At a previous company, manager X wanted to adopt a new monolithic proprietary software suite, and have us write feature drivers for it. I said, "OK. So we shou

At a previous company, manager X wanted to adopt a new monolithic proprietary software suite, and have us write feature drivers for it. I said, "OK. So we should write these drivers in way that makes them independent from the software suite, so that when this software suite is obsolete and we start using something new, we can still retain and reuse our developed features. Right?" His answer: "Well, we're going to invest a million dollars in this software suite, so clearly it's not going to be replaced! Just write the drivers as quickly as you can." Two years later, the project was obsolete. The driver features were rewritten for a new software suite. A UNIX-style design is less simple than a monolithic one, but it gives you real-world benefits: saving time and money on not re-developing features, the ability to adapt quickly to change, flexibility/compatibility. I think the reasons for abandoning it are often short-sighted.