Microsoft shouldn't seek to bury NT 4.0. It should simply open source it.
To paraphrase a famous 17th century playwright: Alas, poor Windows NT, I knew it, Bill: An OS of many blue screens, of most excellent fancy: It hath borne me on its network a million times; and now, how abhorred in our collective memory it is!
Whatever you will say about Windows NT, it was a very successful and prosperous operating system. When Windows 2000 and Active Directory finally replaced it, many NT-administrator types longed for simpler times — as when it was appropriately patched, it was stable, performed well, and was easy to administrate. But on December 31 the sun set on Windows NT 4.0. Server, with Microsoft ending pay-per-incident and Premier support for all but a handful of well-heeled customers. Microsoft is intent on closing the book on a significant piece of its software history.
But should it?
Almost a year ago, when news of a partial source code leak of the Windows NT and Windows 2000 code base appeared on the Internet, I advocated that Microsoft open source Windows NT. Now, more than ever, I think it should be done.
Never mind the fact that a significant portion of Microsoft's customer base that are perfectly happy with their NT 4.0 boxes are being forced into costly upgrades, now that their support options have been yanked out from under them. An open-source release of NT just plain makes sense.
