Overview of Debugging and Running Native COBOL Applications in Containers

You debug and run a containerized native COBOL application or debug and run tests as part of a native Unit Test project in much the same way as you would debug and run a non-containerized native COBOL application but there are a few additional or different steps to consider. The process is as follows:

1. Make sure you have the images that you will need. If you're going to be building you will need a Visual COBOL Build Tools for Windows image whereas if you're going to be running your application in a deployment environment you will need a COBOL Server image.

   See Running the Container Demonstration for the Visual COBOL Base Image for more information.

2. Add a Dockerfile to your project.

   Visual COBOL can create a template Dockerfile for you.

   See To add a Dockerfile to a native COBOL project for more information.

3. Run or debug the project, or run unit tests. The general process for doing this is the same one you would normally use, but there are additional steps to perform depending on where your container will be running.

   See Debugging COBOL applications for information on the debugging process in general, and To debug or run a native COBOL application in a container for container-specific debugging information.

4. When you have finished debugging your project, build a deployment image for the project.

   See To build an image for deployment for more information.