Back

The original publisher of the bullshit claim seems to be https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/southwest-cloudstrike-windows-3-1/ , which was then syndicated to olds everywhere via yahoo.

It quotes a tweet that has no sources and seems to be clearly a joke. It also claims that Southwest's systems are "reportedly" built on windows 3.1 and 95, and links to https://www.forbes.com/sites/hershshefrin/2022/12/31/can-southwest-airlines-fix-its-systemic-weaknesses-in-the-new-year/ as a source, which doesn't say that.

What the forbes article does say is that "by some accounts", portions of Southwest's crew scheduling system is built "on the Windows 95 platform", and then reminisces about remembering when windows 95 launched, replacing windows 3.1. That's the only place windows 3.1 is mentioned.

It does link to another article for its "by some accounts" claim. But, guess what, that source says something completely different again.

That article, https://www.dallasnews.com/business/airlines/2022/12/30/whats-the-problem-with-southwest-airlines-scheduling-system/ , talks about a wave of issues Southwest had in 2022. It contains quotes from the then president of TWU Local 556, the union representing Southwest flight attendants.

They are quoted as saying: "Some systems even look historic like they were designed on Windows 95."

_look_ historic. _like_ they were designed on Windows 95. They're talking about a scheduling system that has web and mobile apps, neither of which are the "Windows 95 platform".

So, it would seem that one shitpost led some journalists to breathlessly google for corroborating sources, and "Southwest builds its crew scheduling apps in-house, and they look like shit, like they're from the Windows 95 era" morphed into "Southwest runs everything on Windows 3.1".

Maybe I've missed some actual evidence for these claims, I dunno. But every mention of Southwest and Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 eventually lead back to this lineage of 3 articles misquoting each other.

The minuscule grain of truth that seems to be hiding in all of this: Southwest's scheduling software is allegedly called SkySolver, and it was _initially_ developed in the 1980s. So could plausibly have run on Windows 3.1 back then, for all I know. But Southwest adopted it in 2004, by which time through a couple acquisitions it was owned and is still being developed by GE Aerospace Services. It's like hearing "I use MS Word" and saying that I'm still using MS-DOS, because Word 1.0 ran on it.

And the 2022 Southwest scheduling sadness did seem to stem in part from that software having bitrotted somewhat and needing an overhaul, so it's not all roses and whatnot. But not updating one piece of enterprise software that's been customized and neglected because the company focused its IT resources on new customer-facing software instead (which is what happened) does not equal "lol running windows 3.1" either.

oh and GE still develops and sells SkySolver btw. Just like you not updating a docker container doesn't mean Postgres stops changing, nor does it mean you still run the same OS that you were when Postgres 1.0 came out.

@danderson Actual screenshots of the software, dating to 2020 (based on the dates displayed in the screenshots) and taken by the Air Line Pilots Association (the union supporting Southwest pilots), show images of Windows XP-era chrome … and potentially some UX elements brought in from Java.

So no, not Windows 3.1 old. But XP was certainly fairly gray by that point, and the high customization likely meant they could not use the mainline software.

(via https://www3.alpa.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=IO7kd%2Bfm2Do%3D&tabid=11702&mid=33968)