SCO

Depending on your license, the license could work for 506 too.
If your System run in a VMware, you can try it using a snapshot.

Please be so nice and tell us about the semi permanent workaround you thought about

Well, its mostly just an improvement on the already stated workaround of booting the system with a date prior to 09/2015 then resetting it to the current date after logon. It is currently dependent on having the system running inside a vm at the moment.

First we set the vm software to always boot the guest with a date prior to 09/2015, this means the system should boot properly regardless of what the system date set as when it shutdown.

Next we just need a way to sync the guest's clock with the host's clock once it has finished booting. My planned method is to have the host run a script whenever the guest is started that simply logs into the guest, fixes the date, then logs back out.

Whether automating it on bare-metal system is possible remains to be seen.

As for upgrading to 5.0.6, I will attempt to do so with a clone of my system as soon as I get a copy of the installation media.

You could use a time server to get the actual date from the network ^^

If that was possible communicating with the system while its a guest within a vm would be much easier, unfortunately the version of OpenServer it is running does not support the tcp/ip stack.

Currently the only way that I know of to send data between the guest system and the host is via a serial connection, for example the output of the printer is sent through one of the guest's serial ports to a named pipe on the host where it is converted to pdf.

the update to 5.0.6 is no option for you?

I have not attempted upgrading to 5.0.6 yet, but it would be the ideal solution. If it also enables the system to access the network then that would be a welcomed bonus.

jgt, may I also contact you via email for instructions about obtaining the installation media for 5.0.6?

Yes. I am in the process of moving the iso images to a more public site.
Simply upgrading from 5.0.0 to 5.0.6 will not add tcp to your system. You will need an Enterprise license instead of your Host license. There was a thread a few months ago about doing this without doing a fresh install.