71–80 of 85 posts
There is an accountant at a company I briefly worked for who still uses an Apple II and some archaic accounting software that he learned to do accounting on. He refuses to change, so they just have a big stack of Apple IIs in a closet to replace them when they wear out. That software probably hasn't been touched since 1980 at the latest.
The boring majority of software in the lab is just the latest iteration of a 'Microsoft-whatever' suite stuffed into a standard enterprise Dell box.
It's the exceptions that are interesting.
For example, a few weeks ago the lab's last PC that ran Windows 95 died. That really sucked for a few people because a piece of proprietary software that ran an important microscope camera only ran on Windows 95. (Only ran on Win95 if you didn't want to pay big time for an upgrade to a modern OS.)
Intriguingly, a PI I am working with is planning on using his old Silicon Graphics machine very soon. He told me there are still certain features lacking in modern software that can be found on software written for some older SG machines.
Finally, we are in the process of restoring an old machine that is frequently used for pulling apart very thin pieces of glass for electrophysiology experiments. Granted, all the software inside is embedded. But the software and the hardware still exceed 13 years of age by a wide margin.
It's really neat to see older programs and hardware chugging along. And it's strangely reassuring to see that while encountering the latest Javascript framework debate on Hacker News.
Turbo C 3.0 is still used in many schools and colleges!
How about our very own jgc running calculation jobs from Charles Babbage?
If that's too historical then the chances are good it is written in Fortran, and being used by a cosmologist on a telescope somewhere up high.
I wrote the lot traceability module of Compufact's ERP package in 1987. 3 years ago, I engaged a company that still used that software. Just for fun, I searched for my initials in their repository. Good news: that software was still being used. Not so good news: one of my programs had been changed 120 times, including bug fixes. I pretended that it was written by another "edw".
The core program was unchanged, there were just some minor changes for this specific application (e.g. the path changed, and there was like one if block added for this purpose). So it was pretty much unchanged for over 15 years.
Canadian nuclear industry has committed to continue the use of PDP-11 until 2050. I guess they have some software there running from 70s. Here's a recent ad for PDP-11 assembly coders they're in dire need of: http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/showthread.php?37827...
I made a website that's by now obsolete for anyone but me, but I still use it. It went live in late 2002 and hasn't been patched since early/mid 2003. This year 1and1 (my host) disabled MYSQL 4, so I moved database to MYSQL 5, but did not change the code. I have grandiose hopes to update it to look current. Although now that I look at it, they say my version of php will be phased out August 1'st :( And they are raisi…
I made a website that's by now obsolete for anyone but me, but I still use it. It went live in late 2002 and hasn't been patched since early/mid 2003. This year 1and1 (my host) disabled MYSQL 4, so I moved database to MYSQL 5, but did not change the code. I have grandiose hopes to update it to look current. Although now that I look at it, they say my version of php will be phased out August 1'st :( And they are raisi…
just a heads-up for you. 1&1 will disable php4 too this year! ;)