Every codebase has ghosts. Functions written by people who left. Comments from a version of the product that no longer exists. TODO markers from 2019 that will never be addressed.

Legacy code is not trying to hurt you. It is simply evidence of a different time, built under different constraints by people who were doing their best with what they had.

Approach it with curiosity, not contempt.

Not every ghost needs to be exorcised. Some legacy code is stable, battle-tested, and quietly doing its job in production. Leave it alone. It has earned its rest.

The art of working with legacy systems is knowing which hauntings are harmless and which ones will bring the house down.

Someday, your code will be the legacy code. Someone will read your variable names and wonder what you were thinking. Someone will refactor your carefully considered architecture.

Write code that haunts gently. Leave comments that explain the why. Make your ghost a helpful one.

— JP, from the void.