The thing makes over $20m a year, has only 3 junior folks for support / maintenance / development (with junior salaries presumably), and budget is tight?
Run. The problem here is empathically not on the technical side.
Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
231–240 of 704 posts
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#232It's not clear from your post what your role really is (is it something like lead dev? or just a more opinionated member of the team?) but if you're not managing the team directly, then don't manage them. It's not your job and no-one likes that. If they wanted to make you the manager, they would have. And they didn't.
There's really only way to help improve a codebase / development process in a situation like this: one small incremental step after another, for a very very very long time. If you don't think you can enjoy that and have the patience to stay with the problem for a few years, consider looking for another job.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#233First leave the company, three junior devs supporting a $20m system isn't realistic.
Hey I've done this, everyone states just rewrite each part isn't really helpful.
You first need to fixup obvious brokenness, turn on error logging and warnings within fpm, next fix absolute path issues, next fix any containerization issues (deps, etc) and containerized it, next roll out some sort linter and formatter.
At this point you have a ci system with standardized formatting and linting now slowly part out things or do a full rewrite as you now can read the code make changes locally
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#234Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, life is too short and there are so many much better jobs to waste time on such a project.
i can imagine how some super senior engineer may like this kind of very challenging experience.
True, perhaps some are into maintaining shitty legacy systems with not enough budget.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#235Try to "fix", or at least go to the bottom of people issues first.
For example, not having version control was already unacceptable 12 years ago. Someone on the team must be strongly opposed to it. Find why. If no-one is against it, just set it up yourself. If it's management, and you know it's not going to change, find some other management to work for.
Rince and repeat for all the low hanging fruits.
After that... Good luck.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#236> 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 why we as a software world need some minimum standards for stuff that deals with sensitive information of users.
Don't get me wrong, if it works it works, but the question is for how long and who will suffer when it doesn't?
Also from a business perspective: If I were the CEO of that company I'd probably like to know that there is something built on sand and a huge technological dept. It is a cashcow now, but I'd like to ensure it still can be one in the future. And for this some level of maintenance would be expected.
Same thing for reliabilty. If as a CEO I knew the entire functioning of the thing that brings the cash hinges on one developer remembering whether index_john-final.php or index_peter-final-final.php is the latest code I would probably have a hard time sleeping.
That means the minimum OP should do is explain the situation neutrally and your point of view is certainly something he should weave into this. In the end the higher ups need to know this, and what they decide to do is their thing, but OP needs to make them aware of why this could potentially endanger the service in the future. If they then decide to take that risk — so be it.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#237Earlier quoted context omitted.
$20M revenue is not the same as $20M profit.
It’s not the same, but if those 20M is primarily generated by the software, then it’s those 3 ppl, who contribute to the top line. The rest, like sales, marketing, are irrelevant: fire them and the product will keep generating revenue off the existing customer base. It will stop doing so, however, if the product brakes. So, the post above is right to an extent, this is the golden goose. ))
Unless the revenue is for products ordered on the site and shipped to paying customers. Believe it or don't, this is still done at some sites that are not Amazon.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#238Hi! I specialise in fixing failing projects. Yours probably not the worst I have seen.
First of all, don't do a rewrite! Your team most likely do not know what they need to know to be able to perform a clean rewrite. You are new and still probably don't know the whole picture and all the knowledge that is in the application in one way or another. If you start a rewrite, the productivity will plummet and you will have to keep choosing whether to put resources on the new or on the old and the old will always win. I have seen this play out many times, the rewrite keeps getting starved of resources until it gets abandoned.
Refactor is better because you can balance allocating resources to refactoring as you go and also keep brining improvements that are BAU development more efficient.
Do not make mistake of forgetting about "the business". They probably are already irritated by the project and will be on the lookout for any further missteps from you. You might think you have good credit with them because they just hired you but that might simply not be the case. Their fuse is probably short. You need to keep them happy.
At first, prioritise changes that improve developer productivity. This is how you will create bandwidth necessary for further improvements. This means improving development process, improving ability to debug problems, improving parts of the applications that are modified most frequently for new features.
Second, make sure to prove the team is able to deliver the features the business wants. The business probably doesn't care about the state of the application but they do care that you deliver features. This is how you will create the credit of trust with them that will allow you to make any larger changes.
Do make sure to hire at least one other person that know what they are doing (and know what they are getting into).
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#239First off, no, a full rewrite is not only not necessary, but probably the worst possible approach. Do a piece at a time. You will eventually have re-written all the code, but do not ever fall into the trap of a "full re-write". It doesn't work. But before you re-write once line of code - get some testing in place. Or, a lot of testing. If you have end-to-end tests that run through every feature that is currently used…
Not a good advice. I have been at Op's shoes, and I inherited a project that was a clusterf, and did a full re-write. It was a lot of work (more than anticipated), but eventually it was very successful.
The original code was just not salvageable. (It was quickly done as a fast hack, and it would break left and right, causing outages).
Just make sure the OP needs to understand what the OG system is trying to do, and what it will take to re-write it to something sane. Don't start it, before understanding all the caveats of the system/project you are trying to re-write.
Re: Ask HN: Inherited the worst code and tech team I have ever seen. How to fix it?
#240Earlier quoted context omitted.
This alternative is not to be neglected. You don't have to save the whole world. Save what you can that is worth saving. If you are competent to build good new things, do that.
Why is 'saving the world' even on the table here or in similar cases? Guys making $20mil a year don't look to me like they need saving from above. If you have that kind of money I trust you know what you're doing and can pay for help when help is needed. Otherwise, you don't deserve that cash. Other people might spend it better. I, for one, have never been saved out of good heart or pitty. Every doctor visit somehow…
Those people didn't have to be doctors, or nurses or med techs. They all need to make a living, but not necessarily by probing you. A good many of them entered medicine because it seemed like something they could do to help people. Even if that has since all burned away, you still benefited.
I spent a career not becoming a millionaire at Microsoft (definitely on the table, at the time) because Microsoft was and remains too evil. Likewise Oracle. Or making weapons. I do not answer Google recruiters' e-mail, and not just because Google interview process is far too annoying for anybody with any self-respect to tolerate. (Who does work there? Many worked for companies Google bought.)
Doing work that benefits humanity, or natural ecosystems or whatever, is the reason to do things. The money it pays is how you afford to be able to spend your life doing that.
I feel sorry for people who work knowing the work they do makes the world worse. But not very sorry, because most have a choice. Some find ways to add value from within, e.g. two I know at Oracle do Free Software full time. I mostly cannot tell which do or don't, so I do not condemn all Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Oracle, BAE employees. But I choose not to be there.