It’s no secret that the one constant in this life changes. As people, we are in a continual process of changing – our interests, our friendships, our homes. It is, as they say, what makes life interesting. And the same is true for your business. In this article, we’ll be showing you how to modernize your legacy system and bring it into 2020.
Legacy Systems: A brief overlook
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Generally, the “legacy system” is a term used to describe something that is outdated, old, and usually paved the way for where you are today. However, legacy systems aren’t necessarily old. They can just be outdated technology, or simply a system that doesn’t allow for quick integration and is hampering your day-to-day operations.
Since business and software is constantly changing, legacy systems need to keep up, otherwise, they pose a security risk, and also lead to decreased productivity, employee dissatisfaction, and quite considerable costs.
So why should you modernize your legacy system?
We live in an age where it’s easier to replace things rather than repair them, and the same is true for legacy systems. Most companies take the rather revolutionary approach and simply chuck out whatever has fallen behind the times. But that’s not necessarily the smartest way to go about it.
Modernizing your legacy system allows you to build on what you already have. Instead of having to start from scratch, you can still use your existing software, which is something that a lot of businesses want to do. Why? Because software is usually still largely functional when it’s qualified as “legacy”, just a little bit slower, out-of-date, and generally not able to process some things as quickly as you’d like them to.
How can you modernize your legacy system?
Once you’ve chosen the evolutionary approach, rather than the revolutionary one, there are quite a few things you can do to aid your software and keep things flowing optimally.
1. Move part of your server somewhere else.
Rehosting a part of your software is one of the most popular tricks for optimizing your server. If you’re having problems with scalability, for example, rehosting is a smart and quick fix because it doesn’t require you to reconfigure anything.
2. Refactor. Refactor. Refactor.
Code gets redundant. Quickly. Because IT is one of the fastest advancing business sectors today, so redundant bits of coding might be keeping your server from functioning properly. Refactoring is something you should do regularly, even when you’re not having a specific problem, just to ensure your program is running as swiftly as possible, with only the necessary coding.
3. Switch up your architecture.
Yes, maybe the architecture you had used to work brilliantly up until a couple of months ago. But hey, times change, and the original layout you have is no longer compatible with your system now. By redoing your architecture, you can salvage a lot of what you’ve built in the last few years, by giving it a new, more modern base to function from.
