2101bob, it is unfortunate but it all depends on which side of the revenue stream you're sitting on. Consumers want to keep their hardware working for as long as possible. On the other side, hardware manufacturers make their money selling new hardware. Driver updates get released for free so engineering costs for maintenance eventually reach a point where there is no more profitability. New OS releases sometimes require a substantial rework of existing source code, so it is around the time of new OS releases when you see the most products become designated as end of life.
It would sound good for manufacturers to release old source code to the open source community and let them maintain it. But unfortunate again because the source code usually contains proprietary information that the manufacturers own and will not divulge for fear losing their proprietary secrets.
Mary
It would sound good for manufacturers to release old source code to the open source community and let them maintain it. But unfortunate again because the source code usually contains proprietary information that the manufacturers own and will not divulge for fear losing their proprietary secrets.
Mary