Registering versioned DLLs in Microsoft Transaction Server so that IIS could proxy requests from IE5.5's RDS ActiveX control to allow async callbacks on your 1999 intranet? Priceless.
Those DLLs calling functions in highly specific versions of the library that talks MS Exchange Server's data store protocol? Even more priceless.
Rebuilding an NT box from scratch because a junior developer accidentally installed a new version of Outlook Express which overwrote the working Exchange DLL with a slightly different version that exposes entirely different interfaces (but none that allow VB to access Exchange, curiously enough)? Priceless++
I've got plenty of stories just like that from the mid-90's
And this is precisely why I don't think it's a good idea to try and abstract crap away like the damn filesystem for software development/IDE. I bet it would be cheaper, less complex and for the overall good to instead teach developers how to wrangle files(if that really is a problem worth solving)
I wonder if it's time for a "I used to have to work with Microsoft Tech in the 90's" Meetup/Support Group :)
Registering versioned DLLs in Microsoft Transaction Server so that IIS could proxy requests from IE5.5's RDS ActiveX control to allow async callbacks on your 1999 intranet? Priceless.
Those DLLs calling functions in highly specific versions of the library that talks MS Exchange Server's data store protocol? Even more priceless.
Rebuilding an NT box from scratch because a junior developer accidentally installed a new version of Outlook Express which overwrote the working Exchange DLL with a slightly different version that exposes entirely different interfaces (but none that allow VB to access Exchange, curiously enough)? Priceless++
I've got plenty of stories just like that from the mid-90's
And this is precisely why I don't think it's a good idea to try and abstract crap away like the damn filesystem for software development/IDE. I bet it would be cheaper, less complex and for the overall good to instead teach developers how to wrangle files(if that really is a problem worth solving)
I wonder if it's time for a "I used to have to work with Microsoft Tech in the 90's" Meetup/Support Group :)