"PDP-11 COBOL: In those days, Column 1 in your program was reserved for forms control. This was a vestige of punched cards and drum printers. Something like "DATA-DIVISION" was supposed to be entered ' DATA-DIVISION.' With column 1 eaten up for forms control, this was interpreted as "ATA-DIVISION" (at least there was no such line in COBOL as "MASS-STORAGE"! :o ) Miss that and you get endless messages: 'Fatal error, abandoning compilation'."
A gallery of goofy error messages
by Toni Bowers | November 15, 2011, 1:05pm PST | Image 27 of 53
Fatal error
Fatal error - Image 27 of 53
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About Toni Bowers
Toni Bowers is the Head Blogs Editor of TechRepublic and is the award-winning blogger of the Career Management blog. She has edited newsletters, books, and web sites pertaining to software, IT career, and IT management issues.
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