Questions about legacy languages, code, or applications.
-4
votes
0answers
43 views
How do I gauge my career development in a dedicated legacy support role? [closed]
I've worked in the software industry industry for three years now, mainly with two medium size software companies. I've recently experienced a renewed passion for software development after a long ...
0
votes
2answers
129 views
Mapping a legacy database to ORM using wrapper classes
I want to use an ORM with a legacy database, but I don't want to expose some of the underlying data types. For example, some of the columns are nullable doubles or floats and I want my domain model to ...
6
votes
5answers
346 views
How to deal with warnings in a legacy project
I work on a C++ project that generates bajillions of warnings. Most of the warnings appeared after the code was written:
Initially the project used Visual C++ 8, soon switching to 9, but there is ...
0
votes
1answer
114 views
Functional document from code
I am a Sr java Developer and have recently joined a new team. Here I have been asked to create a functional document looking at the code of a legacy application. This application was written about ...
0
votes
1answer
30 views
Partial GPL 2 legacy code into a GPL 3 project
I plan to import works from a Java GPL2 project into a GPL3 one.
How must I "head" all my project derivating sources files : must I put the GPL2 license of the original project (saying that "This ...
3
votes
3answers
111 views
System evolution approach: gradual or cataclysmic?
When working on established systems, I've often found ways to improve a user interface to maximize user efficiency (example: legacy app maintenance screen doesn't allow multi-line operations where ...
4
votes
3answers
188 views
How should I go about “overhauling” a large legacy application? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
I’ve inherited 200K lines of spaghetti code — what now?
For my next project, I've been tasked with "overhauling" a large legacy web application with many parts. It is a ...
10
votes
4answers
623 views
How can I update a large legacy codebase to meet specific quality standards?
There is a lot of information about tools and techniques for improving legacy codebases, but I haven't come across any successful real world case studies. Most advice is on the micro level, and while ...
30
votes
2answers
3k views
What is an Anti-Corruption layer, and how is it used?
I'm trying to figure out what the Anti-Corruption layer really means. I know that it's a way to transition/work around legacy code or bad APIs. What I don't understand is how it works and what makes ...
0
votes
3answers
183 views
Migrating legacy procedural code to MVC without rewriting [closed]
I recently started working on a PHP application that was built many years ago before the advent of objects and namespaces in PHP. The code is procedural, does not separate presentation logic from ...
4
votes
3answers
260 views
Functional testing before code checkin
I am working on a project with legacy code where it does not have much code coverage. One of the idea to improve that is to enforce a rule that each code check-in must have test, not only test but ...
7
votes
5answers
274 views
How to understand and debug legacy software? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
I’ve inherited 200K lines of spaghetti code — what now?
Not long ago my company placed me in a team that deals with some of the most complex bugs that are in production. ...
2
votes
1answer
111 views
How to keep background requests in sequence
I'm faced with implementing interfaces for some rather archaic systems, for handling online deposits to stored value accounts (think campus card accounts for students).
Here's my dilemma: stage 1 of ...
4
votes
10answers
559 views
What to do when a project is too difficult to continue developing?
As a developer, can you tell your project manager that an application is unworkable? Or, if you're a project manager, how would you need this presented to you in order to be compelled? This isn't ...
56
votes
14answers
3k views
Forbidding or controlling “Hidden IT…” Who should write and maintain ad-hoc software applications?
Bigger companies usually have the problem, that it is not possible to write all programs employees want (to save time and to optimize processes) due to a lack of staff and money.
Then hidden programs ...
6
votes
2answers
479 views
“Guiding” a Domain Expert to Retire from Programming [closed]
I've got a friend who does IT at a local non-profit where they're using a custom web application which is no longer supported by the company who built it. (out of business, support was too expensive, ...
10
votes
7answers
1k views
What are the advantages of mainframes? [closed]
The downsides of Mainframes is well trodden ground; expensive, legacy, dwindling community, etc.
I'm not particularly interested in the downsides, but I am curious if there are any benefits to ...
3
votes
2answers
127 views
Deprecated Methods in Code Base
A lot of the code I've been working on recently, both professionally (read: at work) and in other spheres (read: at home, for friends/family/etc, or NOT FOR WORK), has been worked on, redesigned and ...
4
votes
11answers
466 views
Is it better to spend resources on a skilled team or good process practice?
Which one of these is of more importance? Skilled team or good process practice?
When I say skilled, I mean logical, creative members with good coding and testing skills. Good process would be the ...
2
votes
2answers
320 views
How do you deal with the details when reading code? [closed]
After reading some projects, I find that it is not the architecture of the software that is really hard to know. It is not hard to figure out the architecture immediately if the project is clearly ...
2
votes
2answers
470 views
How to unit test Visual Basic 6 legacy code?
I am doing legacy software programming in Visual Basic 6.0.
How do I unit test it?
3
votes
2answers
242 views
Methods to rewrite a program [duplicate]
Possible Duplicates:
How to approach refactoring an existing web application?
Starting a coherent architecture in a legacy application
We have a fidelity system running on the company I ...
17
votes
5answers
572 views
How-to convince company to start documenting for legacy software
It has been less than a year since I joined my current company. Their majority of sales have come from a single product that has been alive since the last 10 years. However, there is minimal (if at ...
3
votes
2answers
206 views
What are the three main technologies for a redesign of a COBOL legacy system
There exists an application that reports financial data of a bank to a national bank (all located in Europe). It is a legacy system that is written mainly in COBOL. Only the user interface is written ...
11
votes
10answers
1k views
What type of interview questions should you ask for “legacy” programmers?
We have recently been receiving lots of applicants for our open developer positions from people who I like to refer to as "legacy" programmers. I don't like the term "old" because it seems a little ...
8
votes
3answers
207 views
Migration strategies for deprecating in-house scripting language
We have a scripting language that we use internally for many things. It began as a simple evaluation statements for dynamic labels to become a Turing complete language used pervasively throughout our ...
14
votes
5answers
2k views
What are the key points of Working Effectively with Legacy Code?
I've seen the book Working Effectively with Legacy Code recommended a few times. What are the key points of this book?
Is there much more to dealing with legacy code than adding unit/integration ...
2
votes
5answers
427 views
Why should you document code? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
“Comments are a code smell”
I am a graduate software developer for an insurance company that uses an old COBOL-like language/flat-file record storage system. ...
56
votes
11answers
2k views
Best Practices for Handing over Legacy Code
In a couple of months a colleague will be moving on to a new project and I will be inheriting one of his projects. To prepare, I have already ordered Michael Feathers' Working Effectively with Legacy ...
10
votes
5answers
366 views
Starting a coherent architecture in a legacy application
I have responsibility for a large Asp.Net based website. It is currently a website (not web application), some windows services and a number of class libraries.
The data layer uses a mixture of ...
