[Coco] DriveWire 4 on Window 98

[Aaron Wolfe]

On Sep 24, 2013 6:32 AM, "Gene Heskett" <gheskett at wdtv.com> wrote:
>
> On Tuesday 24 September 2013 06:03:36 David Ladd did opine:
>
> > Aaron,
> >
> > Thank you for following up on this and letting us know our options for
> > the java versions and OS's.
> >
> > On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 12:10 AM, Aaron Wolfe <aawolfe at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > After investigating things, it seems there are 2 problems running DW4
> > > on Win98.
> > >
> > > The first is the JVM version required.  This I have solved, and DW4
> > > now requires only version 1.5.  This will allow it to run on even
> > > older Linux and Mac machines, and allows the server and "lite" UI to
> > > run fine on Win 98 (the lite UI allows disks to be inserted/removed
> > > and little else, similar to the DW3 software).
> > >
> > > However, to run the full featured UI there is also a problem with the
> > > native GUI library (SWT).  They dropped support for Win98 quite some
> > > time ago.
> > >
> > > In order to make the full DW4 UI run on Win98, I would have to use a
> > > very old version of SWT, which would potentially impact the more
> > > modern platforms negatively and limit the features we can use going
> > > forward.
>
> Rather than that, any machine with win98 on it should not be allowed a
> network connection without protection of some sort in the router.  It will
> be owned by some black hat and used to relay spam, typically in less than
> 20 minutes.  It may also get key loggers installed to report your banking
> login and password details, sending that to someplace halfway around the
> planet if you do your banking on it.  So don't.
>
> A Win98 machine is also an excellent candidate to put a recent linux on.
> You'll automatically get a version of java new enough to run drivewire in
> the bargain.  If its a low resource machine, with less than 512 megs of
> ram, that should be upgraded if possible, and the linux flavor chosen
> should e something with a simpler, uses less memory, gui.  The ubunbtu
> 12.04 LTS is available with the xfce interface, called xubuntu.  The 12.04
> stands for the release date, April of 2012, and has the advantage of the
> 'LTS' (Long Term Service) in that it will be supported for all security
> updates until April of 2017. The update manager will check about once a
> day, automatically, and ask you if it should install those updates that
are
> related to what you actually have installed.  Generally, any security
fixes
> are installed before the black hats even know about them.
>
> I just installed that on an old ex-school system Dell for a friend and it
> works well.  But, I also sold her a yard sale router I had a $20 bill in,
a
> Linksys WRT54GL that I had reflashed to DD-WRT, making her system as
bullet
> proof against the attackers as there is.  I've been running DD-WRT here
for
> several years, only one person has come through it and into this machine,
> and I had to give him the passwords on the phone before he could.
>

Win 98 is definitely risky to put online.  I could see someone using a
win98 machine as a dedicated DW server, but even then it probably doesnt
make sense when you consider a Raspberry Pi for $40 will run DW4 just fine
and pay for itself in power savings compared to an old pc... how long that
takes depends on many factors of course, but coco forever(!), so it is
enevitable.