There are legacy applications that have been there decades, and much younger applications but a few years. Both can be subjects of software reengineering for a variety of reasons:
- technology no longer supported
- to inflexible and/or unable to harness emerging technologies
- newer technology can give a better solution
- it was just simply not written as best as it could have been
- the code has much duplicity, not scalable, and maintenance costs high
- badly architected
- after much maintenance the code has become disorganized
- skills to maintain are becoming rare
- compliance with updated or new regulation
What is software reengineering?
Software reengineering is the examination and modification of existing code to continue its use in a more refined state or to migrate it to a new modernized system.
Why not just start again and re-write?
This is the area that generates most debate with agile followers that say “we can just start again and throw away the legacy system when we are finished. All we need are dedicated users to work along side us”. This is re-inventing the wheel.
Software often has complex business-critical processes within. Simply re-writing and you may lose valuable information hidden within the code. Migration requires more upfront analysis, design, planning, and maybe contract negotiations as we move and probably in many steps to the desired outcome. In terms of the agile manifesto we have a lot of value on the items on the right which is less agile and more waterfall. Nothing in the agile manifesto says don’t do waterfall by the way – but it does say be as agile as you can be.
Not everything is obvious via the UI, documented, in someone’s memory, or can be accessed in anyway. We need to access that hidden information buried inside the code. Legacy software is also a completed document in its own right – it contains many lessons learned and algorithms that can be modified to fit the new technology. Starting again and throwing away the legacy system when finished could be a very bad decision.
Many avoid the subject of reengineering but how many of today’s applications start off as a new idea compared to something already existing? Software reengineering is a very valuable skill for a software engineer to have.
Reverse Engineer
Reverse engineering is the analysis of the existing system and development of high-level plans and designs – the existing system is a very detailed:
- functional specification
- requirements document
- working software
The primary purpose is:
- capturing requirements
- finding any lost or hidden information, and logic
- high level solutions
It is also a feasibility study should/can we
- modernize existing code?
- migrate to a new system?
If we decide to migrate to a new system then what is the best approach?
- The big bang – write a completely new replacement system that we begin using all at once.
- Migrate incrementally by modularization – identify modules (if any). We modify legacy code so it is organized into modules where each module represents a function or business area – combine related code parts in modules. We create integration/interface points between these modules so when we introduce a module that is part of the new system, we can redirect those integration points to it. If we are really clever, we use “feature switches” so we can switch between old and new without downtime.
We need to review and document what we will:
- Keep
- Remove
- Improve
We need to look at impact and risk and identify
- integration points
- interdependencies
- interfaces
Do we need to change or normalize the data?
- Determine if the interface and relationship with the data permit migration incrementally by modularization or forces a “big bang” approach. We may need complementary strategies such as migration one region at a time to enable migration incrementally.
- Can we use the same database for legacy and reengineered concurrently? If yes, we may need to make modifications to both legacy and reengineered applications to synchronize with the database as we go. If no we need a data migration strategy and plan.
- If we are migrating incrementally by modularization and require a new database then how do we synchronize data between legacy and reengineered databases?
Forward Engineer
From the high-level plans and designs created in “Reverse Engineering” create low level plans and designs – especially if migrating incrementally by modularization
- Database(s)Database designs, migration, synchronization, concurrent support strategies. Unlike a new product this is live and we have real data that we must not lose. We have an opportunity to create this right first time – as we have lessons learned from the legacy application. There is little room to evolve a design.
- ApplicationObject Orientated Design – design patterns, and application frameworks. This is not something new, we have an existing application and the majority of requirements. There is less requirement to evolve an architecture because we know most of the requirements.If we have planned to migrate incrementally by modularization then we know what each of our modules are. We also need to plan for feature switches between them – to turn off modules in the legacy application and on in the reengineered application.
From the low-level plans and designs begin the physical implementation.
If we have planned to migrate incrementally by modularization the first step is to modify the legacy code into modules first or in synchronization with the reengineered application. If we are creating a new database this would normally be created before the UI.
