Duration of non supported applications

[Devin Asay]

On Mar 15, 2007, at 8:32 AM, Ken Ray wrote:

> On Thu, 15 Mar 2007 11:23:45 +0100, Signe Marie Sanne wrote:
>
>> So far I have used MetaCard and engine 2.6.6. The programs make use
>> of a portal stack (thanks to Sivakatirswami) which downloads/opens
>> the various educational programs. This downloading is done by http.
>>
>> My questions to the group:
>> If the institute and the students are happy with the programs as
>> they  are with no urgent need to change anything,  for how many years
>> can we count on their functioning? 5? 10?
>
> Well, that would depend on how often the computers they're running on
> get upgraded with new operating systems, etc. If they never get
> upgraded, they will last as long as the computer can last at the
> institute. Unfortunately, if they *do* get upgraded, there's no way to
> tell whether something in a new OS will cause a program to fail - for
> example, the latest post about the Daylight Savings Time bug would
> cause date-oriented applications to fail unless they are patched to

I agree with Ken. It would not hurt and would probably help to update  
your materials to the newest version of rev. At a minimum, you should  
re-build the "portal" standalone with the latest rev engine. In my  
view that would help legacy stacks survive longer.

Devin

Devin Asay
Humanities Technology and Research Support Center
Brigham Young University