The SCREEN SECTION allows you to define complex terminal layouts with colors, positioning, and input fields. Instead of using raw DISPLAY statements, you define the entire screen structure declaratively in the Data Division. This was the standard way to build user interfaces before GUIs.

You can control attributes like REVERSE-VIDEO, BLINK, HIGHLIGHT, and colors (foreground/background). The DISPLAY statement paints the whole screen at once, and ACCEPT handles the interaction, moving the cursor between fields and collecting user input.

This section is often used in CICS or other transaction processing monitors to define the "maps" that users see on their green-screen terminals. It provides a structured way to handle form data separately from the program logic.