- The database was the central component of the system, with a table called "Merchants" that had over 500 columns due to running out of columns in the original "Merchants" table.
- The "SequenceKey" table was a single-column, single-row table used to generate IDs, demonstrating a creative but unconventional solution.
- The system had a manually maintained "calendar" table to track login access, which was a fragile and outdated approach.
- The employee data was reloaded from a CSV file every morning, with an email-based process to replicate the data to headquarters.
- There was a normalized copy of the database, but it required 7 joins to go from the "Merchants" table to a phone number, showing the complexity.
- The codebase was a mix of VB and C#, with a proliferation of JavaScript frameworks and custom modifications.
- The "shipping manager" application was built in a weekend by a single developer named Gilfoyle, who was known for not checking in his code.
- The author discovered a bug related to the shipping queue that was caused by a SOAP service client doing all the side effects instead of the service itself.
- The "Merchants Search" page was optimized by a senior developer named Justin, who was able to make significant improvements by decoupling the page into separate endpoints.
- The codebase, despite its flaws, allowed for a sense of freedom and creativity, with developers carving out their own "little worlds of sanity" within the larger monolithic application.