COBOL and C/C++

In many applications, enterprise systems, and operating systems, C and C++ provide core capabilities and support functions. To help you build integrated applications that make the best use of COBOL programs, ACUCOBOL-GT® provides several robust methods for interoperating with C programs. These technologies work equally well with C++ programs that conform to C calling conventions.

ACUCOBOL-GT provides methods for both calling C from COBOL and calling COBOL from C. Methods for calling C from COBOL include:

Direct calls to C programs located in Windows dynamic link libraries (DLLs) and UNIX/Linux shared object libraries.
Direct calls to C programs linked into the ACUCOBOL-GT runtime.
Interface calls, through a special interface, to C programs linked into the ACUCOBOL-GT runtime.

To support the ability of C programs to call COBOL, ACUCOBOL-GT includes an extensive C Application Programming Interface (API).

All of these facilities are described in detail in this chapter.

Note: ACUCOBOL-GT does not support the Object COBOL elements of the 2002 ISO/IEC COBOL Standard. Neither does ACUCOBOL-GT provide direct object-level interoperability with OO elements and structures.