No Flame War – of course. Linux IS the future (and, as a matter of fact, the principle OS I use for work, and that our gurus use on our race robot). There’s a lot to be said for the portability of open source operating systems. I wouldn’t suggest using COBOL for running a robot, any more than I would suggest using the CPU from my 1985 Radio Shack “Tandy 100” in the Mars Sojourner Rover – (oops, strike that – already been done). Anyway, COBOL was optimized for business use, just like FORTRAN was set up for math, and Linux for human beings.