| I worked on legacy code in my initial years. And when I say legacy, it was truly legacy. COBOL/JCL/REXX on a mainframe. I now develop web apps using NodeJS and occasionally build UI using Angular and get to evaluate some of the "shiny-est", "cutting-edge" code/frameworks. Do I think I wasted my initial years?
NO. I worked on side projects which eventually helped me move to the tech I've always wanted to work on. Did I do a shitty job on the legacy code?
NO. On the contrary, I won many accolades for automating several processes and improving the performance. Did I learn anything from working on legacy code?
YES. A lot. I believe the experience of working on legacy code made me a much better developer. Why do I think so?
Working on legacy code means you READ more code than you WRITE. I am of the opinion that there are 2 things that are very difficult in software : 1. Reading code written by others.
2. Writing code that can be easily read by others. Coding is one-time read, many-time read activity. So, my advise - work on the code, stay in touch with what you like, but move if it's really bad. (No point in doing what you don't enjoy doing). Just remember, the code that you write today will become legacy code one day. :) P.S.: Also, beware of taking advice from a comment from a stranger on the Internet. :) |