Ask HN: When a developer leaves a project, how do the project survive?
What do software projects do when its key developer(s) leave a company or project, Is there any blogs or interesting write-ups about the problem and what solutions there to addressing the problem?
Also how important is it that the lead/key developer like the technology the software is written in, and can someone that does not no the platform or technology pick-up the project and maintain it?
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I'm aware the above two question is easily influenced by the scenario of the project and company but I'm sure this is a general theme in big and small companies so any links or references would be appreciated, even keywords I must google for(Seeing I already tried and failed).
To help you to answer my question I will try to explain my scenario as follow:
I work for a small to medium sized company of about 150 people. A internal software project was started three years ago by two key people a Developer and Architect. After a year of development the business started to use it, and I joined the team six months later.
A Niche Software Development platform was chosen and in the beginning it gave the company a lot flexibility but after a year and a half we started to run into performance and maintenance problems large due to incorrect usage of the platform.
Recently the key developer left the company on good terms, but we are now left with only 50% of the mind share of the current system.
So we have a complex business system with more then 160 database tables, a really big hairy code base and the original person that developed the system is not available any more.
If I get carte blanche my first reaction is that we need to rewrite the system, but what will change when I leave the company in two years time?