4 ms·

This is not good to hear, at my work we have the production technicians activate the occasional Windows 7 PC via the phone. We do it this way as these are speci

This is not good to hear, at my work we have the production technicians activate the occasional Windows 7 PC via the phone. We do it this way as these are specialized embedded PC’s that won’t connect to the internet. Flippant comments to “just use Linux” are not understanding the realities of keeping 20yr old software in the medical, offshore drilling, etc industries.

inetknght 9mo ago
> Flippant comments to “just use Linux” are not understanding the realities of keeping 20yr old software in the medical, offshore drilling, etc industries. I make such comments. Tell me: what exactly is problematic about medical, offshore drilling, etc industries which makes it difficult or impossible to switch? ... wanna hire me to work on that? I am convinced that, whatever the cost is, it will be cheaper than using software on a very-outdated very-proprietary operating system for another couple of decades.
- tsujamin 9mo ago
  To name a few (presumably): drivers, proprietary protocols, vendor warranties/support, licensing/relicensing, paying you to do the work, waiting for the work to be done/tested, paying for workforce re-training, justifying this to management etc. All these reasons suck, but they’re all reality in one industry or another sadly.
  - tadfisher 9mo ago
    It was the same reality 20 years ago when they ditched DOS for Windows XP. At least now it's far easier to run most things in a VM.
  - inetknght 9mo ago
    > drivers Linux kernel is open source and really easy to read, and also fairly easy to write drivers for. > proprietary protocols I've written many network softwares, and proprietary protocols aren't difficult to me. > vendor warranties/support Fuck vendor lock-in. Move to Linux. > licensing/relicensing Fuck vendors. > paying you to do the work ...is cheaper than paying vendors. > waiting for the work to be done/tested Here, let me demonstrate that it works... with many many many automated tests. > * paying for workforce re-training* Not really important if it's well-done. > justifying this to management A lot of business management can't see past their own nose until it comes to money. Do some maths and show them the cost savings in a presentation. They'll listen.
    - kube-system 9mo ago
      These things are not as trivial as you think they are when that computer is connected to industrial equipment that costs millions of dollars, you have no test environment, the original vendor no longer exists, and any failure or downtime at best will cause millions in financial losses, and at worst will maim or kill people. The best option in these cases is to isolate the system from external networks to keep it secured and keep operating until the organization can afford a major capital expenditure to replace everything.
      - AlotOfReading 9mo ago
        I work in automotive for OEMs and I've seen this at many factories. They still need to switch, because their technical issues are a supply chain risk for me. I don't want to hear that a batch is bad because they did abominable things to the software they were given. That's happened. I don't want to find out that they had a system die or get hacked and now things are shut down until some eBay seller mails replacements. Seen that. So on and so forth. I ran out of patience years ago for the inevitable results of letting an unaccountable third party own decision-making on your critical systems. I'd much rather have that argument when the CEOs aren't breathing down our necks.
        kube-system 9mo ago
        My experience on this topic is mostly with regulated industries like healthcare and critical infrastructure. It was probably less of a headache because the only solution was to properly maintain what you had or buy something new. Nobody was fucking around with the software or they would have gone to prison.
      - inetknght 9mo ago
        > These things are not as trivial as you think they are when that computer is connected to industrial equipment that costs millions of dollars, you have no test environment, the original vendor no longer exists, and any failure or downtime at best will cause millions in financial losses, and at worst will maim or kill people. > you have no test environment That can be solved. > the original vendor no longer exists Even more reason that your company needs to upgrade. > That computer is connected to industrial equipment that costs millions of dollars ... any failure or downtime at best will cause millions in financial losses I heard a minute of downtime on an oil rig costs millions in financial losses. So a fuck-up is extremely expensive. Nothing new to me. I've also worked in industries where a fuck-up can cost lives. That's also extremely expensive. Trust me, there are software engineers and hardware engineers who know your pains and aren't afraid of how difficult you think this stuff is. Yes it's difficult, no it's not impossible. And it's a lot cheaper than you think if it's done right.
- ErroneousBosh 9mo ago
  Great. Let me know where you're going to find someone to certify it.
  - inetknght 9mo ago
    Point me at the certification requirements and we can figure something out.
- TheJoeMan 9mo ago
  The issues are not technical, they are documentation and certification. Here is the specifications for medical device software [1] [2]. You can either keep using a legacy (windows-based) software package, or find the need to verify/validate the entirety of linux and all drivers and packages (software-of-unknown-providence aka. SOUP). You then have to devise a patching schedule/methodology, as right now you just tell the end user to apply the Windows security patches if they’d like. This is a high-cost that is hard to argue for despite the obvious advantages. [1] https://www.iso.org/standard/38421.html https://www.iso.org/standard/38421.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_62304 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_62304
userbinator 9mo ago
Windows 7 activation was cracked long ago and you already paid MS for it, so I would just go that route.
epistasis 9mo ago
"Just use Windows" seems to be more problematic than "just use Linux" here. Though there is hope that WINE will reach enough feature parity for many applications, accessing external hardware is the hardest thing to emulate. Building products on top of Windows seems to limit the lifetime of the product to whatever support Microsoft seem to be willing to provide. The best time to migrate off Windows was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.
baka367 9mo ago
20 year old software is probably also going to have a hard time running on windows 11, even with all their compatibility layers packed up
wobfan 9mo ago
AFAIK Windows 11 IoT, which is intended for exactly these kinds of environments, can be activated via phone and LAN without internet. Microsoft isn't abandoning these markets. They've been min-maxing consumer software enshittification for years now and doing an extremely good job, but they still have good options for enterprise.
TiredOfLife 9mo ago
It's Neowin so the information posted is half right. The device you are activating doesn't need internet. https://visualsupport.microsoft.com/ https://visualsupport.microsoft.com/ has the enter code from pc and get activation code
treesknees 9mo ago
The phone activation process has moved to a website instead of a phone number. It doesn’t mean the OS to be activated needs an internet connection. You can still activate offline systems.
asacrowflies 9mo ago
Using windows 7 in 2025 for those industries seems a massive liability ?

inetknght 9mo ago

> Flippant comments to “just use Linux” are not understanding the realities of keeping 20yr old software in the medical, offshore drilling, etc industries. I make such comments. Tell me: what exactly is problematic about medical, offshore drilling, etc industries which makes it difficult or impossible to switch? ... wanna hire me to work on that? I am convinced that, whatever the cost is, it will be cheaper than using software on a very-outdated very-proprietary operating system for another couple of decades.

tsujamin 9mo ago
To name a few (presumably): drivers, proprietary protocols, vendor warranties/support, licensing/relicensing, paying you to do the work, waiting for the work to be done/tested, paying for workforce re-training, justifying this to management etc. All these reasons suck, but they’re all reality in one industry or another sadly.
- tadfisher 9mo ago
  It was the same reality 20 years ago when they ditched DOS for Windows XP. At least now it's far easier to run most things in a VM.
- inetknght 9mo ago
  > drivers Linux kernel is open source and really easy to read, and also fairly easy to write drivers for. > proprietary protocols I've written many network softwares, and proprietary protocols aren't difficult to me. > vendor warranties/support Fuck vendor lock-in. Move to Linux. > licensing/relicensing Fuck vendors. > paying you to do the work ...is cheaper than paying vendors. > waiting for the work to be done/tested Here, let me demonstrate that it works... with many many many automated tests. > * paying for workforce re-training* Not really important if it's well-done. > justifying this to management A lot of business management can't see past their own nose until it comes to money. Do some maths and show them the cost savings in a presentation. They'll listen.
  - kube-system 9mo ago
    These things are not as trivial as you think they are when that computer is connected to industrial equipment that costs millions of dollars, you have no test environment, the original vendor no longer exists, and any failure or downtime at best will cause millions in financial losses, and at worst will maim or kill people. The best option in these cases is to isolate the system from external networks to keep it secured and keep operating until the organization can afford a major capital expenditure to replace everything.
    - AlotOfReading 9mo ago
      I work in automotive for OEMs and I've seen this at many factories. They still need to switch, because their technical issues are a supply chain risk for me. I don't want to hear that a batch is bad because they did abominable things to the software they were given. That's happened. I don't want to find out that they had a system die or get hacked and now things are shut down until some eBay seller mails replacements. Seen that. So on and so forth. I ran out of patience years ago for the inevitable results of letting an unaccountable third party own decision-making on your critical systems. I'd much rather have that argument when the CEOs aren't breathing down our necks.
      - kube-system 9mo ago
        My experience on this topic is mostly with regulated industries like healthcare and critical infrastructure. It was probably less of a headache because the only solution was to properly maintain what you had or buy something new. Nobody was fucking around with the software or they would have gone to prison.
    - inetknght 9mo ago
      > These things are not as trivial as you think they are when that computer is connected to industrial equipment that costs millions of dollars, you have no test environment, the original vendor no longer exists, and any failure or downtime at best will cause millions in financial losses, and at worst will maim or kill people. > you have no test environment That can be solved. > the original vendor no longer exists Even more reason that your company needs to upgrade. > That computer is connected to industrial equipment that costs millions of dollars ... any failure or downtime at best will cause millions in financial losses I heard a minute of downtime on an oil rig costs millions in financial losses. So a fuck-up is extremely expensive. Nothing new to me. I've also worked in industries where a fuck-up can cost lives. That's also extremely expensive. Trust me, there are software engineers and hardware engineers who know your pains and aren't afraid of how difficult you think this stuff is. Yes it's difficult, no it's not impossible. And it's a lot cheaper than you think if it's done right.
ErroneousBosh 9mo ago
Great. Let me know where you're going to find someone to certify it.
- inetknght 9mo ago
  Point me at the certification requirements and we can figure something out.
TheJoeMan 9mo ago
The issues are not technical, they are documentation and certification. Here is the specifications for medical device software [1] [2]. You can either keep using a legacy (windows-based) software package, or find the need to verify/validate the entirety of linux and all drivers and packages (software-of-unknown-providence aka. SOUP). You then have to devise a patching schedule/methodology, as right now you just tell the end user to apply the Windows security patches if they’d like. This is a high-cost that is hard to argue for despite the obvious advantages. [1] https://www.iso.org/standard/38421.html https://www.iso.org/standard/38421.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_62304 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_62304

userbinator 9mo ago

Windows 7 activation was cracked long ago and you already paid MS for it, so I would just go that route.

epistasis 9mo ago

"Just use Windows" seems to be more problematic than "just use Linux" here. Though there is hope that WINE will reach enough feature parity for many applications, accessing external hardware is the hardest thing to emulate. Building products on top of Windows seems to limit the lifetime of the product to whatever support Microsoft seem to be willing to provide. The best time to migrate off Windows was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.

baka367 9mo ago

20 year old software is probably also going to have a hard time running on windows 11, even with all their compatibility layers packed up

wobfan 9mo ago

AFAIK Windows 11 IoT, which is intended for exactly these kinds of environments, can be activated via phone and LAN without internet. Microsoft isn't abandoning these markets. They've been min-maxing consumer software enshittification for years now and doing an extremely good job, but they still have good options for enterprise.

TiredOfLife 9mo ago

It's Neowin so the information posted is half right. The device you are activating doesn't need internet. https://visualsupport.microsoft.com/ https://visualsupport.microsoft.com/ has the enter code from pc and get activation code

treesknees 9mo ago

The phone activation process has moved to a website instead of a phone number. It doesn’t mean the OS to be activated needs an internet connection. You can still activate offline systems.

asacrowflies 9mo ago

Using windows 7 in 2025 for those industries seems a massive liability ?