You guys make me feel ancient. :omg: I took a couple of programming classes at the local community college, one of which was for COBOL :-O (this was back around 1977 - 78). I got a job at a local bank where I graduated to computer operator of a remote job entry system. Meantime, I tinkered at home. My first computer was a Radio Shack TRS-80 Model 1. I got the expansion interface, and the single-sided, single-density 5.25" floppy. Woo hoo! :) It was not until 1986, after I moved to Florida that I got to do programming as a job. I was hired by a local software company to work in their shipping and receiving department. I started hanging out with the developers as much as I could get away with, going to lunch with them, talking with them, etc. My boss at the time gave me a chance to work on a special project for him. He purchased lists of companies / contact names to use as sales leads. He could get them all printed out in a readable format, but that cost more, so he bought the list on tape, and I was given the task of writing the code on the company's IBM mainframe to read the tape, sort the list, and print out the records in the format that he wanted. Sounds trivial, but it was a real big deal to me at the time. The caveat was that this was a unique "opportunity", and I could only work on it after hours, when my regular shipping job was done! :doh: Being only 20 something, I was excited by the prospect, and went for it. Problem was, at the time of day that I was allowed to work on the project, the only person who was around was the rather eccentric millionaire owner of the company, whose office was right next door to the computer room, and who I feared as if I had been called into the presence of the Almighty God for the final judgement! I remember quaking in my shoes when I had to ask him a question about something. I remember one time when a mainframe developer gave me a bubble sort routine to link into my code. The first time I tried to sort the list, "God" came flying into the computer room shouting at me, "What are you doing to my system!!!!" :-D Funny now, but i was sure at the time I was going to be fired on the spot. :) When I first started working on the special project, I asked my mainframe friend/guru about using COBOL, since it was the only language I had any experience with. He laughed at me, and told me they did not allow COBOL in their shop. He said I had two choices... Either write it in assembler, or PL/1. I opted for PL/1, and the mainframe developer threw the IBM PL
