Structured COBOL Programming, Second Edition

Used earlier of this text years ago and know many COBOL programmers who did the same. This later version is a nice update covering ANSI updates and taking into account new compilers and runtimes especially for Unix, Linux and Windows. A good, solid COBOL reference.

I am finishing up my first semester of COBOL. I find this book to be a very good one, especially compared to the textbooks I've used for some other languages COBOL is verbose, of course, and the examples in the book are quite long, but there's nothing stopping a person from experimenting with shorter programs. The book could have done a better job just teaching some of the simpler things, 'Hello World', he does have a point in that review. But overall, it's an excellent book to learn how to code COBOL. You might want to get another book or two on the basics, I find any book by Doug Lowe very easy to read and learn from. And Arthur Griffith has a 'COBOL for Dummies' which is very good. But I believe you will find this book to be very useful though, like I said, it could have started a little simpler with some basic little programs for students to get a better taste of COBOL. I remember not being sure on a lot of things, but as I like to experiment, I just tried it until I figured it out.

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COBOL is a mature programming language and this is one of the best books and a superb textbook. Structured Cobol Programming by Gary B. Shelly, Thomas J. Cashman and Roy O. Foreman was my book of choice as a COBOL instructor. The chapters are well planned with steady progress with very good examples. Although new edition is required to cover COBOL Functions this book still remains at the top of my list. As an independent COBOL consultant I find this book a good reference.