Re: Mapping (CoBOL) Methodologies to Problem Domains


<klshafer@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:519b9104-a107-4f9d-b341-781c2185da40@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
All -

Haven't been here for a while due to personal demands, but now that
I'm back, I wanted to put out an informal Call for Participation along
the following lines. In another forum I participate in we discuss
methodological approaches more than languages (eg. CMM vs. Agile).
Here is the essence of a post I put out there, and I'm putting it in
CLC to solicit the CoBOL angle, to wit, what methodologies are you
using in your CoBOL efforts: structured analysis / structured design,
object-oriented, custom, code-and-fix :-), whatever. CoBOL to
"language-du-jour" converts' opinions also welcome (that's at least
*you*, Mr. Pete Dashwood :-) ).

I guess it's OK to do some follow up here within this thread in CLC,
but seeing as how this is just a little bit off the usual beaten track
of CLC, I don't want it to get "out of hand" (as if anything here ever
does!)

Anyway, here is a "copy and past" of what I posted elsewhere!

All -

Anonymous's last post got me thinking, and I reviewed my c:\ drive for
some articles I had culled regarding this problem, which is namely,

"What methodologies/methods should we apply to what domains of
problems?"

I have three seminal works by Robert Glass that are directly relevant
here (you will need ACM and/or IEEE membership to get these, but I can
help you):

"Contemporary Application Domain Taxonomies"
http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=625489

"Some Heresy Regarding Software Engineering"
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?tp=&arnumber=1309657&isnumber=29063

"Matching Methodology to Problem Domain"
http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=986228

In these works Glass makes it abundantly clear how **little** work has
been done in this area, by either industry or academia, and so this
might be an opportunity for some (relatively) groundbreaking work.

Those interested in exploring this aspect independently of <CLC and
other Forums>, please post here in this thread, or contact me offline
at my e-mail address. The goal for this exploration should be
initially modest (I have a fair amount of personal business to attend
to in the short term, which limits my time), but could be on the order
of accumulating enough "stuff" (viewpoints, rough "artifacts") to
present a "Roundtable", "Birds of a Feather", "Panel", or simply
"Gathering" at something like GLSEC (Great Lakes Software Excellence
Conference), but certainly not so much as to qualify as a "seminar" or
"workshop", let alone a "conference" :-).

I think for the time being this effort would be organized as a simple
cc: list for some occasional group e-mailings, and not yet anything
more structured.

But I'd like to get started on it by accumlating a list of interested
parties?

Any takers?

Ken

This response may be more low level than you are looking for. I am not
heavily into project management although I have been exposed to CMM. I was
not impressed with how it was implemented where I work. People often
generated a lot of the required documentaion after the fact so it was not
true CMM.

For business application I have found data flow diagrams, process mini specs
and data dictionaries helpful. See "How to Design and Develop Business
systems" by Steve Eckols. This book is dated by now. I have used
data-structured design. See "Programming on Purpose" seriesby P.J. Plager.

For CICS I have found screen flow diagrams helpful. See "CICS for the COBOL
Programmer" by Doug Lowe.

For manitenance I have used structure charts to show what
CALLs/PERFORMs/XCTLs/LINKs what. For some twisted logic flowcharts can
help, and where they don't help a debugger that allows breakpoints and
tracing usually works.

For OO design patterns are great. See "head First Design Patterns".


.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Basic books on OOA&D
    ... > There are lots of OOA/D methodologies around and each has its own ... I've ordered R. Wirfs-Brocks "Object Design: ... I've also ordered R. Martins "Agile Software Development". ...
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  • Mapping (CoBOL) Methodologies to Problem Domains
    ... CLC to solicit the CoBOL angle, to wit, what methodologies are you ... I guess it's OK to do some follow up here within this thread in CLC, ... Those interested in exploring this aspect independently of <CLC and ... "Gathering" at something like GLSEC (Great Lakes Software Excellence ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)
  • ISQED06 Call for Papers - Deadline Extension - Oct 17
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  • Re: Call for Papers, IEEE ISQED 2006
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