So, this thing landed on my plate a while back. Felt like I drew the short straw, you know? The task was basically cleanup, but man, it was more like being the tech undertaker. And not just one burial, felt like three deep, one after the other. Undertaker, undertaker, undertaker, that’s what went through my head.
The Mess We Had
We had this old system chunk. Nobody really knew how it worked anymore. The folks who built it? Long gone. Documentation? Hah, funny joke. It just… sat there. Mostly worked, sometimes threw a fit. But the problem was, we needed to finally, properly get rid of it. Yank it out. Problem is, it had tentacles deep into other things. Things we actually needed.
Pulling this thing out wasn’t just flipping a switch. It was more like trying to untangle a massive ball of knotted fishing line, in the dark. Every time you thought you had a piece free, you found it was hooked into five other places.
Digging In
First thing, I had to just stare at it. Tried to map things out. Got access to the dusty old servers where parts of it lived. Spent days, maybe weeks, just tracing connections. Where does this data go? What calls this function? Why, for the love of god, does it do that?
It was slow going. You’d find one part, figure out how to replace its function or reroute the dependency. Okay, good. Felt like progress. Then you’d find another one. Same process. Dig, understand, replace, test. Dig, understand, replace, test. Over and over. That’s the ‘undertaker, undertaker, undertaker’ part. Each piece felt like its own little funeral you had to arrange.
- Step one: Identify a limb.
- Step two: Figure out what it’s holding onto.
- Step three: Build a replacement or find a way around it.
- Step four: Carefully cut the old limb off.
- Step five: Test like crazy to make sure nothing else fell off.
- Step six: Repeat. Endlessly.
And testing was a nightmare. Things would break in completely unrelated areas. You’d pull out a piece handling user profiles, and suddenly the billing report goes nuts. Made no sense. Hours spent tracking down phantom bugs caused by disturbing the ancient code spirits.
Why Me, Though?
Honestly, nobody else wanted to touch this thing. It’s the kind of job that gets passed around until it lands on someone who either doesn’t know better or just can’t say no. Guess which one I was. Reminds me of my first job out of college, they gave me the oldest, buggiest reporting tool to maintain. Said it was a ‘good learning experience’. Yeah, learned how to hate my job, mostly. This felt kinda like that, full circle.
There were meetings, sure. People nodding along, saying “Yes, that legacy system needs to go”. But when it came to actually doing the dirty work, everyone suddenly got very busy with ‘critical priorities’. So, there I was, the designated gravedigger.
Finally Done (Mostly)
Eventually, piece by painful piece, we got it done. The main chunk of the old system was finally deactivated. We ripped out the code, shut down the old servers. It wasn’t clean. There are probably still bits of shrapnel embedded in other systems that we’ll find later. But the core monster was gone.
Didn’t feel like a victory, more like just… relief. Like finishing a marathon you didn’t want to run. You’re just glad it’s over. Poured myself a stiff drink that night, let me tell you.
It’s the kind of work that needs doing, dealing with the old stuff. Somebody’s gotta be the undertaker. Just wish it didn’t always feel like you’re burying things three times over.
