Abstract :
Dusty Cobol card decks, difficult-to-maintain programs, and software generally incompatible with current state-of-the-art application frameworks: that´s legacy. Or is it? Start with the cleansing effect of Y2K, add the Internet and e-commerce, and throw in component technologies such as Corba, COM, and Enterprise JavaBeans, the standardization effort behind XML, and the resurgent interest in data, and you´ll find new meaning and vitality for the term legacy. Estimated at over 100 billion lines of code, most of it Cobol, it drives the world´s infrastructure. The end result is a new appreciation of legacy and a search for ways to capitalize on its potential. Cobol programs and data are being viewed in a new positive light with options for interconnection and integration for both code and data
Keywords :
COBOL; Internet; distributed object management; hypermedia markup languages; software maintenance; Cobol language; Cobol programs; Internet; XML; Y2K; component technologies; data integration; e-commerce; interconnection; legacy integration; standardization effort; Application software; Companies; Databases; Displays; Graphical user interfaces; IP networks; Internet; Java; Web server; XML;