COBOL TRANSLATIONS

As one of COBOL’s aims was that code should be English-like so it could be read by non-programmers, it’s interesting to consider whether there were variants based on other natural languages. After all, a French accountant wouldn’t find an ordinary COBOL program to be as easily readable as a British or American accountant. Well, it transpires that there were, indeed, translations of COBOL.

We’d like to be able to report that we found something as bizarre-looking as Greek or Arabic COBOL code, but we’re not sure that such a thing ever existed, and we can’t even conceive of a Chinese version. We do understand, however, that COBOL was translated into Russian, and that, of course, involved the Cyrillic alphabet. Like most things relating to the former Soviet Union, though, details are almost impossible to find. However, back in 1965, the European Computer Manufacturers Association published a report defining the translation of COBOL into French, German and Italian, and these were later published as national standards. So, if you thought that the original COBOL was odd, you might be interested in these equivalents to our previously quoted instruction MULTIPLY GROSS-PAY BY TAX-RATE GIVING TAXDEDUCTED. . In French COBOL, this would be MULTIPLIER SALAIRE-BRUT PAR TAUX-DIMPOSITION RESULTANT TAXE-DEDUIT. (yes, we also took the liberty of translating the variable names), while in German it’s MULTIPLIZIERE BRUTTOLOHN MIT STEUEERSATZ ERGIBT STEUERABZUG. , and the Italian equivalent is MOLTIPLICA RETRIBUZIONE-LORDA PER ALIQUOTAFISCAL DANDO IMPOSTA-DETRATTA. .