[_old_dude_]

COBOL changes very slowly, once in a decade or two. Python does not offer support of a release for more than 3 years and a half [1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Python

[yieldcrv]

But a compute instance or bare metal computer that never needs a new release wont have to deal with that in python either

Its only new builds on someone else’s computer that have this modern issue

[0cf8612b2e1e]

I could believe there are legacy installations happily humming away on Python 2.7 without issue.

[remlov]

Several years ago I briefly worked at a major telecommunications provider with services across the southern United States that ran Python 2.4 on their production provisioning servers. Worked just fine.

[gavindean90]

The difference being that the COBOL is still supported after a decade.

[int_19h]

ActiveState still offers a supported Python 2.7 version across all major platforms for those who need it (https://www.activestate.com/products/python/python-2-7/), so that's 14 years and counting.

If enough stuff needs it, people will keep it running. Java 8 will probably be in the same boat eventually if/when Oracle finally drops support.

[0cf8612b2e1e]

I am not even sure what support is needed at this point. The interpreter is what it is. You know there are no new libraries to integrate.

I guess deploying it on a newer OS which might make it challenging to install unless it is a freshly compiled build?

[int_19h]

Patches for security issues, most notably.