COMTRAN


COMTRAN is an early programming language developed at IBM. It was intended as the business programming equivalent of the scientific programming language FORTRAN. It served as one of the forerunners to the COBOL language. Developed by Bob Bemer, in 1957, the language was the first to feature the programming language element known as a picture clause.

Contributions to COBOL

Several elements of COMTRAN were incorporated into COBOL:
A picture clause element defines the length of any given datum, much like a dictionary defines words. In particular a picture clause determines whether the datum contains letters and numbers, and other characteristics of the data, including format, size, and data type.

Sample program

This is a sample COMTRAN program, doing payroll calculations.

01001 *PROCEDURE
01002 CALL EMPLOYNO,
01003 BONDEDUCT,
01004 BONDENOM,
01005 BONDACCUM,
01006 INSPREM,
01007 RETPREM,
01008 DPT.
01009 START. OPEN ALL FILES.
01010 GET.MASTER. GET MASTER, AT END DO END.OF.MASTERS.
01011 GET.DETAIL. GET DETAIL, AT END GO TO END.OF.DETAILS.
01012 COMPARE.EMPLOYEE.NUMBERS. GO TO COMPUTE.PAY WHEN DETAIL EMPLOYNO
01013 IS EQUAL TO MASTER EMPLOYNO, LOW.DETAIL WHEN DETAIL
01014 EMPLOYNO IS LESS THAN MASTER EMPLOYNO.
01015 HIGH.DETAIL. MOVE 'M' TO MASTER ERRORCODE, FILE MASTER IN
01016 ERROR.FILE.
01017 GET MASTER, AT END DO END.OF.MASTERS.
01018 GO TO COMPARE.EMPLOYEE.NUMBERS.
02001 LOW.DETAIL. MOVE 'D' TO DETAIL ERRORCODE, FILE DETAIL IN
02002 ERROR.FILE.
02003 GO TO GET.DETAIL.
02004 END.OF.MASTERS. IF DETAIL EMPLOYNO = HIGH.VALUE THEN GO TO
02005 END.OF.RUN OTHERWISE SET MASTER EMPLOYNO = HIGH.VALUE.
02006 END.OF.DETAILS. IF MASTEREMPLOYNO = HIGH.VALUE THEN GO TO
02007 END.OF.RUN OTHERWISE SET DETAIL EMPLOYNO = HIGH.VALUE, GO
02008 TO COMPARE.EMPLOYEE.NUMBERS.
02009 END.OF.RUN. MOVE CORRESPONDING GRAND.TOTAL TO PAYRECORD, FILE
02010 PAYRECORD, CLOSE ALL FILES.
02011 STOP 1234.
02012 COMPUTE.PAY. IF DETAIL HOURS IS GREATER THAN 40 THEN SET DETAIL
02013 GROSS = * MASTER RATE * 1.5.
02014 SET DETAIL GROSS = DETAIL GROSS + MASTER RATE * 40, DO
02015 FICA.ROUTINE, DO WITHHOLDING.TAX.ROUTINE.
02016 IF MASTER BONDEDUCT IS NOT EQUAL TO ZERO THEN DO
02017 BOND.ROUTINE.
02018 DO SEARCH FOR INDEX = 112.
02019 NET. SET PAYRECORD NETPAY = DETAIL GROSS - DETAIL FICA - DETAIL
02020 WHT -DETAIL RETIREMENT - DETAIL INSURANCE - DETAIL
02021 BONDEDUCT.