64

I was thinking about the recent story about the DB looking for windows 3.1 administrator.

A classic issue I've soon working in heavy industry is that hardware last longer than windows version. So 10 years ago, you bought a component for the product you design or a full machine for your factory which only comes with a windows XP driver.

10 year latter, Windows XP is obsolete, upgrading to a more recent windows might be an option but would cost a shit load of money.

I have therefore the impression that Linux would offer more control to the professional user in term of product lifecycle and patch deployment. However, there is always that stupid HW which doesn't have a Linux driver.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] philpo@feddit.de 3 points 9 months ago

Linux is on a shitton of products nowadays, but often people don't recognise it as such.

In terms of the DB - Windows 3.1 story the solution is simple: It's time. Windows 3.1 is old as fuck and while Linux is one year older in theory it was a hobby project back then and, more important, was not providing any graphical interface back then - which is what the German Bahn used it for - as a graphical interface. While Unix would have been an option these systems were often hardware-vendor specific(AIX for IBM, HP-UX for HP) and the then standard supplier Siemens-Nixdorf did not provide it's own Os afaik.OS/2 was basically still Microsoft at that point so there was little reason to not use MS.

The other point are the incredibly long development and usage times of industrial equipment - if you start to design a new high speed train from scratch it can easily take 15 years from start to finish - and the decision which OS you use is one to be done rather early on. And that train will then be used for 30-40 years. The complete IT business will change A LOT during that time. And maybe you bring out a newer model but need it to be backward compatible for some reason. And bam,you use Windows 3.1 in 2030.

For a matter of fact I know of at least one nuclear plant still being controlled by a Digital Equipment PDP11 and one conventional power plant controlled by a Robotron system.

Which brings us to the old:"Never change a running system". If your application works under windows XP and usually these things do after so many years, why do you need a new OS ? Unlike consumer systems these systems are often in a walled garden or not connected at all and there is literally zero reason to change it.

Nowadays things are different - we have much more outside connections in hardware and linux/Unix is in many more products than people think - I personally would even be fairly sure that it's in more products than MS nowadays, since they got rid of CE there has been a steep decline in their market share afaik.

this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2024
64 points (92.1% liked)

No Stupid Questions

35868 readers
757 users here now

No such thing. Ask away!

!nostupidquestions is a community dedicated to being helpful and answering each others' questions on various topics.

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules (interactive)


Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All post titles must include a question.

All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.



Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.

Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.



Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.

Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.



Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.

That's it.



Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.

Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.



Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.

Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.

On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it's in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.

If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.



Rule 7- You can't intentionally annoy, mock, or harass other members.

If you intentionally annoy, mock, harass, or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.

Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.



Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content.



Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.

Let everyone have their own content.



Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here.



Credits

Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!

The greatest banner of all time: by @TheOneWithTheHair!

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS