Discussion on:

Message 15 of 1
0 Votes
+ -
@edkollin No. That's what happens when people/companies refuse to upgrade to the latest versions of software. Sticking with old software out of an idea that it's safer is often an illusion... laziness and stinginess are often the real reasons behind the decision.

I remember when I developed software in the 1990s and one customer of the firm I worked for continued to use the Windows *3.1* version of our product and simply wouldn't buy an upgrade, even with many new features in the upgrade version, including a completely open/modular "plug-in" design that would let users update and add functionality on their own. It was a major drag on my time, as I had to maintain two different versions of the software, using two different versions of the development tools. As my development tools upgraded and added new features I couldn't add them to the Win 3.1 version so the codebase diverged. The modular style of the system let me have one main program and just minor different modules to produce custom versions for each client, cutting down on work and potential errors, but the Win3.1 was monolithic and a pain to update/fix. Finally I talked the CEO into just giving the client the new version because of the toll it was taking on development and essentially needing to do everything twice.

Mozilla should not be expected to divide its development team in half and do everything twice for a handful of users afraid of updates. That would cripple the main, "real" product's development pace. ESR users should be happy and thankful they're getting bug fixes at all, especially as they're not paying for this long-term support.
ie8 fix

The best of ZDNet, delivered

ZDNet Newsletters

Get the best of ZDNet delivered straight to your inbox