Customer Reviews

Cobol: Structured Cobol Programming v. 1: From Micro to Mainframe

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I have taught COBOL for a number of years and have always used Grauer Villar & Buss. This new edition, although commendable in adding Microfocus Cobol, lacks true Mainframe focus. A few years ago there was an accompanying small book that greatly added to the mainframe concepts - but is no longer available. However, the flow of the book, the explanations, examples and summaries have proved to be an excellent textbook for professional training, especially when accompanied with appropriate JCL and CICS textbooks. Still above all, I rate this at the top of COBOL books - but don't agree with the authors assumption that the mainframe is no longer a relevant part of COBOL programming.

This book is a great resource for the beginning or intermediate Cobol programmer. Very clear explanations and abundant examples aid understanding. The authors favor a "hands on" approach which encourages the reader to try out the concepts in each chapter. The example code is included on the CD (along with the input files for the exercises) which is a great timesaver.

The authors are careful about pointing out differences between Cobol-85 and Cobol-74 as they arise. While this may seem to be a minor point with the advent of the latest Cobol standard, it is helpful to those who work with older systems that are not fully Cobol-85 compliant.

The Fujitsu Cobol environment comes along with the book. The Fujitsu compiler is a big improvement over the DOS-based compiler and editor that came with the second edition. An appendix provides some step-by-step examples to help the reader get up to speed with the compiler.

The book is weighted more towards micro computers - if you are working in a mainframe environment, you will probably want to find additional references on JCL, CICS, etc.

The book may not be the best choice for someone who has no previous programming experience, but for readers who have some background in programming (in any language) and are interested in learning Cobol, this book & compiler set is the best resource I've seen for Cobol at this level. I strongly recommend it.

I teach programming at the university level and have recently switched to this publication as the main text for my classes. The book provides fantastic examples and explains concepts at a level a beginning programmer can understand. As with any text, the solutions are available in the instructor's manual (available from the publisher). The extensive support provided by the publisher's web site and by the authors themselves is unmatched. As this book was written to be instructive, it lacks somewhat as a reference guide, but is still a valuable resource for any junior programmer.

This is a textbook that I used to teach myself COBOL. Althoughit is a textbook, it is not obtuse or pompous and it is actuallysometimes funny. The new edition, however, comes with Microfocus COBOL, which get seems to get the same clear and thorough treatment as before. The examples in every chapter demonstrate the concepts well and logically build upon preceding material: almost made the self-learning process painless. More variety in the exercises would have made it a 10.

I first had the second edition of this book, and I bought the third edition as soon as I heard it was out. It has the most complete sample programs of any COBOL text I've seen. I found code examples for every concept or method introduced. The accompanying software makes COBOL projects almost fun, giving you a GUI-like workspace as opposed to SEU on the AS400 (I teach on that). I recommend this book to all my students who are serious about COBOL.

I HAVE FOUND THIS BOOK TO BE VERY INFORMATIVE. MY QUESTION IS THIS. THE BOOK I PURCHASED FROM SCHOOL CAME WITH THE MICROSOFT COBOL COMPILER SOFTWARE. WHAT I WANT TO KNOW IS THIS SOFTWARE THE SAME AS THE OTHER PERSONAL COBOL MICROSOFT SOFTWARE?

This book is excellent for the Cobol language, but when it comes to talking about Mainframes, only in the title do you find the word Mainframe. I could have missed the import of the book, but when 'mainframe' is not even in the index, nor is MVS (Multiprogramming Virtual Storage), CICS (Customer Information Control System), TSO (Time Sharing Operation: a program that allows the typing of the Cobol program) JCL (Job Control Language, a batch like computer language used to link and compile and interface between the programmer and MVS). I welcome "Constructive" corrections to that fact. I truly find the title "Cobol: From Micro To Mainframe: Preparing for a New Millenium" to be misleading! Had there been a better description of the book contents, I would have not ordered the book directly from the publisher.

I attend DeVry Inst. and am taking cobol as my first programming language ever. We are using this book as our text book. I'm running into problems finding answers to my questions in this book. It seems to only skim the surface and not really dig into cobol. It's not a good reference book and hard to understand at times.

As a student, I am finding that there is only a limited amount of information on a variety of topics, and few examples about applying the information. I am also finding that there are many inconsistancies and lacks in the program design specifications and the downloadable data files. I am disappointed with the quality of the book and data.

Some of the authors' explanations are very weak, even on some of the important points. As I read this book, I get the sinking feeling that the authors were in a hurry to get to press and thereby brushed over some topics simply because they did not take the time to address them properly. This book leaves me flat. Some of the input data in the sample problems is bad, making correct output impossible. It is clear that the authors have not run all the programs with their own sample data. At times, it's just pathetic.