We never stopped doing that. Only now the people that write the new programs and that don't want to deal with the aftermath of what they've created run off to some new and greener pasture while leaving others to do the dirty work.

If you ever find out, please share. I'd also love to hand most of my code to other people and never see it again.

Start from a data model you don't understand and use/write objects that force your data into expected results. Make sure everybody involved sees a working version

Writing this way is time consuming but ensures nobody including you wants to maintain it or add features.

I don’t think that was true everywhere — otherwise we wouldn’t have ended up with the latest modem and pc every few years so dad could support his code in the middle of the night.