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by LeFantome 443 days ago
I agree. On Linux (and Mac really), new APIs replace old ones and old binaries stop working.

On Windows, new layers are applied over the old. There is DirectX 9-12. New binaries may use 12 but the ones still using 9 are perfectly happy. Things like .NET work the same. You can have multiple apps installed relying on different .NET versions.
2 comments
int_19h 443 days ago
It's not necessarily the same code, though. But COM is nice for a stable ABI like that - so long as you consistently version your interfaces, the apps can just QueryInterface for the old one they need and know that it's there, even if it's just a thin wrapper around the new stuff.
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account42 442 days ago
You can still use OpenGL 1.0 and Xlib-like-it's-1999 on modern Linux distributions.
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