Websites

“The COBOL Programming Language” page provides a short history of COBOL, as well as several sample programs in the language and related links for further research.

The Smithsonian Institution also has a history of, and documents related to COBOL in this online exhibition.

This article summarizes the history of COBOL as well as the present (early 2000s) uses of the language, and also includes technical information.

Articles

How important was the commercially-produced COBOL to the scholarly field of computer science? “The Relationship Between COBOL and Computer Science”, a short article written by Ben Schneiderman in 1985, examines the historical, technical, and social links between the two. With the help of literature reviews, interviews with industry veterans, and his own knowledge of the field, the author shows the ways in which COBOL has contributed to computer language design and data processing, COBOL’s limitations in design and function, and the modifications that might better incorporate COBOL into the computer science field.