4 ms·

On the other end of the spectrum, I work with lab equipment that are more than 15 years old but still work great. The software which interfaces with it is old,

On the other end of the spectrum, I work with lab equipment that are more than 15 years old but still work great. The software which interfaces with it is old, but still works with Windows. Would such a thing be possible with Apple, or would Apple's insistence on upgrading every few years force the lab equipment to be replaced at significantly greater cost?

jpxxx 14y ago
Macs have never really been appropriate for embedded computation, and it doesn't come up much in practice. I work with people who work with lab software which is happily running OS X 10.2 Jaguar. It's no different than the XP box in the corner, as long as everyone understands that the checkbook has to come out when it breaks. On the other hand, the quarter million dollar cytometer is going to be running Windows NT 4 Embedded, and when that ATA-66 hard drive fails or the software becomes unable to talk properly with the modern world anymore, it's on the vendor to make it work again. The support typically blows, but it's their problem to handle and none of them are going to be relying on Apple's memory-hole platform.
wmf 14y ago
Apple maintained Classic compatibility from ~1984-2006 and Carbon PPC compatibility from ~2000-2010. It's a long time but it's not forever.
pooriaazimi 14y ago
They're not gonna come and take your lab equipments away, you know... Leave them on OS X Lion for a century and you'll be okay. Just like many have left their lab computers on Windows XP for a decade. As long as Lion gets security updates (2 years, minimum), there's absolutely no need for an upgrade. After that, you can just disconnect it from the Internet and use an stronger password.
- eswangren 14y ago
  Because using a stronger password somehow nullifies security holes in an OS?
  - pooriaazimi 14y ago
    Sorry, I said a stupid thing. You shouldn't comment when you're sleepy... I meant you can restrict remote access to them to be more safe (from trojans, etc), but somehow a stupid point about restricting "physical access" made its way into my comment and made it look ridiculous :)
saturdaysaint 14y ago
(parent here) I completely agree and that's a very valid scenario. Apple tactical advantage is that consumers have completely different usage patterns and expectations than the enterprise/lab (which Apple essentially ignores). If %95 of consumers either (a) upgrade within five years or (b) are completely perplexed by the notion of updating their operating system at all, then Apple are at a huge efficiency advantage EOL-ing technologies around the five year mark. As opposed to having top engineers work on maintaining compatibility with deprecated APIs, old hardware, etc. for 15 year old software.

jpxxx 14y ago

Macs have never really been appropriate for embedded computation, and it doesn't come up much in practice. I work with people who work with lab software which is happily running OS X 10.2 Jaguar. It's no different than the XP box in the corner, as long as everyone understands that the checkbook has to come out when it breaks. On the other hand, the quarter million dollar cytometer is going to be running Windows NT 4 Embedded, and when that ATA-66 hard drive fails or the software becomes unable to talk properly with the modern world anymore, it's on the vendor to make it work again. The support typically blows, but it's their problem to handle and none of them are going to be relying on Apple's memory-hole platform.

wmf 14y ago

Apple maintained Classic compatibility from ~1984-2006 and Carbon PPC compatibility from ~2000-2010. It's a long time but it's not forever.

pooriaazimi 14y ago

They're not gonna come and take your lab equipments away, you know... Leave them on OS X Lion for a century and you'll be okay. Just like many have left their lab computers on Windows XP for a decade. As long as Lion gets security updates (2 years, minimum), there's absolutely no need for an upgrade. After that, you can just disconnect it from the Internet and use an stronger password.

eswangren 14y ago
Because using a stronger password somehow nullifies security holes in an OS?
- pooriaazimi 14y ago
  Sorry, I said a stupid thing. You shouldn't comment when you're sleepy... I meant you can restrict remote access to them to be more safe (from trojans, etc), but somehow a stupid point about restricting "physical access" made its way into my comment and made it look ridiculous :)

saturdaysaint 14y ago

(parent here) I completely agree and that's a very valid scenario. Apple tactical advantage is that consumers have completely different usage patterns and expectations than the enterprise/lab (which Apple essentially ignores). If %95 of consumers either (a) upgrade within five years or (b) are completely perplexed by the notion of updating their operating system at all, then Apple are at a huge efficiency advantage EOL-ing technologies around the five year mark. As opposed to having top engineers work on maintaining compatibility with deprecated APIs, old hardware, etc. for 15 year old software.