1. COBOL - Noun
2. COBOL - Proper noun
common business-oriented language
Source: WordNetAggregated data Data items in COBOL are declared hierarchically through the use of level-numbers which indicate if a data item is part of another. Source: Internet
A PL/I compiler was two to four times as large as comparable Fortran or COBOL compilers, and also that much slower—fortunately offset by gains in programmer productivity. Source: Internet
A reluctant short-term committee enacted a total cleanup and, by March 1963, it was reported that COBOL's syntax was as definable as ALGOL 's, although semantic ambiguities remained.sfn Early COBOL compilers were primitive and slow. Source: Internet
Another factor was pseudo-similarities to COBOL, Fortran, and ALGOL. Source: Internet
COBOL code is split into four divisions (identification, environment, data and procedure) containing a rigid hierarchy of sections, paragraphs and sentences. Source: Internet
An optional Decimal/Business instruction set was added to improve COBOL performance. Source: Internet