IBM's COMTRAN language, invented by Bob Bemer, was regarded as a competitor to FLOW-MATIC[41][42] by a short-range committee made up of colleagues of Grace Hopper.[43]Some of its features were not incorporated into COBOL so that it would not look like IBM had dominated the design process,[26] and Jean Sammet said in 1981 that there had been a "strong anti-IBM bias" from some committee members (herself included).[44]In one case, after Roy Goldfinger, author of the COMTRAN manual and intermediate-range committee member, attended a subcommittee meeting to support his language and encourage the use of algebraic expressions, Grace Hopper sent a memo to the short-range committee reiterating Sperry Rand's efforts to create a language based on English.[45]In 1980, Grace Hopper commented that "COBOL 60 is 95% FLOW-MATIC" and that COMTRAN had had an "extremely small" influence. Furthermore, she said that she would claim that work was influenced by both FLOW-MATIC and COMTRAN only to "keep other people happy [so they] wouldn't try to knock us out".[46]Features from COMTRAN incorporated into COBOL included formulas,[47] the PICTURE clause,[48] an improved IF statement, which obviated the need for GO TOs, and a more robust file management system.[41]

The usefulness of the committee's work was subject of great debate. While some members thought the language had too many compromises and was the result of design by committee, others felt it was better than the three languages examined. Some felt the language was too complex; others, too simple.[49]Controversial features included those some considered useless or too advanced for data processing users. Such features included boolean expressions, formulas and table subscripts (indices).[50][51] Another point of controversy was whether to make keywords context-sensitive and the effect that would have on readability.[50] Although context-sensitive keywords were rejected, the approach was later used in PL/I and partially in COBOL from 2002.[52] Little consideration was given to interactivity, interaction with operating systems (few existed at that time) and functions (thought of as purely mathematical and of no use in data processing).[53][54]




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