Oldest software you still use

bigred

Penultimate Amazing
bigred
Joined
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Discounting stuff like Notepad which has been around as part of the OS or apps that you have a newer version of but the app itself has been around a long time.

Examples might be:

Win XP
MS Word 97

I guess you could include games tho I was thinking more of practical stuff.
 
Maybe iTunes? Been on the various PCs for about 13 years along with our daughter's repository of music. Strangely, about half the tracks on her albums have gone awol for no good reason. I suspect it was a shared file-distribution glitch along the way.
 
Primavera Project Planner 3.0. 20 years old and still the best scheduling software there is.
 
Define "use".

May sound like a silly question, but I work with computers... occasionally I have to do some programming on a system that uses software that is >20 years old. Its not something I "use" every day, but I get exposed to it.

On the other hand, I do use WinXP regularly. And there are some legacy systems here that were programmed in Visual Basic 6 (a computer language that has a copyright date of 1998, so 20 years old) that I sometimes have to update.
 
Makes me want to login to myspace to see if my page still exists.

I still play the original Rome Total War most everything else is up to date.
 
and yeah, it depends on what's meant by 'use'

i have my original 1980 Vic-20 still operating, my kids play Gorf on it from time to time

and when any of my geeky friends come over, they always want to play Oregon Trail on an old Mac Classic, just for the nostalgia

so depends on what you mean by use
 
Office 97
Quicken for Windows

I also use a number batch files which I wrote back in DOS 5.0 days, and which still function in Windows 10

I also have one batch file which I wrote under DOS 3.3 (for the Apple ][+) almost 40 years ago. Obviously the actual file won't run, but I rewrote it in notepad and made the necessary syntax changes, and it still runs on Windows 10.
 
I am using on a daily basis at least two commercial programs copywrited in 1992, ProWrite and JForth.
 
Age of Empires.

iSeries RPG (LOL). Still going strong after 58 years, though I've only been involved with it for :gulp: 38 years.
 
Oh, and does embedded software count? My old calculator is from the 1970s.
 
blutoski said:
Oh, and does embedded software count? My old calculator is from the 1970s.
Click to expand...

For my PC based calculator, I have always ditched the one that came with Windows and use the built in calculator from PC Tools V6, dating back to the 1980's. It has an on screen "tape" on an Algebraic calculator as well as a Financial and a Hex Progammer's calculator, and even an HP style Scientific Calculator that uses RPN

Works fine in Windows 10, and remarkably, you can still download it

https://winworldpc.com/product/pc-tools/6x
 
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Windows 10, whose roots still go back to PDP-11 DOS.

ETA: Or so I've understood. I'm sure someone will be correcting me forthwith. How about CP/M instead?
 
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The DOS version of Hoyle Solitaire, which was originally on a single floppy disk. Best solitaire program. It played fine on Win XP, but not on later OS, so now we get it on the web archive through dosbox.

I also still use the Win3.0 database "Cardfile," which used also to run on XP and Vista, but now requires a third party program. Still the same files, though. I find it a handy repository for passwords and the like, and I figure I can hide the files and nobody will find or open "CRD" files buried in the OS.

I still have an XP laptop set aside for running things that newer systems can't, including a couple of scanners.
 
I don't, but wish I could, still use Qubecalc, the absolutely best spreadsheet I have seen (for my purposes, anyway). It is/was a true three-dimensional spreadsheet running on a two-dimensional character-based DOS system.

I have not played with virtual machines, but would think about doing so if (a) my mind still worked, and (b) I had a desktop computer as well as this laptop.
 
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Once a year, I fire up the old mac (or emulator) to play the best video game ever created: 3 in Three (1989)
 
I have a Powermac G3 running OS 8.5.1 and Microsoft Office 98.
It gets used quite regularly.
 
Paradox and Lotus123 both on an old machine running with its massive 3gb HDD.
 
Ancient History: Duke Nukem 3D (I wish). My neighbor and I wired an ethernet network between our homes before WiFi was even nearly affordable for home use.
 
My girlfriend has a design programme for her Elna sewing machine that I think dates to 1992. It's on a stiffy anyway (although burned to CD as well many years ago).

It only works on Win 95 and earlier I think.
 
fagin said:
My girlfriend has a design programme for her Elna sewing machine that I think dates to 1992. It's on a stiffy anyway (although burned to CD as well many years ago).

It only works on Win 95 and earlier I think.
Click to expand...

Ahaaaa! That reminded me of something that may take the prize. I have an antique music box.

Is the spool a program? Compsci grads, please weigh in.

Oh! ETA: my player piano. Is the score a program? That sucker's almost 200 years old. (came with the house, so technically i've only been using it for 9 years)
 
Software for work-
Textpad
Elist Pro

old OS-
Winxp
windows server 2008 r2

Game-
Starcraft Broodwar

Each serves its purpose just right for me after many years of use.
 
I've got an XP computer sitting in the garage because one of these days I'm going to attempt to fire it up and see if there are any files remaining I might want. I may see if there are any very old apps as well.

ETA: Inspired by this thread, I just downloaded Hover! Years ago I played it somewhat obsessively. I don't even remember how it works. And on this computer, it doesn't appear to work very well.
 
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John Jones said:
Ancient History: Duke Nukem 3D (I wish). My neighbor and I wired an ethernet network between our homes before WiFi was even nearly affordable for home use.
Click to expand...


Duke Nukem!!! That was my favourite "graphics" game back in the day!

Also, Steve Meretzky's "Planetfall" and Scott Adams' "Ghost Town" take pride of place among the "Text Adventures"

go north. look

"oil lamp, old paint, a piece of rope"

get old paint

"old paint is too heavy to pick up"

open old paint

"old paint cannot be opened"

kick old paint

"are you sure?"

Yes

"old paint kicks you back and breaks your neck... you are dead!"
Click to expand...
 
I meant like an application, not scripts etc. And "use" was kinda vague, I was thinking at least semi-regularly ish.

I loved Office 97. If I could find it I'd still use it. I guess mine is Ultraedit, about 15-20 yrs old now?
 
blutoski said:
...

Oh! ETA: my player piano. Is the score a program? That sucker's almost 200 years old. (came with the house, so technically i've only been using it for 9 years)
Click to expand...

Hehe we have a street organ from around 1970 I think, you know the kind where you turn a crank to play music from a band of punch cards.

I can't find my Access 97 CD. That would be my oldest software still in use. I dearly miss it :(
 
People keep mentioning XP as if it should be in a museum.
A lot of the dentists I visit are still using XP for their Digital Xray sensors and scanners because there aren't any drivers for any later systems.
 
Captain_Swoop said:
People keep mentioning XP as if it should be in a museum.
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It should be due to the large and growing number of security problems with this almost 17 year old and out of extended support for 4 years OS.

Captain_Swoop said:
A lot of the dentists I visit are still using XP for their Digital Xray sensors and scanners because there aren't any drivers for any later systems.
Click to expand...

This was a major cause of the NHS's ransomware problems, XP machines.
https://www.wired.com/2017/05/still-use-windows-xp-prepare-worst/

Usually when the users say there aren't any drivers it means they aren't willing to pay huge sums of money to get updated drivers written. Sometimes the driver re-writing fee can come close to, or exceed the cost of, replacing the whole system.
 
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