It always surprises me again and again that our management does not recognize the archaic equipment we are working on as a big problem that frustrates employees, wastes everyone’s time i.e. costs this company a lot. Is it possible that they consider investing in replacing equipment that is obsolete to be an 'unnecessary expense'?
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Chuckle.
Oh they recognize it just fine and upper management is all in favor of replacing it.
Until they see the real numbers of how MUCH equipment needs to be replaced and what the cost and timelines will look like.
Then they quietly let those projects fade away, retire and let someone else worry about them.
I'm still repairing 1A ESS eqpt and DIA carrier banks. Hey, it works and besides no-one is buying our LandLine service anyway.
btw, anyone know where I can find a Burroughs drive or PDP 11/44 drive anywhere?
No kidding. They tried to show me how to open a "man ho-e". The new ones are called person holes!
Some equipment is so outdated / no longer supported that spare parts are purchased from places like eBay. No guarantee the part will work, so more time is spent to determine why and / or find another to part to purchase.
In a nutshell institutional momentum and generational turnover. Old rickety systems especially when maintained by a team or a person are known quantities with typically minimal work. So it's just easier to keep "the lights on" also lots of the older folks who maintain them are just counting down to retirement so that's their solution, they won't be around....and aren't about to take on a big bang project and give themselves more work or headaches... Combine the two above reasons and management apathy and that covers 90% of the cases
It always surprises me again and again that our management does not recognize the archaic equipment we are working on as a big problem that frustrates employees, wastes everyone’s time i.e. costs this company a lot. Is it possible that they consider investing in replacing equipment that is obsolete to be an 'unnecessary expense'?
They have. It is called the Decomm project.
Windows XP is a security risk, can't be used.
Obsolete technology costs money to support and the reliability of plugins may be in question.
Some of the older technology still has bugs in it and cards need to be reseated/rebooted to work properly ever so often.
what's wrong with windows xp on servers?
If it ani't broke don't fix it.
management does not recognize the archaic equipment we are working on as a big problem
They will never "recognize" that because if they were to, it would be a problem and ultimately their fault. And management is never wrong, just ask the Stank man. So there you go.
Sounds like you have it all figured out. Go tell the city and government customers we have to replace their systems. They will be right on that.