Ahem A Rivet's Shot  wrote:
> On Fri, 13 Mar 2020 14:32:09 -0000 (UTC)
> Martin Gregorie  wrote:
>
>> Full-stops mean stuff to a COBOL compiler!
>
>  The largest output per bad byte of source I've ever seen came from
> a COBOL compiler absorbing the consequences of a missing full stop (IIRC
> after the word DIVISION). It got very confused and went on about it at great
> length.
>

My only professional run-in with COBOL was an interval of maintaining and
enhancing a poor man’s version of runoff (needed for a documentation
project) written in COBOL.

That’s when I found that a period omitted in the middle of an IF nest
didn’t produce a syntax error, but it radically altered the operation of
the program!

Given the “now you see them, now you don’t” behavior of line printer
periods and their general resemblance to flyspecks, I decided that COBOL
was not for me...

--
-michael - NadaNet 3.1 and AppleCrate II:  http://michaeljmahon.com

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