The place to start is version control, a dev environment and a CI process. Only then can you start to tackle the code. Priority number one is to have some control over the whole thing.
Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
171–180 of 704 posts
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#172Lots of people are giving advice on how to fix the code piecemeal. First put it on Git, then add tests, then, carefully and gradually, start fixing the issues. Depending on the project, this could take a year or several years, which isn't bad. The problem with this plan is corporate politics. Say that OP takes on this challenge. He makes a plan and carefully and patiently executes it. Say that in six months he's alre…
> But then why would that job be better than just taking a random position in a FAANG company? The code quality will be better and so will the pay. Exactly the thing people are missing here. It's a lot of work at a very high skill level with lot of political burning ground if refactoring break things or suddenly slow down at a mediocre shop.
This is more reason for the gradual approach. Bringing source control, testing, and separation of dev and prod environments, makes things safer and will speed up work pretty soon by making the people much more comfortable to actually try things.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#173> I have to find a strategy to fix this development team without managing them directly
Sorry what? What position are you in here? If you have no authority here then you are in a very precarious situation and you should figure that out first.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#174Why is it necessary? It's ugly, but it's earning millions. Find out why resistance to change is huge. Maybe the devs are stuck in their ways, or maybe it's too damn scary for them to fail because the business comes down hard on them? Get to know your devs, find out from them what they think the problems are and how they would like to solve them. Maybe they just need more help. And as the team lead it sounds like you…
This is the correct answer.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#175There is a way out of this mess. It is not straight forward though. There are two ways:
1. Convince the business team that these team members might leave and put the $20mn revenue at risk. There is no way you can make them learn and do things properly. Therefore, take separate budget, hire a new separate team. Do full rewrite of backend and plug the app and new website into it. It would be 1-2 year project with high chance of getting failed (on big bang release...stressful and large chance of you getting fired but once done you can fire the oldies and give the business team a completely new setup and team) or partial failed (that means large part of traffic would move to new system but some parts would remain...making the whole transition slow, painful and complex plus never ending).
2. Add newer strong and senior php members to the existing team. Ask new senior members to not fight with them but train them. They would listen to them as these guys would know more. Slowly add version control, staging-dev envs, add php framework for new code, add caching, CI/CD pipeline, bring on a automated test suite built by external agency etc. This would be low risk as business team would see immediate benefits/speedups. Rewrite portions of code which are too rusty and remove code bases which do not required anymore. This would be possibly take 5-6 years to complete, giving you ample job security while achieving results in a stable manner.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#176A lovely knot to unravel! First, get everything in source control! Next, make it possible to spin service up locally, pointing at production DB. Then, get the db running locally. Then get another server and get cd to that server, including creating the db, schema, and sample data. Then add tests, run on pr, then code review, then auto deploy to new server. This should stop the bleeding… no more index-new_2021-test-jo…
I'd add putting in a static code analysis tool in there because that will give you a number for how bad it is (total number of issues at level 1 will do), and that number can be given to upper management, and then whilst doing all the above you can show that the number is going down.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#177If you don't manage them directly that sounds like you don't have authority.
Without the authority to make changes you this will be very hard to do, given the scope of changes required. Soft skills and influence works up to a point but given your remarks about resistance to change this is a big challenge.
You need to ask for the proper remit and authority, or decline and move onto another project or job.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#178> this code generates more than 20 million dollars a year of revenue From a business perspective, nothing is broken. In fact, they laid a golden goose. > team is 3 people, quite junior. One backend, one front, one iOS/android. Resistance to change is huge. My mistake, they didn't lay a golden goose--they built a money printer. The ROI here is insane. > productivity is abysmal which is understandable. The mess is just…
This is the sanest answer. No amount of leadership is going to help an incompetent team. A codebase with massive technical debt, tight coupling, and accidental complexity will be hard to improve incrementally. Impossible without competent engineers.
I agree it's the sane answer. But I don't think these engineers are incompetent. They lacked direction, accidentally followed worst practices, and _still_ came out on top.
I would say they are good engineers but perhaps bad project managers / architects.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#17920 Million dollars per year. This should be the thing that starts every conversation. Because IT WORKS for the intended purpose. Someone else said it. Put everything in source control first. And just fix things that directly impact that 20 Million dollars a year. Example, fix speed issues. Fix any javascript issues. Fix anything that will get you to 21 million dollars a year. Then if you want, you can put together a…
Right. An attempt to do a full rewrite just doesn't pass the most basic cost/benefit analysis. Redoing it in [sexy language / framework / paradigm / design pattern] will feel aesthetic, but even if it goes perfectly, it won't get you to $40M a year. But if it goes poorly, it might get you to $0M a year (and fired). The bigger question for OP should be "do I wish to be employed by an organization that is OK with these…
Doing in new language will subtract some value. Adding new features may add value. Doing it as an spa could kill the entire thing.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#180PHP is great in a sense that you can easily combine legacy and modern code in the same codebase. Just do a new_index.php for all new stuff. I'd start building new features and features that are in active development in the 'modern way', and just keep the legacy code as is. When the new way has been established, and the team has accustomed to it, it becomes easier gradually rewrite old parts, when necessary. You might find out that lots of the old code doesn't need to be rewritten, but can be managed as a legacy part of the app which means mostly frozen but working code.
You should also understand the audience. Who are the users of the app? It sounds like that the app does not need high reliability or availability, or any of the stuff that's required for typical mass market web apps. Understanding this might give you some room to improvise.