COBOL, short for Common Business-Oriented Language, is a computer programming language that’s used mainly in commerce and for business applications. COBOL was created to be able to work across platforms and operating systems. Although it was first released in 1959, it remains in wide use, especially in legacy software run on mainframe computers. Although COBOL is slowly being phased out as companies and government agencies migrate programs from mainframes to new platforms, and write the new programs in different languages, there are still significant industries and fields, such as banking, finance, and infrastructure, that rely on COBOL.