A piece of software that is operating on an non-supported OS is not a functioning piece of software.
Why not, exactly? What is mysteriously going to stop working just because someone's legal arrangement expired?
Or to be blunt, how many people do you think we should kill by not using medical technology bought at great cost just because some lawyers would like a bit more money please?
Usually, when software in the corporate environment is purchased, it is with a maintenance agreement or it should be. Part of the maintenance agreement should be for future versions of the OS from the same software vendor (eg, Microsoft in this case).
That's a lovely theory, but in the real world organisations buy very useful, very expensive equipment all the time with the expectation that its useful lifetime will be longer than any currently available OS is officially supported for. Moreover, in many cases it might not be economic to purchase at all without that. This is why standards and compatibility are so important.
Perhaps in the future with more and more apps going from Desktop to SAAS or mobile this might be less of a problem.
Heaven help us if anything important ever moves to SAAS, because no-one else will. SAAS is sometimes useful for convenience or short term flexibility. Self-hosted is for professionals who need guarantees.
> "Why not, exactly? What is mysteriously going to stop working just because someone's legal arrangement expired?"
No, it is about engineering and resiliency as opposed to just getting something to work. Would you fly on a plane with unsupported software?
Firms can choose to use unsupported software at their own risk (at least in most situations -- there may be situations where it is illegal to do so such as mission critical safety systems).
> "That's a lovely theory, but in the real world organisations buy very useful, very expensive equipment all the time with the expectation that its useful lifetime will be longer than any currently available OS is officially supported for."
First, I don't know if that's true about the expectation that a very expensive piece of equipment is expected to run on unsupported software. If it truly an expensive piece of equipment that usually comes with maintenance agreements (eg, MRI scanner, CT scanner) and in that case, the vendor can't be using unsupported software. It should be part of FDA approval process that that be the case, but I don't know for certain.
Regarding SAAS, it might be a private firm server (farm) but one that is a server none-the-less which is easier on upgrades than entire sets of desktop systems.
I believe that firms that use unsupported, outdated software open themselves up to various liabilities.
Why not, exactly? What is mysteriously going to stop working just because someone's legal arrangement expired?
Or to be blunt, how many people do you think we should kill by not using medical technology bought at great cost just because some lawyers would like a bit more money please?
Usually, when software in the corporate environment is purchased, it is with a maintenance agreement or it should be. Part of the maintenance agreement should be for future versions of the OS from the same software vendor (eg, Microsoft in this case).
That's a lovely theory, but in the real world organisations buy very useful, very expensive equipment all the time with the expectation that its useful lifetime will be longer than any currently available OS is officially supported for. Moreover, in many cases it might not be economic to purchase at all without that. This is why standards and compatibility are so important.
Perhaps in the future with more and more apps going from Desktop to SAAS or mobile this might be less of a problem.
Heaven help us if anything important ever moves to SAAS, because no-one else will. SAAS is sometimes useful for convenience or short term flexibility. Self-hosted is for professionals who need guarantees.