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A few days ago, my girlfriend installed Corel Draw 10 in Windows 11 and it just amazed me how long good software keeps working. Corel Draw 10 is over 20 years

by k__ 3y ago

A few days ago, my girlfriend installed Corel Draw 10 in Windows 11 and it just amazed me how long good software keeps working. Corel Draw 10 is over 20 years old, and it still works. With installation wizard and everything.

hermitcrab 3y ago
Although it is easy to criticize Microsoft (and I often do) they are very good at keeping old apps running. I believe PerfectTablePlan v1, which I wrote in 2005 still works on the latest Windows. Apple, on the other hand, like to nuke their entire developer ecosystem from orbit every few years.
- johncoltrane 3y ago
  Anecdotal, maybe, but three of the apps I am currently running on this M1 Pro are quite old and work the same: Adium (last build almost 7 years ago), Slate (12 years ago), and Notational Velocity (13 years). Laptops go, but my .app bundles stay ;-). I agree about Windows, though.
  - fredoralive 3y ago
    ...but any apps from 20 years ago like the Corel Draw example will have a nice "No" cross over them, as they'll be PowerPC (either Mac OS X or classic). 15 years old stuff will probably be a no go as well, as they'll largely be 32 bit x86. And frankly, most people expect 64 bit x86 support to go away sooner rather than later. Apple really are aggressive about this stuff.
  - hermitcrab 3y ago
    The latest build of my software applications (built with Qt 5) work back to macOS 10.13, which was released in 2017. If your macOS is pre 10.13 they won't run.
- appplication 3y ago
  Not defending Apple, but one of the big transitions was stopping support for 32 bit apps. Even 20 years ago it was clear to anyone even mildly technical that 64-bit apps were the immediate future. Continuing to develop 32-bit only apps well into the 2010s was a conscious decision by developers to limit the lifetime utility of their software to a few years at most.
  - 1over137 3y ago
    In the case of macOS though, Apple chose to make many APIs not work in 64 bit. So it wasn't just a matter of fixing all their pointer sizes, they needed to totally change frameworks too. i.e. Apple nuked their ecosystem from orbit.
  - aleph_minus_one 3y ago
    > it was clear to anyone even mildly technical that 64-bit apps were the immediate future But dropping support for 32 bit apps was a conscious decision by Apple. Windows users rather complain until today that Microsoft dropped backward support for 16 bit apps under 64 bit Windows versions.
Dalewyn 3y ago
Gotta give credit to Microsoft too for their legendary commitment to backwards compatibility.

by k__ 3y ago

hermitcrab 3y ago

Although it is easy to criticize Microsoft (and I often do) they are very good at keeping old apps running. I believe PerfectTablePlan v1, which I wrote in 2005 still works on the latest Windows. Apple, on the other hand, like to nuke their entire developer ecosystem from orbit every few years.

johncoltrane 3y ago
Anecdotal, maybe, but three of the apps I am currently running on this M1 Pro are quite old and work the same: Adium (last build almost 7 years ago), Slate (12 years ago), and Notational Velocity (13 years). Laptops go, but my .app bundles stay ;-). I agree about Windows, though.
- fredoralive 3y ago
  ...but any apps from 20 years ago like the Corel Draw example will have a nice "No" cross over them, as they'll be PowerPC (either Mac OS X or classic). 15 years old stuff will probably be a no go as well, as they'll largely be 32 bit x86. And frankly, most people expect 64 bit x86 support to go away sooner rather than later. Apple really are aggressive about this stuff.
- hermitcrab 3y ago
  The latest build of my software applications (built with Qt 5) work back to macOS 10.13, which was released in 2017. If your macOS is pre 10.13 they won't run.
appplication 3y ago
Not defending Apple, but one of the big transitions was stopping support for 32 bit apps. Even 20 years ago it was clear to anyone even mildly technical that 64-bit apps were the immediate future. Continuing to develop 32-bit only apps well into the 2010s was a conscious decision by developers to limit the lifetime utility of their software to a few years at most.
- 1over137 3y ago
  In the case of macOS though, Apple chose to make many APIs not work in 64 bit. So it wasn't just a matter of fixing all their pointer sizes, they needed to totally change frameworks too. i.e. Apple nuked their ecosystem from orbit.
- aleph_minus_one 3y ago
  > it was clear to anyone even mildly technical that 64-bit apps were the immediate future But dropping support for 32 bit apps was a conscious decision by Apple. Windows users rather complain until today that Microsoft dropped backward support for 16 bit apps under 64 bit Windows versions.

Dalewyn 3y ago

Gotta give credit to Microsoft too for their legendary commitment to backwards compatibility.