On 6/13/20 5:00 AM, Filip Piechocki wrote:
Hi,
for me not updating a system, software etc for many years is just equal to
building a technical debt. Any serious company should be aware that this
will finally kick them in their butt, should have measure the potential
cost and decide where is the point where they should switch. If a company
decides to not care about this then someone else will decide for them for
example by dropping support for their OS/hardware/whatever.
Backwards compatibility is nice but the world (especially IT world) is
moving forward and lagging behind is a potential risk and cost.
Honestly, I can see how one would think that; but the truth is it almost
never does.
I worked on the trading floor system for the Chicago Stock Exchange
multiple times. This "temporary" system started out on PDP 11 hardware
running either RSTS or RSX OS (I forget which, could have even been
RT-11). That was the 1970s. In the 1980s it moved to VAX hardware and
OpenVMS quite easily actually because the BASIC compiler strove to be
backward compatible. In the 1990s it moved to the Alpha. When the
Itanium processor came out it moved to that. Do you know when they
finally retired this "temporary" system? When they got rid of the
trading floor just a few years ago.
With a proper business model, technical debt never has to be paid.
That FDA regulated company in California running a 1970s era PDP will
run it until the business becomes unprofitable (or not profitable
enough) then they will shut the line down. If there ever comes a time
when they can no longer scrounge up parts or physically cannot find
_anyone_ willing to train on how to run the thing, then and only then,
they will set up a new line with current tech in some other location,
usually off-shore. They probably already have such a line. This one will
simply be scrapped once it can no longer function.
This is the reality of industry.
You can always find someone willing to be trained for the proper amount
of money and that proper amount of money is always less than starting
over. You only "upgrade" when you physically can't make it work anymore
or a federal regulation forces you.
--
Roland Hughes, President
Logikal Solutions
(630)-205-1593
http://www.theminimumyouneedtoknow.com
http://www.infiniteexposure.net
http://www.johnsmith-book.com
http://www.logikalblog.com
http://www.interestingauthors.com/blog
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