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time and software obsolescence


Daveo

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I have been using PTE now for about 6 months and have made 8 slide shows that I am very pleased with. I have invested a good bit of time producing these shows and now worry that as technology and software moves forward I could face having my work lost as I become unable to run them on tomorrow's platforms or operating systems. I suppose this was the one (and possibly the only) advantage to the old photo album approach to archiving your photographs.

Has there been any discussion on how to keep our PTE presentations current or must I assume in 10 years the slide shows I enjoy today on my PC will no longer be functional? Of course I have the original raw and Jpeg images but recreating a show would probably be prohibiitive to start from scatch again.

Thoughts from anyone on this topic? Regards, Dave

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If you'll allow me to step in here, Igor, while you are formulating your response, I have a suggestion which might help.

One of the things on my 'wish list' in another thread on this forum was for a table of image titles, dissolve (transition) times, and times from the start for each sequence, etc., which could be printed out (or even saved as a text data file).

Then, having the original jpegs saved safely away, it should be possible to readily recreate the show in any new system that comes along, provided that system also allowed one to input this data at least manually (or, better still, as an electronic data base).

Ciao,

Al

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:rolleyes: .... just don't throw out your old PC... Get a marking pen, and write on the side "PTE"... and store it in a closet somewhere...Then when you want to show your old shows ten years from now, you have a dedicated platform!

(That's a dad talking, who just witnessed the kids opening this year's Christmas Loot... left wondering how long all *that* will last!)

Hope you all have a great New Years!

Brian

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Has there been any discussion on how to keep our PTE presentations current or must I assume in 10 years the slide shows I enjoy today on my PC will no longer be functional?

This is a very good question but it would be impossible to answer since no one knows how operating systems will work in the future. I suppose the best we could hope for would be an emulator to run the older shows if they don't work on newer OS's or perhaps PTE will have the ability to convert older shows in to the newer format needed to run on the newest OS's.

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Data obsolescence is unlikely to be a serious concern in our lifetimes. Because of the costs of maintaining critical data in business, backward compatibilities are likely to be maintained for many years to come. I still can read data from my Kaypro 4/84 CPM machine from 1981 and files and software which worked on the first IBM PC's still work today on the latest versions of Windows.

More of a problem is being able to read the media platform. But the "up" side is that as newer formats become available, we can easily transfer data from one to the other. This has the added benefit of refreshing the code (in the case of magnetic media) and provides a means of keeping our archives current.

In short - I believe this to be not a serious problem. What can be and is serious, are color prints made in the 70's which are dying and turning sepia - and transparencies made in the 70's which are falling apart. Thankfully, we have readily available and reasonably priced scanners which may be used to salvage these while still possible.

Best regards,

Lin

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