Best practices are tough for practices where the foundations are not stable. And with programming, we have trouble defining the foundations. Much less stabilizing them.

And note I don't mean stable as in, not crashing. I mean it as not changing.

For a while, this was doable with java. For its warts, it gave a good foundation. Industry practice got caught up in start up enthusiasm, though, and that went out the window.

Similar could probably be said for Windows. I was not a fan of its model, but it provided a stable base for business apps for a long time.