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Maintenance and technical debt are intertwined, but I don't think it's just a words game. Things without a name are less visible, and maintenance and technical
by gjulianm 6y ago
Maintenance and technical debt are intertwined, but I don't think it's just a words game. Things without a name are less visible, and maintenance and technical debt are different.
There's maintenance unrelated to technical debt, and technical debt unrelated to maintenance. Taking into account the technical debt you have helps you when estimating the cost of maintenance and new features, or to understand the possible problems when new environments come into play.
IMHO, part of being smart about it is having the words to communicate the concepts clearly, it's not a moot discussion.
- kthejoker2 6y ago> There's maintenance unrelated to technical debt, Agreed. > and technical debt unrelated to maintenance Disgareed, as you cheerfully indicate yourself in your next sentence. Technical debt as a concept of "debt" is paid back through maintenance. What else might it be paid back with?
- gjulianm 6y agoWith extra time to build a new system when adding new features, new products or tools...
- what-the-grump 6y agoTime value of money. Technical debt it's literally dollars to donuts in time spent getting yourself out of the hole you are in right now. Maintenance is the cost of keeping the lights on. I run a two year old system which is now riddled with technical debt. How we got here has very little to do with the technology decision, stack, code, and a lot to do with management outsourcing and cost cutting. Technical debt is never paid back through maintenance. It's just conceptionally wrong to tie them together. To phase better I can't maintenance my self out of this problem, but I can keep this system running forever with little to no cost.