Business programming with REXX: Bringing programming to business students

Programming is among the most feared subjects for undergraduate students, especially for business students. At the same time it is a truly useful skill not only for IT gurus, because it can help simplify a lot of tasks in very different occupational fields. There are many different ways of teaching programming, some of them being well suited to attracting students while others are not. Thus a good approach to teaching programming needs to be found to revise students mindset concerning programming. Business Programming 1 and 2 are courses which are part of a study specialization at the Vienna University of Economics and Business aiming at tackling that very issue. For this purpose, the programming language Rexx is the main language taught. Rexx is a particularly easy to learn, user centric scripting language which facilitates the first steps of novice programmers in the field of programming. This paper introduces the design of the Business Programming courses as well as the features of the Programming language Rexx and its object oriented version ooRexx.