Question

The home work is to do a survey comparing the following three programming language:
COBOL , FOTRAN 77, and PASCAL regarding:

1-   Character set.
2-   Reserved(key) words and special symbols.
3-   Simple data types and data structures used.
4-   Control structures used (selection and loop structures)
5-   File structure used.

Answer 1

CHARACTER SET IN COBOL:

The most basic and indivisible unit of the COBOL language is the character. The basic character set includes the letters of the Latin alphabet, digits, and special characters. In the COBOL language, individual characters are joined to form character-strings and separators.

Basic COBOL character set.

Character Meaning Space + Plus sign - Minus sign or hyphen * Asterisk / Forward slash or solidus = Equal sign $ Currency sign1 , Comma ; Semicolon . Decimal point or period " Quotation mark2 ' Apostrophe ( Left parenthesis ) Right parenthesis > Greater than < Less than : Colon _ Underscore A - Z Alphabet (uppercase) a - z Alphabet (lowercase) 0 - 9 Numeric characters

CHARACTER SET IN FORTRAN 77:

The character set consists of the following:

• Uppercase and lowercase letters, A - Z and a - z

• Numerals 0 - 9

• Special characters--The following table shows the special characters that are used for punctuation.

Space	Space
Tab	Tab
=	Equals
+	Plus
-	Minus
*	Asterisk
/	Slash
( )	Parentheses
,	Comma
.	Period
'	Apostrophe
"	Quote
$	Dollar sign
!	Exclamation
:	Colon
%	Percent
&	Ampersand
?	Question mark
\	Backslash
< >	Angle

CHARACTER SET IN PASCAL:

A set is a collection of elements of same type. Pascal allows defining the set data type. The elements in a set are called its members. In mathematics, sets are represented by enclosing the members within braces{}. However, in Pascal, set elements are enclosed within square brackets [], which are referred as set constructor.

COBOL RESERVED WORDS:

A	ACCEPT ACCESS ADD	ALPHABETIC-LOWER ALPHABETIC-UPPER ALPHANUMERIC	APPLY ARE AREA
B	BASIS BEFORE BEGINNING	BINARY BLANK BLOCK	BOTTOM BY
C	CALL CANCEL CBL	COLUMN COM-REG COMMA	COMPUTATIONAL-5 COMPUTE CONFIGURATION
D	DATA DATE-COMPILED DATE-WRITTEN	DEBUG-SUB-1 DEBUG-SUB-2 DEBUG-SUB-3	DESTINATION DETAIL DISPLAY
E	EGCS EGI EJECT	END-INVOKE END-MULTIPLY END-OF-PAGE	ENDING ENTER ENTRY
F	FALSE FD FILE	FILLER FINAL FIRST	FOR FROM FUNCTION
G	GENERATE GIVING GLOBAL	GO GOBACK GREATER	GROUP
H	HEADING	HIGH-VALUE	HIGH-VALUES
I	I-O I-O-CONTROL ID	INDICATE INHERITS INITIAL	INSPECT INSTALLATION INTO
J	JUST	JUSTIFIED
K	KANJI	KEY
L	LABEL LAST LEADING	LIMIT LIMITS LINAGE	LINES LINKAGE LOCAL-STORAGE
M	MEMORY MERGE MESSAGE	METHOD METHOD-ID MODE	MORE-LABELS MOVE MULTIPLE
N	NATIVE NATIVE_BINARY NEGATIVE	NO NOT NULL	NUMBER NUMERIC NUMERIC-EDITED
P	PACKED-DECIMAL PADDING PAGE	PIC PICTURE PLUS	PROCEDURE-POINTER PROCEDURES PROCEED
Q	QUEUE	QUOTE	QUOTES
R	RANDOM RD READ	RELATIVE RELEASE RELOAD	RESERVE RESET RETURN
S	SAME SD SEARCH	SIGN SIZE SKIP1	STANDARD STANDARD-1 STANDARD-2
T	TABLE TALLY TALLYING	TEXT THAN THEN	TITLE TO TOP
U	UNIT UNSTRING UNTIL	UP UPON USAGE	USE USING
V	VALUE	VALUES	VARYING
W	WHEN WHEN-COMPILED WITH	WORDS WORKING-STORAGE WRITE	WRITE-ONLY
Z	ZERO	ZEROES	ZEROS

FORTRAN RESERVED WORDS:

Unlike most other languages, Fortran does not have any reserved words. Although it is possible to use words that the language is built upon as variable names if the context shows that it can't be meant as a keyword, this can become very confusing and is therefore not recommended.

and	array	begin	case	const
div	do	downto	else	end
file	for	function	goto	if
in	label	mod	nil	not
of	or	packed	procedure	program
record	repeat	set	then	to
type	until	var	while	with

RESERVED WORDS IN PASCAL

DATA TYPES IN COBOL:

There are mainly five data types in COBOL.   

• Numeric
• Alphabet.
• Alpha-numeric.
• Sign.
• Assumed decimal point.

DATA STRUCTURES IN COBOL:

A COBOL copybook is a selection of code that defines data structures. If a particular data structure is used in many programs, then instead of writing the same data structure again, we can use copybooks. We use the COPY statement to include a copybook in a program. COPY statement is used in the WorkingStorage Section

DATA TYPES IN FORTRAN 77:

Fortran 77 Data Type	Size
BYTE X CHARACTER X CHARACTER* n X	1 1 n
COMPLEX X COMPLEX*8 X DOUBLE COMPLEX X COMPLEX*16 X COMPLEX*32 X	8 8 16 16 32
DOUBLE PRECISION X REAL X REAL*4 X REAL*8 X REAL*16 X	8 4 4 8 16
INTEGER X INTEGER*2 X INTEGER*4 X INTEGER*8 X	4 2 4 8

DATA STRUCTURES IN FORTRAN 77:

The STRUCTURE @ statement organizes data into structures.

STRUCTURE [/structure-name/] [field-list]

      field-declaration

     field-declaration

    . . .

END STRUCTURE

DATA TYPES IN PASCAL:

There are four simple scalar data types in Pascal: INTEGER, REAL, CHAR and BOOLEAN.

DATA STRUCTURES IN PASCAL:

An array is a data structured whose domain is a finite subset of Euclidean n-space Rⁿ. Observation. Arrays in PASCAL are assigned the datatype of the elements that they contain, which can bee one and only one datatype.