I like the little typo ... c:// :)
this post was submitted on 18 May 2025
465 points (96.8% liked)
Technology
70248 readers
3759 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
"stuck" more like happy to not have to deal with the last 15-ish years of microsoft ruining everything they previously excelled at.
load more comments
(7 replies)
I had a 486DX running DOS for writing and editing CAM programs for CNC mills, lathes, pipe bender, and a laser cutter. And for funsies, an even older Macintosh that booted from a 5 1/4" floppy that ran a CMM, (co-ordinate measuring machine). And the software for the CMM ran from another 5 1/4" floppy.
This was about 2017 before I retired as a toolmaker.
I know it's not exactly the point of the article but for a lot of things, I reckon a good amount of 'innovation' was pretty pointless. I personally don't think I ever needed anything that Office 2003 can't do... (Of course I don't use any MS office to begin with but you get the point)
load more comments
(4 replies)
there's a word for those people: awesome
windows xp was peak; running anything before xp is legendary
I ran Linux 1994ish. Amiga OS before. Amstrad CPC 464 before. A friend ran Sinclair ZX-80, that was the first system I had access to.
load more comments
(4 replies)
load more comments
(8 replies)
Why not? Still using Windows 7 on one of my ThinkPads. It's a solid system, if you know what you're doing and how to use is safely.
load more comments
(5 replies)
The elevator was running Windows XP.
Clearly an extreme case of overengineering. A elevator has no business running more than a few microcontrollers.
Qube cinema servers only got off XP in 2015. They're still on 7 though.
It's probably only the screen component that is running an old version of embedded windows.
That's what I think too. And then I see "Their systems are built into everything around us", which basically only applies to PCs and laptops. What is built into pretty much everything around us, is GnuLinux.
load more comments
(3 replies)
Screen? In a elevator?
How else are you gonna show ads?
I hate that you are right.
Yes? That is not that unusual and it is mentioned in the third sentence of the article.
As I rode up to the 14th floor, my eyes were drawn to a screen built into the side of the lift.
Those screens can easily run on an integrated Raspberry Pi microcontroller, they dont exactly have complex graphics
We are far away from the release of the Raspberry Pi if that screen is running an early version of Windows CE. Putting a PC in the elevator to drive the screen was probably the most cost effective solution.
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(8 replies)
I’m visiting my parents in my home country after many years of not being there. I’m hoping my dad’s old pentium 2 laptop is still around.
I think i still have a copy of this OS. Along with NT4.0 and various others. I hoard stuff like this.
I'm disturbed that an elevator is running a desktop OS. How did this happen? Did they never hear of microcontrollers?
I could tell you the stories of W95 & XP that runs the medical world...
My assumption would be that the display is not related to operating the elevator, but rather displaying information about businesses on the respective floors. I've seen those a fair few times, and since they run on isolated networks or even fully local, there's little risk.
Frighteningly, i worked as an admin at a hospitality wifi business that ran a windows box for dhcp duty. I would have to go o site, in the middle of the night, down to the basement of this hotel, and reboot the damn thing. It would die almost every week. Replaced with a linux server and never heard from them again.
I just found the Warcraft install disk for Windows 98 if y'all need something to do...
We've got multiple tools still on Windows 2000, happily running production. They're on an airgapped network though, so no issues.
Instead of using old proprietary shit you could use Linux or *BSD with a vintage desktop environment and have a blast
Something I noticed is that basic users (someone using a fucking 30 y/o OS is definitely one) have an easier time with *nix because most "technical" people are overfitted and brainwashed to the Micro$uck ecosystem
Dude, you clearly have no idea about proprietary and specialised hardware. Which is fine, but you're choosing to attack people from your ignorance.
Don't do that
load more comments
(4 replies)
If a system is extremely old you can use Alpine Linux with no desktop environment
Instead of using old proprietary shit you could use Linux or *BSD with a vintage desktop environment and have a blast
I'm not sure you get it.
The CnC operator, for instance, didn't choose windows; they chose the CnC machine because it's best at making wood into shapes they need. It came with 'a computer' to control it. That computer had a desktop and an icon.
You see how CHOOSING THE OS wasn't on the list? They chose - and fucking get this - A CNC MACHINE out of a printed catalogue with a 30-word write-up. The number of CnC machines with a Unix or Linux or BSD or BeOS install on them in 2000 was - drumroll please - zero.
If you want to fix that, you're going to need a time machine. Remember to bring your flag with you.
Go learn about ReactOS, too.
I would totally hang with that lady in the thumbnail lol
Depends if the photo was taken recently or at the time W95 was around...
load more comments
(1 replies)
My wife still using windows 2000 on her laptop. Still boots and runs. She just doesn't connect it to the internet.