The Role Of The Web Developer
The software industry has taken the world by storm. Almost everything you see today is driven by software, even the device you are reading this write-up with is software driven. Without doubt, software developers are very much in demand.
A web developer is a software developer that builds and works on web applications. We are going to take a look at the role of the web developer.
Before proceeding, let’s take a brief look at the three types of web developers we have today.
We have the:
Front-end web developer: The web developer who focuses on building the parts of web applications that you can see and interact with.
Back-end web developer: The web developer who focuses on building the business and computational logic of the web application, which you can’t see.
Full-stack web developer: The jack of all trades, who tries to combine the tasks of both the front-end and the backend developer.
The Basics
At the surface level, a web developer is the one who writes the code that dictates how the web application functions. Web developers are usually familiar with the best design practices, how servers work, business needs.
Being familiar with business needs could be quite crucial for a web developer. This is because they have to take business solutions and try to convert them into a web application. Without doubt, this would require some knowledge of how the business side of things work.
A Breakdown
Now that we have understood the major task of a web developer, let’s break things down a little using some analogies.
Consider a web application to be a car, to manufacture a car you need to know the needs of a user and build a car that would suit the user’s needs.
A car consists of parts that you can see on the outside, the paintings, the design. The car also consists of parts you can’t see such as the working of the engine, conversion of fuel into energy that powers the car.
Both painted scenarios apply to a web developer. The front-end web developer works on the parts you can see. For example, in an e-commerce web application, the front-end web developer is in charge of determining what happens when you click a button, how images show on the web page.
The back-end developer works on parts you can’t see. Using an e-commerce web application as an example too, the back-end web developer ensures that you are able to make purchases securely without your credentials being leaked, they also ensure that the billings are done rightly.
Work Life
As a web developer, you would find jobs that would allow you work from home only to report at a physical location some days in the week or not at all. While this is one side to the story, some web developer jobs require you to be present at the workplace for all days in the week, in a small cubicle of your own to work in.
Requirements
The job of an entry level web developer doesn’t require a college degree most times, as you would do well with the minimum of a high school diploma, GED or its equivalent. However, while self-teaching, you need to build projects to show that you have the skills need to work as a web developer.
Salary
The salary of a web developer for an entry level position usually starts at $41,000 for a front end developer and $45,000 for a backend developer. However, as you continue in the career and gain more experience and skills you could end up earning as high as $92,000 at some point in your career.