[WinPartners] Discontinuing Software Support during FY2004

[Deb Bowser]

Date: Tuesday, 7 October 2003
To: Members of the MIT Community, itpartners at mit.edu, 
macpartners at mit.edu, winpartners at mit.edu, 
sw-release-announce at mit.edu, ed-tech at mit.edu
From: Software Release Team <swrt at mit.edu>
Subject: Discontinuing Software Support during FY2004
Cc: infosys at mit.edu, itag at mit.edu, swrt at mit.edu

Good Day,

On September 22,  an announcement was sent that contained a proposed 
list of applications targeted for desupport during FY2004 and asked 
for feedback and review of this proposed list in an effort to obtain 
consensus that in retiring the applications listed, would not impose 
any significant burdens to your Department and/or the client 
community that you support.  The list below reflects changes based on 
feedback that was received.

In an on-going effort to ensure a high level of quality support for 
the Macintosh and Windows platforms, Information Systems reviewed the 
vast combinations of software currently being recommended and 
supported.

Our review suggests that discontinuing support for the following 
applications, during this fiscal year is vital to maintain quality 
support, improve responsiveness to new vendor releases and make it 
possible to introduce new product offerings.


Windows software slated for retirement on December 31, 2003:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Acrobat Reader 4.0
BrioQuery 5.5
Dreamweaver 4.0
FileZilla 1.9.7
Internet Explorer  5.5
Kerberized Line Printer 1.0
Kerberos for Windows 2.1
Tivoli Storage Management 4.1.3
VirusScan 4.5.1 SP1


Macintosh software slated for retirement on December 31, 2003:
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Acrobat Reader 4.0
BrioQuery 5.5
Dreamweaver 4.0
Fetch 4.0.2
Kerberos for Macintosh 3.5
Kerberized Line Printer 2.1.1
Virex 7.0


Windows software slated for retirement on June 30, 2004:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Office 2000 - Mainstream support from Microsoft will end on June 30, 
2004.  Windows XP users who have not upgraded their version of Office 
from 2000 should.  We are waiting to see what happens with the 
expected MS Office 2003 to determine the best migration path to 
recommend.


Macintosh Operating Systems slated for retirement on June 30, 2004:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mac OS 9 (All versions)  - Apple has been steadily diminishing its 
support for Mac OS 9 since the release of Mac OS X in March 2001. 
Beginning January 1, 2003, newer machines from Apple were not capable 
of running Mac OS 9 as the primary operating system.  At this point, 
most vendors developing products for the Macintosh are providing only 
Mac OS X versions of their software.  IS recommends that everyone 
migrate to some version of Mac OS X by June 2004.  IS will make 
additional recommendations regarding upgrading to Mac OS X including 
which version well before June.


Windows Operating Systems slated for retirement on December 31, 2004
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Windows 2000 Professional - Mainstream support from Microsoft will 
end on March 31, 2005.  Information Systems will discontinue support 
for Windows 2000 Professional on December 31, 2004 and will provide 
more guidance in upgrading from Windows 2000 Professional before 
December 2004.

Desupporting this OS requires adequate planning, resources and lead 
time.  We are prepared to work with the MIT community in an effort to 
help ease the difficulties in migrating to a more current environment.

In closing, we appreciate the Community's assistance and involvement 
in Software Release.


Deb Bowser
MIT Information Systems
Software Release Team
W92-176
Ph:     617-253-3879
Fax:    617-258-8736
http://web.mit.edu/swrt/
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