@eyepopslikeamosquito, I really like the posts you're linking to, thanks! Something for today's study.

From skimming those posts, I think we agree on a lot. So far at work I've finagled using VCS branches and not pushing code straight to the production branch during a release cycle (we are not CI/CD), requiring peer review before merging into the release branch, requiring a test document for each set of changes, automated some of the build steps, significantly increased the automated testing, and have written several documents that explain the code base processes.

Most of that comes from reading "Working Effectively With Legacy Code". Being the "new guy" in an established code base gave me the openness to see what wasn't tested or documented. It has been a challenge. In a chat with Matt S Trout (of Shadowcat fame), he pointed out that dealing with a large code base is a skill of its own. That was super encouraging, I went from feeling really really really behind to just really really behind. :P

I also failed to communicate something that impacts what you wrote. I work on system tools that rely on the customer's OS version of Perl. We don't embed Perl into the tool, and the customer base tends to use older OS versions. If our tool was only used in-house then your initial points are appropriate, and upgrading Perl is a really good idea.