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[DISCUSS] IBM using LLMs to convert COBOL to Java (techcrunch.com)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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It's not the 1st time a language/tool will be lost to the annals of the job market, eg VB6 or FoxPro. Though previously all such cases used to happen gradually, giving most people enough time to adapt to the changes.

I wonder what's it going to be like this time now that the machine, w/ the help of humans of course, can accomplish an otherwise multi-month risky corporate project much faster? What happens to all those COBOL developer jobs?

Pray share your thoughts, esp if you're a COBOL professional and have more context around the implication of this announcement 🙏

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (10 children)

according to a 2022 survey, there’s over 800 billion lines of COBOL in use on production systems, up from an estimated 220 billion in 2017

That doesn't sound right at all. How could the amount of COBOL code in use quadruple at a time when everyone is trying to phase it out?

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Because it’s not actually getting phased out in reality

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

But it isn't getting quadrupled either, at least because there aren't enough COBOL programmers in the world to write that much new code that quickly.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

It doesn’t say unique lines of code.

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