Creating Software that Works with Windows 95/98/ME

Filed Under VB6, Building Your MicroISV, Programming & Coding | Leave a Comment

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Seems to me, especially when I read about Microsoft’s latest software development platorm (.net 2005) and the upcoming Office version, that Microsoft is doing everything it can to get people to upgrade their OS to XP (or Vista when available).

Seems resonable. Windows 95/98/ME are old, have lots of stability problems, and security problems as well. I believe Microsoft will stop supporting 98 and ME this summer (2006), and 95 is no longer supported (does anyone care about Windows 95 anymore?). However, there are still people using these operating systems (we use them inside of Virtual PC machines for menial tasks and beta testing - but I don’t think that really counts, or does it?).

The real pending question (for us, and perhaps most software companies developing software for Windows) is whether or not to continue to support (or make your software work with) these older Microsoft operating systems.

I am kind of in the middle myself. On one hand, I would rather have a larger audience of potential customers that may buy our product. For example, are you willing to lose 10% of your business because the 10% of the people still using Win 98/ME can no longer use your product? On the other hand, I question whether or not those people that use the older operating systems are the kinds of people that actually BUY software. If they haven’y purchased an operating system since 2000/2001, are they really a candidate to purchase our software?

It’s a tough decision to make. If we cut off all previous versions, and just stuck with developing for/supporting XP, 2003 Server, and Vista, it would be simpler to manage (and we could beef up a few things).

Does anyone have any feedback on this? I for one would be interested to hear -