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There's no need to rewrite a system that works and that you're not gonna change. While programming languages go out of fashion there will always be people who a
by gmmeyer 6y ago
There's no need to rewrite a system that works and that you're not gonna change. While programming languages go out of fashion there will always be people who are capable of writing them. The median age of a cobol programmer has not changed in 20 years because more people keep learning the language.
Demand in this case, will likely create its own supply.
- hinkley 6y agoI tend to replace my car when it starts to show signs of future problems, not when I'm up to my eyeballs in repairs. We shouldn't really be treating software differently. The liability for a mission critical system that works but cannot be repaired climbs over time. Just because it works doesn't mean it isn't broken.
- derriz 6y agoThat analogy doesn't really work - software doesn't get worn out from interaction with users. If software is working and in use, then it's age doesn't matter. Evolution/flux is not the natural state of all software. I've seen plenty of business/enterprise software which has continued to provide business value for decades without structural or architectural changes.
- hinkley 6y agoLots of security patches and infrastructure are held hostage by breaking changes to APIs. Eventually you have to upgrade, and the longer you have put it off the more painful it will be. And as we've seen with old video games, there are lots of timing problems that you simply never encounter on the original hardware but are impossible to ignore on recent vintage hardware.
- ChiranSoogoor 6y agoWisdom is in not in spending years and millions rewriting billions of lines of cobol code into a new language and then rewriting that other language into another newer language and so on … what's the problem in maintaining what's already working?!!