Ask HN: Stuck on a project for too long; am i being an asshole?

[masokupride]

my job mainly consists of making small changes to legacy projects, Either adding features or fixing bugs.

recently i've been stuck on a small project for far too long, and its creating some stress. I'm stuck at a crossroad of alot of brittle code and a ui which just can't do what i need it to do. I've gotten things working a few times now, but have had to make changes for various reasons.

this past weekend i actually rewrote most of the functionality from scratch in a day, and now i feel kind of discouraged... like im realizing that maybe many of my obstacles are self created. This really could have been a one day project if i had been allowed to rewrite, or if i were more able to think like some of my co-workers, who probably would have copied some code in and been done with it.

Instead i feel as if i am creating all these problems, other people are getting involved, and I don't see things ending well.

[Thetawaves]

What can you learn from this experience? Every problem looks simple once you figure it out.

[masokupride → Thetawaves]

oh. now i realize i may not have explained my issue very well...

my problem here is not solved. my rewrite can't be used because i rewrote too much code. what i meant to say is that when i don't have to deal with the obstacle of all this legacy code, it becomes easy for me to create a solution. my difficulty is not actually solving the particular problem, but with trying to build something on top of the legacy codebase.

i am realizing everything i am trying to do boils down to a hack to try and refactor shitty code into something its not. I am trying too hard to make what we have work like I think we need it to. I know that i am guided by best practices, my own experience, source code written by people smarter then me, and blogs posted on hacker news, but maybe my company doesn't want a good solution, maybe they just want some shit that works.

Part of me wants to be confident this is the right thing to do, and just be like fuck it and quit, but i have heard stories about the well intentioned and read about lava layers and part of me is worried that i am just being arrogant.

[tuananh]

talk to a colleague! I find talking to someone may help as I need to think it thorough again one more time before talking to her/him. Sometimes, solution may come midway while i was trying to explain the problem to her/him.