Date:         Wed, 24 Dec 1997 03:34:34 GMT
Reply-To:     Melvin Klassen <Klassen@UVIC.CA>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@UGA.CC.UGA.EDU>
From:         Melvin Klassen <Klassen@UVIC.CA>
Organization: University of Victoria
Subject:      Re: COBOL vs SAS
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

On Fri, 19 Dec 1997 19:52:43, Paul Darlington
<pdarlington@pd.yrac.com> wrote:
 
There is no registered domain named 'yrac.com',
although 'cary.com' and 'cray.com' are registered.
 
> Several days ago I posted the following to two COBOL groups:
>        "Does anyone have a qualified opinion on how SAS fares
>         in comparison with COBOL as a general programming
>         language? As a set of tools to perform certain tasks?
>         As a manager, I have to decide which language to use for
>         a project that is going to be heavy on i/o, sophisticated
>         data manipulation and complex reporting (involving, for
>         instance, multilevel control breaks) and, to some degree,
>         data warehousing. SAS is (and will be) licensed by the site,
>         so it's not a point of concern. All the work will have to be
>         done on mainframe, OS390.
 
Which is more "cost-effective" for you:
 
(a) a SAS programmer who writes a program in 1 hour, and OS/390 runs
it in 2 minutes;
(b) a COBOL programmer who writes a program in 2 hours, and OS/390
runs it in 1 minute;
 
if the programs take identical input, and produce identical output?
 
>         Apart from seeing a few SAS-generated reports I haven't
>         had any significant exposure to the software, so I would
>         appreciate any ideas you may have."
 
Take a look at the SAS source-code used to generate those reports;
and compare it to the COBOL source-code, and guess which programmer
worked "smarter" and which programmer worked "harder" to write the
code.
 
> So, like stated above, I would appreciate any ideas you may have.
 
Such is my $0.02; if you want a *FULL* report, hire a consultant.
 
P.S. Reassign those COBOL programmers to your "year2000" project.  :-)
SAS is already "ready" for "year2000".