That's an interesting point and thought experiment: what piece of software currently exists that will still be widely used in a century? And what's the oldest software that's still being used currently?
That's an interesting point and thought experiment: what piece of software currently exists that will still be widely used in a century? And what's the oldest software that's still being used currently?
I am very interested in this question, but much of software is proprietary and you don't have much visibility into their history.
For software in the public, trivial lower bound is GCC 1.0 in 1987. Another case I know is Community Climate System Model, in continued development since 1983.
So basically, the age of software is limited by its hardware. (It's similar with animals: if nobody bumps them off and the hardware keeps ticking, the software probably will too... fish and mammals can live for hundreds of years)
https://www.pcworld.com/article/249951/if-it-aint-broke-dont...
E.g. the CIP project aims to maintain released kernels for 25 years. https://www.cip-project.org/