> Did the rewrite take way longer than initially projected? Yes. > Was it a lot more effort than initially projected? Yes. > Was it painful medicine that none

> Did the rewrite take way longer than initially projected? Yes. > Was it a lot more effort than initially projected? Yes. > Was it painful medicine that nonetheless left the business in a better place? Yes. You make it sound like this is a net positive, but that is meaningless when you are not comparing it with the alternative: > Would refactoring it be faster? Yes > Would it require less effort? Yes > Would it still leave the business in a better place? Yes I don't think one can ever justify a rewrite unless (1) the code is trivial to implement, or (2) it is covered with extensive unit and system testing, or (3) the technologies used are no longer available/supported, there is no upgrade path, and a new language/framework is absolutely necessary.