Comment by account42
> Things that go through the proper channels are usually compatible.
But that's a pretty low bar - previously Windows went to great lengths to preserve backwards compatibility even for programs that are out of spec.
If you just care about keeping things working if they were done "correctly" then the average Linux desktop can do that too - both for native Linux programs (glibc and a small list of other base system libraries have strong backwards compatibility) as well as for Windows programs via Wine.
On paper maybe. In practice there's currently at least one case that directly affects me where Wine-patched Windows software still works on Windows thanks to said patch... but doesn't work under Wine anymore.