5 years old Java code is really no problem as long as it uses maven as build tool (and don’t use long deprecated code generation tools).
This is the main difference l see between maintaining old Java code and e.g old Delphi code:
In maven/java I can run a couple of commands to build it, open it in any of my three favourite IDEs (Netbeans, IntelliJ and Eclipse in that order) and it just works.
In other languages there is often some dependency hunt involved before you can even start. Bonus for dependencies that must be installed using .exe installers, in a specific order (hint: if you don't get it right - good luck with cleaning the registry before trying another installation order.)
I might have been very unlucky in my encounters with legacy code in other languages but so far every encounter makes me love the Java ecosystem more.
(Although I'll happily admit that parts of it might be related to the fact that Java developers seems to avoid using non oss code to a much larger degree than anyone else - maybe except from php and js devs?)
This is the main difference l see between maintaining old Java code and e.g old Delphi code:
In maven/java I can run a couple of commands to build it, open it in any of my three favourite IDEs (Netbeans, IntelliJ and Eclipse in that order) and it just works.
In other languages there is often some dependency hunt involved before you can even start. Bonus for dependencies that must be installed using .exe installers, in a specific order (hint: if you don't get it right - good luck with cleaning the registry before trying another installation order.)
I might have been very unlucky in my encounters with legacy code in other languages but so far every encounter makes me love the Java ecosystem more.
(Although I'll happily admit that parts of it might be related to the fact that Java developers seems to avoid using non oss code to a much larger degree than anyone else - maybe except from php and js devs?)