I just now remembered this; would the article linked below be an example of what it was like before?
Edited to add:
I made a mistake in my (a) and (b) statements, in that, as far as I can tell, neither the Instructions for Foreigners, etc., nor Article 16 of the Act for Recruitment, etc., mention a five-year requirement for the foreign professional (although I’m pretty sure that’s the usual process), but only for the dependents. As far as I know, that mistake doesn’t affect anything that we’ve discussed so far, but I thought I’d mention it, and I apologize for it.
Edited to add no. 2:
I was having a lot of trouble finding the Taipei Times article linked above until I stumbled on the link at the beginning of a thread here on Forumosa: