article <Kmrmk.414459$I42.352...@fe04.news.easynews.com> ,
> William M. Klein <wmkl...@nospam.netcom.com> wrote:
>
> >FYI,
> > *From IBM-MAIN (with LOTS of follow-up comments there)
> >> --
> >> Bill Klein
> >> wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
> >> "john gilmore" <john_w_gilm...@MSN.COM> wrote in message
> >>news:BAY104-W220CC4A942A5E8BACA5EB7C67A0@phx.gbl...
> >>>I like David Farber's (of course impolitic) 'vacuum tubes' analogy.
>
> >>> From this morning's New York Times:
>
> >>> But the California controller, John Chiang, says the state's payroll system -
> >>> which uses a programming throwback known as Cobol, or Common
> >>> Business-Oriented Language - is so antiquated it would take months tomake
> >>> the changes to workers' checks.
>
> >>> "In 2003, my office tried to see if we could reconfigure our system to do
> >>> such a task," Mr. Chiang told a State Senate committee on Monday. "And after
> >>> 12 months, we stopped without a feasible solution."
>
> From the same article, found at
> <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/06/us/06computer.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&or...>
>
> --begin quoted text:
>
> Mr. Farber said California was not alone in having out-of-date systems —
> or handy excuses.
>
> "It's old technology, and you can’t find a repairman who knows how to fix
> it," he said. ?It also a neat way of figuring how not to get your salary
> cut."
>
> Even before his remarks to the Legislature, Mr. Chiang, a Democrat, had
> made no secret of his dislike for the order by Mr. Schwarzenegger, a
> Republican, saying he would refuse to follow it even if the state’s
> computers could handle the job. The governor, in turn, has threatened to
> sue Mr. Chiang to force the pay cuts, saying Mr. Chiang was violating a
> 2003 California court decision mandating that state employees take minimum
> wage if the Legislature does not pass a budget.
>
> --end quoted text
>
> DD- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Another way to look at this is the classical "consider the source" of
the quote.

These facts are useful when "connecting the dots":

1. Professor Farber is a computer science professor at Carnegie-Mellon
University (CMU).

2. CMU is home to the Software Engineering Institute (SEI).

3. The following excerpt is from Robert Glass's _Facts and Fallacies
of Software Engineering_, where he quotes Peter Mcbreen in _Software
Craftsmanship_: "Software engineering has been trying to kill COBOL
for decades."

4. McBreen's book is copyrighted 2002.

And this compilation of facts is from someone (me) who actually likes
Software Engineering and who thinks CMU is a very, very good
school. ;-)

ken

<klshafer@att.net> wrote in message
news:18c61bb1-65d7-4e75-be1b-a264a8b28750@34g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...

[snip]

> 3. The following excerpt is from Robert Glass's _Facts and Fallacies
> of Software Engineering_, where he quotes Peter Mcbreen in _Software
> Craftsmanship_: "Software engineering has been trying to kill COBOL
> for decades."

COBOL predates Software Engineering.

COBOL was and is well suited for and early on was used
and is used still to implement ad hoc designs.

Engineering is related to planning, constructing, and managing
according to specific methods.

Software Engineering has no methods for ad hoc design.