pThis book is a practical, hands-on guide to COBOL code optimization. It provides basic principles and techniques for writing efficient, high-level COBOL programs. The book assumes that you are an experienced programmer and want to learn how to develop high performance applications using the latest tools and techniques. The book is also a practical guide to developing high performance applications by optimizing both COBOL code and the application.pp ppThe book targets IT professionals who are responsible for the day-to-day development and maintenance of business applications written in COBOL. The book introduces essential concepts of performance analysis and optimization. It also covers many tools and techniques including some advanced techniques such as parallelization, multiprocessing, virtual machines, and XML parsing. With the help of hands-on examples, real world case studies, process maps and a full-scale application, this book teaches professionals and students alike how to buil