decompilation as archiving?

[Chuck Guzis]

On 4 Dec 2006 at 20:08, Jerome Fine wrote:

> So software can also fail in ways that are similar to hardware
> problems - EXCEPT that software will NEVER develop an entirely
> new bug called a failure due to age problems whereas hardware
> will always eventually reach this stage if used long enough.
> If this latter characteristic is what you refer to as the prime
> difference between hardware and software, then I agree 100%!!!

But that doesn't imply that time's not an enemy of software!  
Obsolescence is the biggest enemy--try making a single MS-DOS 2,1 C: 
partition on that new 250GB drive.   

In the 70's and early 80's, it wasn't unsual to find programs that 
don't deal with dates after 1999.  A program may have worked well for 
more than 20 years suddenly becomes useless when the century changes.

Old programs using program loops to introduce a small delay.  On an 
XT, the following loop takes more than a second to execute:

    MOV CX, 0FFFFh
Here:
    LOOP	Here

Cheers,
Chuck