Sams Teach Yourself COBOL in 24 Hours

Hour 13Sequential Files

One of the many things that makes COBOL such a rich and powerful language is its ability to clearly, accurately, and quickly handle data files. Business deals with data files constantly. In this hour, you learn about one type of commonly used file: the sequential file. You learn

• How to define a sequential file in a COBOL program

• How to Open and Close the file

• How to create records in the file

• How to read records from a sequential file

• How to update existing records in a sequential file

In addition, COBOL uses some terms that you need to understand in order to discuss data file access.

First, a file is made up ...