Some years ago HP introduced a series of functions that can be called from 
COBOL to handle dates.  Below is a copy of a 'test' routine that I wrote 
back then to try them out.  I think there is a function that returns the 
difference of two dates.

Regards
Paul Christidis


$CONTROL LIST ,post85

 IDENTIFICATION DIVISION.
 PROGRAM-ID.       'COBDSUBS'.
 AUTHOR.           Paul H. Christidis
 DATE-WRITTEN.     07/14/97.
 DATE-COMPILED.
 REMARKS.
                   Test program to demonstate the different
              date related functions that are now available
              in cobol.
            NOTE: The compiler control keyword 'POST85' MUST
              be specified as one of the '$CONTROL' options in
              order for the date functions to be enabled.

 ENVIRONMENT DIVISION.
 CONFIGURATION SECTION.
  SOURCE-COMPUTER.         HP3000.
  OBJECT-COMPUTER.         HP3000.
 INPUT-OUTPUT SECTION.
 DATA DIVISION.

 WORKING-STORAGE SECTION.
 01 old-today                      pic x(8).
 01 full-date.
    05 c-date                pic 9(8).
    05 c-time                pic 9(8).
    05 c-time-diff.
       10 c-gmt-dir          pic x.
       10 c-hour             pic 99.
       10 c-minutes          pic 99.

 01 int-date                 pic 9(8).
 01 future-date              pic 9(8).

 LINKAGE SECTION.

 PROCEDURE DIVISION.

 0000-START.
   display "Subroutine".

   move current-date  to old-today.
   display "Old Today    = ", old-today.

   move function current-date to full-date.
   display "New Today    = ", full-date.

   compute int-date = function integer-of-date (c-date).
   display "Integer Today= ", int-date.

   add 998 to int-date.
   compute future-date = function date-of-integer (int-date).
   display "Future day   = ", future-date.

   GOBACK.

The above produces the following:

Old Today    = 02/08/06
New Today    = 2006020814340100-0800
Integer Today= 00147962
Future day   = 20081102


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