Dealing with legacy systems and how to manage integrations with them
Legacy systems, the bane of every new developer. You probably got interested in development thanks to some new language or design mechanism you learnt about and enjoyed working with because everything just works! So you got serious, did some learning, completed that learning years later, and now you want to work for someone with your “official” skills using the language or framework you love. Guess what, their system uses Java, C#, FTP, and pipe delimited data, maybe even XML if you are super lucky.
Well sh*t, that just doesn’t sound fun, are you going to have to learn a new language each time you change job. What if you don’t enjoy working with that language. Will you earn enough to put food on the table if you try and find a job that actually, maybe uses the stack you understand?
This is a problem I have faced many times in the recent year. I have had the luck to be self-employed and a one-man team, but it definitely sucks trying to interface with these systems.
I work with modern frameworks and languages and focus on providing a top tier production quality code. This means it’s malleable but strict enough that you aren’t confused what the heck the application is doing or wants.
Here’s how I managed to keep my sanity while dealing with these technological dinosaurs:
1. Embrace the Adapter Pattern (Your New Best Friend)
Look, nobody wants to pollute their beautiful, clean codebase with ASCII file parsing and FTP logic scattered everywhere. Create a clear boundary between “their mess” and “your code.” I learned this the hard way after spending weeks trying to make my modern REST API play nice with a system that only speaks in pipe-delimited flat files.
2. Build Your Translation Layer
Think of yourself as a technological diplomat. Your job isn’t to rewrite their ancient system (though wouldn’t that be nice?), it’s to create a reliable translation layer. I ended up building a small service that sits between my sleek API and their crusty FTP server, converting modern JSON into whatever format their system expects. Yes, it’s extra work, but it beats losing your mind trying to make your main application understand COBOL-era data structures.
3. Document Everything (Because It Won’t Make Sense Later)
Trust me on this one — you think you’ll remember why you wrote that weird parsing logic that splits on pipes except when they’re escaped with a backslash unless it’s the third Tuesday of the month? You won’t. Document it. Document it like your future sanity depends on it, because it does.
The Reality Check
Let’s be honest — these legacy systems aren’t going anywhere. They’re like that old COBOL mainframe that’s been running since the 70s, nobody wants to touch it because it “just works” (until it doesn’t). Instead of fighting against this reality, I’ve learned to build clean interfaces around them.
I specialize in optimizing logistics operations through custom software development, process automation, and digital transformation. View my complete portfolio at albarel.dev to see how I’ve helped companies streamline their operations and boost efficiency.
