Hello World!

This is a sample program that displays "Hello World":

     ---- hello.cob -------------------------
           * Sample COBOL program
            IDENTIFICATION DIVISION.
            PROGRAM-ID. hello.
            PROCEDURE DIVISION.
            DISPLAY "Hello World!".
            STOP RUN.
     ----------------------------------------
     

The compiler is cobc, which is executed as follows:

     $ cobc hello.cob
     $ ./hello
     Hello World!
     

The executable file name (i.e., hello in this case) is determined by removing the extension from the source file name.

You can specify the executable file name by specifying the compiler option -o as follows:

     $ cobc -o hello-world hello.cob
     $ ./hello-world
     Hello World!