why will certain software coded for 7 and Vista not work on XP???

Discussion in 'Windows XP / Older OS' started by stayboogy, Jul 5, 2012.

  1. stayboogy

    stayboogy MDL Addicted

    May 1, 2011
    846
    215
    30
    i've just never understood why some software that is made for Windows 7 and Vista, and that is not also made for XP will not run on XP

    why is this? what's the difference in the coding or compiling that makes some programs work for 7 and Vista only and not XP??? doesn't really make any sense to me...

    i mean, why can't i take an .exe from my Windows 7 machine and run it on my XP, like snipping tool for instance or even notepad???

    what would have to be changed within the program so that it would run on an XP machine???

    someone please explain???
     
  2. woot332

    woot332 MDL Senior Member

    Feb 18, 2011
    390
    815
    10
    Also if you changed this members in the pe header the windows loader would try to resolve the
    import address table and fail if functions are missing.

    MajorOSVersion
    MinorOSVersion
    MajorImageVersion
    MinorImageVersion
    MajorSubsystemVersion
    MinorSubsystemVersion
     
  3. ranchhand

    ranchhand MDL Novice

    May 3, 2012
    28
    7
    0
    Have you ever tried reading "Olde English" from Geoffry Chaucer or Shakespear's day in original text? You can't. You may make out a word here & there but the majority is unreadable compared to modern English. Same thing in writing code for a program. Old code sometimes refers to subroutines and algorithms that don't exist in Windows7 anymore.
     
  4. roirraW "edor" ehT

    roirraW "edor" ehT MDL Addicted

    Sep 1, 2007
    618
    217
    30
    Good analogy.
     
    Stop hovering to collapse... Click to collapse... Hover to expand... Click to expand...
  5. SuperBubble

    SuperBubble MDL Member

    Nov 18, 2011
    150
    295
    10
    Though it's extremely rare for Microsoft to actually rip things out of Windows... that's why each release is twice the size of the last. :)
     
    Stop hovering to collapse... Click to collapse... Hover to expand... Click to expand...