A few days ago, I started getting this message from Pidgin, the instant-messaging client that Ubuntu Linux uses by default:
The client version you are using is too old. Please upgrade at http://pidgin.im
Well, I’ve seen that happen before, so I waited. Sure enough, that evening’s software update told me that there was an upgrade for Pidgin. I told it to install the upgrade and thought nothing more of it.
Until today, when I noticed that it was still giving me that error. Which was rather confusing, since it was definitely fixed, and I explicitly recall seeing the upgrade come in. Checking the version number of Pidgin just made me more confused, because it claimed to be version 2.4.3 — not 2.5.2, which the Ubuntu servers were passing out. Removing and reinstalling it didn’t seem to make any difference, either to the problem or to the version number.
It took a little while before I recalled that I’d manually installed a version of Pidgin about a year and a half ago, and considered the possibility that it was still hanging around. Sure enough, a peek into /usr/local/bin and /usr/local/lib showed old versions of Pidgin, the libpurple library that it uses, and the OTR plug-in as well. Cleaning those out solved all of the problems.
I guess I’m still getting used to Linux. Under Windows, you had to wipe out the OS and reinstall it every so often, so it was rare that you’d forget what you’d installed since the last one. One of the hidden advantages to running Windows, I guess. 😉
Windows is such a hack, it’s a wonder that it works at all the way Microsoft threw it together. It probably costs them billions a year just keeping it’s bugs fixed.
They call it “job security”. 😉
Job security for Steve Ballmer perhaps, I don’t know if you’ve read the news but Microsoft had a round of several thousands of people, a double-digit percent of their workforce, being laid off.
Well, 1,400 people, not several thousand. Still, a lot of people, and the first widespread layoffs in their history.
You said it yourself: this is the first large layoff in their history. Before that, it was job security for them. (I know that’s not the reason for the shoddy state of Windows, but it does sound good. 😉 )
By the way, your bug wouldn’t happen on OS X. Replacing an app is replacing the app with all its files and dependencies, manual or automatic install. Same goes for installing an app. You just take the app from the “disk image” and drag it to the /Applications folder usually. It’s one of the good things about OS X, though it’s a little bit wasteful of space (but space is something we have plenty of nowadays.) Also, some programs have installer programs that do leave debris in the system, though usually, unless it’s certain parts of the OS like Quicktime (barf), don’t require crazy stuff like rebooting after install like under Windows. 😉