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Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

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Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#151

Post by Fradow »

When doing a school project, in 2009 or so, we had to record a lot of sounds, each linked to an image. The usual process of recording, cutting the ends of the sounds and saving with proprer file name was too cumbersome (we had multiple languages and some variants to record, bringing the total sounds to over 100).

Instead, I coded a small utility hidden within the program to show the image, and allow to record with a single keypress. It is precise enough that you don't have to cut it afterwards, and it auto-saves to the right file name.

To this day, I didn't find a better way to record lots of small sounds, and since it was written in C# and XNA (which has been killed since then), I keep a Windows computer around just to run it, when I need it, about one or two times a year.

There is little incentive to rewrite it until it stops working altogether, since the use is so infrequent, but each time it saves me several hours of boring work.

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#152

Post by andyjohnson0 »

Back in the late nineties I was working for a small ISV and was a dev lead on a project to develop a C++-based visual programming environment and runtime for monitoring SCADAs and PLCs. It got used by a few customers, but ultimately wasn't successful and was discontinued when the company did what we'd now call a pivot.

I moved on to a company in the financial sector and my employer acquired the rights to use this software (a decision I had nothing to do with). We ended-up using it as a way to embed customer-specific customisation scripts into a cloud-based product - something that it had never been designed to do, but which ultimately worked quite well.

A couple of weeks ago I finally replaced it with a much smaller and more focussed body of C# code, 16+ years after it was initially developed.

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#153

Post by c2340596 »

xxxxxxxx wrote: post #128

I still have an excel sheet that I wrote to perform mortgage calculations. The timestamp on the file is 10 March 1994. The latest version of excel can still open it and it works. Although it exists, it's not in use. I suspect all the stuff I wrote back in the late 80's and early 90's has long been switched off at some point, which is kinda sad. It would be hard to run today: EBCDIC mainframe stuff and 16 bit PC stuff…

Stagnation is far more sad

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#154

Post by lamontcg »

Last I checked the nmap autoconf script still had code that I wrote back in 1996 when I ported what Fyodor wrote up in Phrack to Solaris, NetBSD, Digital Unix, SunOS and possibly HP-UX and/or IRIX. It probably still has support for doing "RST" scanning (and i think determining if the port is open backed on the windows size in the packet that comes back, which worked on several TCP stacks back then...).

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#157

Post by herbst »

jedisct1 wrote: post #141

Maybe pure-ftpd. The first version was released in 2001. 15 years later I still work on it and release new versions. Because people still use FTP.

i rarely use FTP these days, but the last server i setup with ftp used pure-ftpd. thanks for that.

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#158

Post by allan_s »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #66
haberman wrote: post #36

MP3 importing code for the Audacity audio editor. I wrote this in 2002. https://github.com/audacity/audacity/blob/master/src/import/... Amusingly, a TODO I put is still there: /* TODO: get rid of this by adding fixed-point support to SampleFormat. * For now, we allocate temporary float buffers to convert the fixed * point samples into something we can feed to the WaveTrack. Allocating * big blocks of data like this i…

A great example of why we tell people to forget using a substandard approach and language for "quick and dirty code that will probably get thrown away." A lot of long-lasting code started out exactly that way. ;)

my way to approach this, be it for my hobby or corporate projects, is to always associate a TODO with a ticket/issue number (in github/redmine/jira/whatever) so that I can remember them, and/or include them in a sprint (in my company I always try to include one or two "fix todo" issues in our sprints)

It also helps teammate who find themselves with 1 hours idleing to have a little thing to do.

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#159

Post by trymas »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #135
trymas wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably not worth it to argue indeed. Though coming from a country where $10 can get you 5 lattes :), I would not give those money back. Nevertheless I payed taxes for that income. It's pennies, but I have known/seen too many people who try to haggle extensively, who need to be reminded about common sense.

I get you, and agree on general principle, but I also have to consider what my time is worth. I once calculated that even a single customer service interaction cost me far more than ten dollars at my standard billing rate. If I want to argue with implacable assholes, I'll go pitch a VC or something.

Not worth it - exactly.

> If I want to argue with implacable assholes, I'll go pitch a VC or something.

That's a great one. :)

Re: Ask HN: Oldest code you have written that is still in use?

#160

Post by Wingman4l7 »

jeffreygoesto wrote: post #104

Around 1989 I wrote a PC program that replaced an Epson HX20 storing injection molding machine programs on small cassettes. 2000 I got a call the molding machines had been sold and the old IBM PS/2 ditched. The new owner asked me if I still had the program. I re-mounted my old QIC streamer sleeping in a box, installed Borland Turbo Pascal in a DOS box in OS/2 and could recompile it from source. Got the same price as…

Did you adjust the asking price for inflation? ;P
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