[DigitalJack]

There is another aspect. Changing languages. Rewriting in a language that is sufficiently different from the original forces you to look at the problem with new eyes. You effectively have greater mental coverage of the problem domain.

[z3t4]

Articles like: We switched from language X to language Y with the conclusion that language Y is better smile

My favorite is when they make another post half a year later saying they changed from Y to Z.

It seems that following the trend and using the latest and greatest tools doesn't necessary mean the new tools are better, but that you got to rewrite your applications from scratch, with much more knowledge about the problem domain then before.

[kbenson]

> My favorite is when they make another post half a year later saying they changed from Y to Z.

Sometimes I wonder if the real subtext is "we have such high turnover that almost nobody was around when the first system was designed. We rewrote it in a new language, and now we're all much happier because we all understand it much better, having been involved in its design." Wait a year, repeat.

[paulryanrogers]

Being a hold over employee through 4 rewrites I'd say that can be one factor. Another is that the business landscape changes too. So all these factors combined make it difficult to say for certain which of them had an objective impact.

[cmrdporcupine]

And they inevitably fail to mention the pissed-off product or QA manager or customer who realizes their favourite feature or corner case or bugfix is missing from the rewritten version because the developer didn't understand or notice that aspect of the original.

[pekk]

Instead of blaming the developers every time a feature is missing, consider who is setting the priorities for development. In places where developers are being paid for their work, this is rarely done by the developers themselves. Always interesting to see how much end users specifically blame developers for whatever's going on, I guess without understanding that there are usually all kinds of managers who may not understand software or the users or both but just want to sit on developers to crank features out as quickly as possible.

[q3r3qr3q]

Now someone has to sound exasperated at everyone jumping to blame managers.

[prodigal_erik]

> It hardly seems worth even having a bug system if the frequency of from-scratch rewrites always outstrips the pace of bug fixing. Why not be honest and resign yourself to the fact that version 0.8 is followed by version 0.8, which is then followed by version 0.8?

[adekok]

LinkedIn: Our iOS app is web-based! Simple and fast! We save money!

2 years later...

LinkedIn: Our iOS app is native! Simple and fast! We save money!