IBM Mainframe Forum

Hello all !

Whats the difference between Cobol 85 and VS Cobol II ?

They are "old" versions of IBM Cobol. Why do you need to know what the differences are?

COBOL 85 is a language standard, developed by the ANSI COBOL committee. You will not find a "COBOL 85" compiler -- you will find compilers that support, to one degree or another, the COBOL 85 standard. This standard added features such as END-IF, END-PERFORM, END-READ to COBOL; prior COBOL language specifications did not include these features.

VS COBOL II is a COBOL compiler developed by IBM. The last version of this compiler was withdrawn in March 2001 and IBM has not let anyone order it for almost 11 years now. Hence, you are talking about ancient (in computer terms) history at this point. VS COBOL II supported (in versions 3 and 4, at least -- the earlier versions would recognize but not necessarily compile) the COBOL 85 standard.

Robert Sample wrote:COBOL 85 is a language standard, developed by the ANSI COBOL committee. You will not find a "COBOL 85" compiler -- you will find compilers that support, to one degree or another, the COBOL 85 standard. This standard added features such as END-IF, END-PERFORM, END-READ to COBOL; prior COBOL language specifications did not include these features.

VS COBOL II is a COBOL compiler developed by IBM. The last version of this compiler was withdrawn in March 2001 and IBM has not let anyone order it for almost 11 years now. Hence, you are talking about ancient (in computer terms) history at this point. VS COBOL II supported (in versions 3 and 4, at least -- the earlier versions would recognize but not necessarily compile) the COBOL 85 standard.

Thanks for the reply. Does it mean that there is no cobol in mainframes or Are we still using the VS COBOL II old version in mainframes ?

The current COBOL compiler being used on IBM mainframes is called Enterprise COBOL for z/OS. After VS COBOL II but before this compiler, IBM came out with these compilers:
COBOL/370
COBOL for MVS & VM
COBOL for OS/390 & VM
Enterprise COBOL for z/OS & OS/390

There is almost no chance that anyone today is using the VS COBOL II compiler -- if they are, they had to acquire it BEFORE March 2001 and never upgraded to one of the newer compilers. Since the original release of the System/360 back in the 1960's IBM has always had at least one COBOL compiler available on its mainframes.

Thanks once again for reply and this is what I am looking for.