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Ask HN: Any active COBOL devs here? What are you working on?

234 points _false | 2 comments | 18 Jul 25 13:05 UTC | HN request time: 0.016s | source

COBOL legacy systems in finance and government are somewhat of a meme. However, I've never actually met a single person who's day job is to maintain one. I'd be curious to learn what systems are you working on?
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zeeframe ◴[18 Jul 25 13:45 UTC] No.44604586[source]▶
I’m not a COBOL dev but I work with mainframes(z/OS). Most COBOL applications I’ve seen have been banking and insurance related with few exceptions. Most of them either run as a series of batch jobs or via transaction managers like IMS and CICS. Backends are usually sequential files(we call them datasets),DB2,VSAM(Virtual Storage Access Method) or DL/1(hierarchical DB that’s part of IMS). Quite a few places I’ve seen have run IBM MQ as well.

If changes are made to these systems it’s often due to changes in regulation or driven by changes in the business(new financial products being offered etc.

Off-topic: I’ve seen quite a few mainframe related posts on HN fly by over the years. I’ve been meaning to create an account and participate but I’ve only gotten around to it just now.

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znpy ◴[18 Jul 25 14:57 UTC] No.44605362[source]▶
Dumb question: mainframes and z/OS look interesting, how does one get started with learning about those systems and those environments ?
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1. mindcrime ◴[18 Jul 25 15:40 UTC] No.44605955[source]▶
There's an emulator called Hercules[1] that lets you run (some) mainframe stuff on a PC. There are limits to what you can run on it though, mostly due to licensing issues with IBM.

You can also look at the IBM Redbooks site[2]. Search for terms like Z/OS, MVS, CICS, DB/2, etc. and you'll find a lot of IBM books, whitepapers (well, they call them redpapers, but whatever) and so on.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hercules_(emulator)

[2]: https://www.redbooks.ibm.com/

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2. whistl034 ◴[18 Jul 25 16:04 UTC] No.44606305[source]▶
I've setup Hercules on my Mac before. Fun tool, since I last touched OS2/MVS 40 years ago. Best part is many of the old OS's (MVT, MVS, vm/370) are all still available since IBM never saw the need to copyright them.