Developer track · Core · 5 days · prerequisite: CS100
The language of the ledger, taught from the bytes up: divisions, packed decimal for real, files, tables, copybooks and subprograms — about 70% of your time is in the editor.
Cohort / corporate first self-paced release follows recording
Every session ends in a lab on your own environment. Labs are machine-checked against expected outputs — you and your L&D team always know exactly where you stand.
The four divisions, sections and paragraphs, the coding form and its columns, and the compile → link-edit → run pipeline with the JCL provided.
LAB Your first program, compiled and run.
PIC clauses, COMP and COMP-3 — and why packed decimal exists, shown nibble by nibble in a hex view. VALUE, REDEFINES, group items, 88-levels.
LAB Build record layouts and inspect their storage byte by byte.
MOVE and its conversions, arithmetic verbs, ROUNDED and ON SIZE ERROR, edited pictures for output.
LAB A calculation module with edge cases the harness checks.
IF/ELSE and EVALUATE, condition names, and PERFORM in all its forms — inline, THRU, TIMES, UNTIL, VARYING.
LAB Decision-table exercises.
SELECT/ASSIGN, FDs, OPEN/READ/WRITE/CLOSE, AT END, and the FILE STATUS discipline that separates production code from coursework. Report writing with headings and totals.
LAB The classic master-file report, checked to the byte.
OCCURS, subscripts versus indexes, SEARCH and SEARCH ALL, multi-dimensional tables.
LAB Rate-table lookups.
COPY, CALL static and dynamic, USING and the LINKAGE SECTION.
LAB Refactor the report into modules sharing a copybook.
A small batch application: validate input, apply rules from a rate table, write a report and an error file.
LAB Full capstone, graded by the harness.
Your seat is a private, full z/OS-compatible environment with the full compile-link-run pipeline in the browser — nothing to install, snapshot and reset per exercise. By the end of the course the lab harness will have verified: at least 10 working COBOL programs per student.