Legacy software is usually common specially for businesses that have been around for quite some time. One thing about legacy software is that it is usually custom developed for the company. This is arisen as to why legacy software is usually key to the operations of a company and makes it difficult to do a replacement or an upgrade. There are also other reasons as to why it is difficult to update legacy software which include poor architecture, technology choice, new requirements among others. With new technologies being innovated every day, being an upgrade is important because it makes the existing software easier to maintain while at the same time increasing its performance. In the following paragraphs, you will find some key tips that will help to upgrade our legacy system.
There are some parts of the system that are not needed anymore and it is important to begin by identifying them. Since the software has been used in the company for a long time, there are huge chances that some of it is not needed anymore. This will be a major contribution to the simplicity of your new system which makes its development more easier.
A common characteristic amongst older systems is a large code base that has its logic combined. The best way to deal with this challenge is to develop an n-tier architecture which involves separation of the software into layers. The architecture you’ll be adopting shall involve three layers which at presentation, application and database layer. It is recommended for you to develop these layers in such a way that they are independent of each other.
It is also advisable for you to ensure that you have decided upon the development approach you should use in this process. You will, of course, need to talk with your team so as to figure out which method they like the most. Agile software development is an approach that is being used today in most software development companies because of its efficiency. In this approach, you work on one piece of software at a time which also involves debugging it.
Researching on modern development frameworks is a good step that you should take at this point in this process. There are many new programming languages and frameworks every year and this will be an opportunity for your team to familiarize themselves with them.
Developing the system modules is recommended in this process. In such a system, each of the major softer components shall be operating on their own. This enables effective maintenance of the system. Click here to read more about this topic.