You've got to get the hang of this embedded computer thing.....
I don't know where it is chiselled in stone that "You have to upgrade your software at all times OR ELSE". This is obviously the thing for desktop computers, epsecially if you like a bit of a game of chance, embedded systems run by a different set of rules, the most important being "If it works don't mess with it". Despite what the IoT evangelists tell you its not considered good practice to dangle appliances on the Wild Web -- there's too many probers, too many script kiddies and what-have-you to spend your life playing whack-a-mole with them. If they're networked at all they should be communicating with a local control server with the rest of the communicating capabilites sufficiently buttoned up that nobody can get in -- and just as important -- no process can get out.
A lot of the kit that's made has to go through a fairly extensive and involved test and ceritification cycle. This takes for ever and is fundamentally incompatible with the Agile way of doing things (which looks more like the "Spray the stuff at the barn wall and see what sticks" school of programming). The Windows release cycles and test methodology are too hasty and slapdash to trust anything to -- OK, an information board isn't going to do any harm if it malfunctions but what if that system is running the positioning and scanning equipment of an Open CAT scan device (a half-ton of machinery whizzing around next to your fragile body.....). The upgrade cycle could literally take years so there's a need for a stable release, one that might not have the latest tricks in drag 'n drop or fashion in icon design, just something that people can rely on.
Personally, I wouldn't use Windows for any critical application. But 'I' don't get that choice. Real programmers build castles in the air so they love the freedom Microsoft gives them to make wonders out of trivia -- and they can always point the finger elsewhere when everything goes belly up.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
