---
title: "Important Developer Implications: Windows XP Service Pack 2"
url: "https://osherove.com/blog/2004/3/18/important-developer-implications-windows-xp-service-pack-2.md"
canonical: "https://osherove.com/blog/2004/3/18/important-developer-implications-windows-xp-service-pack-2.html"
published: "2004-03-18T14:38:00"
updated: "2004-03-18T14:38:00"
tags: [".Net Quotations"]
author: "Roy Osherove"
description: "One important issue for developers is how the windows XP service pack 2 affects software we write today. You'd be surprised but there are some “breaking” changes inside it, stuff we should be aware of. Today this turned…"
usage: "Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page)."
license: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
---

# Important Developer Implications: Windows XP Service Pack 2

By Roy Osherove March 18, 2004 In [.Net Quotations](https://osherove.com/blog/category/net-quotations)

**Historical article** · Originally published March 18, 2004; technical details may be outdated.

One important issue for developers is how the windows XP service pack 2 affects software we write today. You'd be surprised but there are some “breaking” changes inside it, stuff we should be aware of.

Today this turned up in the [MSFT Downloads RSS feed:](http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/results.aspx?sortCriteria=date&OSID=&productID=&CategoryID=&freetext=&DisplayLang=en&DisplayEnglishAlso=)

[Changes to Functionality in Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2](http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7bd948d7-b791-40b6-8364-685b84158c78&DisplayLang=en)

_This document focuses on the changes in Windows XP Service Pack 2 and its implications for developers. Examples and details are provided for several of the technologies that are experiencing the biggest changes. Future versions of this document will cover all new and changed technologies._

from a quick browse I can tell you it's a good idea to have a browse through and make sure your code won't break with the new service pack.

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---

## About the author

**Roy Osherove**: Senior Solutions Architect at AWS working on AI for production and AI-driven development; author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership, with about 20 years of consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery.

### Sites

- [RobotPaper](https://robotpaper.ai/): This blog: AI patterns and anti-patterns, AI and coding agents, and engineering leadership.
- [osherove.com](https://osherove.com): Roy's personal site. Author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership; consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery, plus about 20 years of blog posts.
- [The Art of Unit Testing](https://www.artofunittesting.com): The Art of Unit Testing, 3rd Edition (Manning): readable, maintainable, trustworthy unit tests, plus TDD workshops in C#, JavaScript, Java and Kotlin.
- [5whys.com](https://www.5whys.com): Roy's writing on software team leadership: self-organizing teams, surviving chaos, learning mode and the Elastic Leadership model.
- [Pipeline Driven](https://pipelinedriven.org): Continuous delivery and DevOps practices: build patterns, pipeline-friendly testing, DevOps metrics and enterprise DevOps.
- [Elastic Leadership](https://www.elasticleadership.com): Elastic Leadership, Roy's framework for software team leaders (survival, learning and self-organizing modes).

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### License

Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page). License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/