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from Cobol/Natural to Java translation

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municipal

Programmer
Jan 1, 2001
62
IL
Hi All.

We are considering to transform all our applications from Natural or Cobol to Java.

Natural is procedural language like Cobol.

There is a Product which produces Java code out of Natural Code . what is your opinion about such step?
TIA.
 
I would expect the resulting java code to be very 'mechanistic' in its implementation. I would be impressed if the code followed any appropriate high-level design patterns, or be as concise as hand-written code <b>could</b> be.

You'll probably have to go in and tweak some of the Java.

One important aspect of good OO design is to 'encapsulate what varies', or is likely to vary. How would a conversion tool be able to tell what bits might vary? That's something only humans with a design plan would know. This could lead to maintenance / future expansion problems.

I would get an evaluation version of the tool and try it out.

To sum up my overall opinion of tools like this:- Machines can produce code, but it takes a human to produce a good design which good code can flow from.
 
Hi municipal,
if it is a real cross compiler I would expect that it really works.
I would however expect procedural code rather than true OO code - this would require a redesign. However I would expect that the generated code could be maintained with reasonable learning effort by the then ex Natural people.
I stumbled across such a tool and it worked surprisingly well.
 
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