Old software on newer hardware, is the Pi backward compatible?

Greetings folks,

I am super new to Raspberry Pi, so new that I don't even have one yet! But have been planning on getting one soon. But before I dive in, I want to ask about a specific project related question..

I'm interesting in reproducing the project demonstrated in this tutorial: https://learn.adafruit.com/touchscreen-pi-timelapse-controller, but looks like it is written for an older model using older hardware, and has many old bits and uses an older OS (i.e. raspbian 2014-01-07), I am concerned about making it work without much fuss if I am to get a latest Pi 3 B, or using a capacitive touchscreen (https://www.adafruit.com/products/2423) instead of a resistive one shown in the tutorial. Some initial setup steps might be different I'm sure, but I mainly want to make sure it works at the end

It could be a really silly question but I don't want to find out the hard way that I need to make massive tweaks to make said project work. Thanks in advance!