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Legacy code that has a really long and convoluted way of integrating Dropbox authorisation to save files etc.

This happened in a meeting discussing where I’m at with the upgrade.

Me: This upgrade is going to take a while because of how outdated the app is. Also for assets uploaded by the user why don’t we just use active storage for this now as we have rails 6 now. Plus it will reduce a lot of code.

Other Dev: why would we do that? It’s a big change and will need testing.

Me: A lot of stuff is broken after the upgrade anyway and if we have a more built in simple way to do it why wouldn’t we? Also simplifying the code base is always good. The PR is already 1000+ files and we’re going to have to retest the app anyways.

Other Dev: *crickets*

I’m trying to make the app more smooth and streamlined and overall a better codebase as currently it’s shocking there and security holes galore, its like they don’t trust me with changing anything big haha honestly I think I’m the only one who wants to actually improve the application.

Comments
  • 2
    In business environment there is always cost-value question. Specially in start-ups or small firms. Every dev that loves what he is doing, would want to improve the code base, and when it comes to cost-value calculation his opinion probably would be biased.
    I would love to say it’s a matter of seniority, and you learn to evaluate things with time, but even after 11 years in the industry I’m making this kind of mistakes sometimes.
    I don’t say necessarily that your case is a mistake as I don’t know what you are working on, but it could be, just try to calculate how much time it’ll take you and how much time it’ll save the company, and with the results you can go to your superiors.
    If they are not accepting your point without proper explanation after you have the numbers, may be you are working in the wrong place.
  • 0
    @migus this is a very large company and the app is an all-in-one business accounting system. It’s a pretty old system so my job currently is to refactor it and upgrade the system, so yeah we have the time to change whatever we need to change, plus if that part of the system is broken (as a good amount of the system) then I think if we have the chance to reduce some code I don’t see why we shouldn’t. We’re going to end up retesting the whole system anyways
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