IBM Creates a COBOL Compiler For Linux On x86

IBM has announced a COBOL compiler for Linux on x86. 'IBM COBOL for Linux on x86 1.1 brings IBM's COBOL compilation technologies and capabilities to the Linux on x86 environment,' said IBM in an announcement, describing it as 'the latest addition to the IBM COBOL compiler family, which includes Enterprise COBOL for z/OS and COBOL for AIX.' The Register reports: COBOL -- the common business-oriented language -- has its roots in the 1950s and is synonymous with the mainframe age and difficulties paying down technical debt accrued since a bygone era of computing. So why is IBM -- which is today obsessed with hybrid clouds -- bothering to offer a COBOL compiler for Linux on x86? Because IBM thinks you may want your COBOL apps in a hybrid cloud, albeit the kind of hybrid IBM fancies, which can mean a mix of z/OS, AIX, mainframes, POWER systems and actual public clouds.

But the announcement also suggests IBM doesn't completely believe this COBOL on x86 Linux caper has a future as it concludes: 'This solution also provides organizations with the flexibility to move workloads back to IBM Z should performance and throughput requirements increase, or to share business logic and data with CICS Transaction Server for z/OS.' The new offering requires RHEL 7.8 or later, or Ubuntu Server 16.04 LTS, 18.04 LTS, or later.

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