On Twitter we asked the egghead community for advice for new developers:
egghead.io@eggheadio
What advice would you give to someone new to web development?23:01 PM - 18 Feb 2020
Tons of developers gave out some awesome advice and we wanted to share some with the dev.to community.
1) The fundamentals are always a good start.
Lauro Silva@laurosilvacom@eggheadio First, master fundamentals. Then, play infinite games.23:36 PM - 18 Feb 2020
2) Don't get stuck on the "right way".
Ashley Lindsay đ@haylinds@eggheadio Donât get hung up on doing a thing the ârightâ way. Youâll learn as you go and ârightâ and âbestâ will change. Often.00:19 AM - 19 Feb 2020
3) Make a journal for your future self.
@eggheadio Solve problems and document how you solved these problems. Some call this a blog, I call it a journal since Iâm writing for my future self.00:54 AM - 19 Feb 2020
4) Hang out with veterans to see they don't know it all.
@eggheadio Pick a group/framework, hang out with them for a while so you don't get overwhelmed. Even people who have been doing this for decades don't know it all.
After that you can learn any of the others pretty quickly.20:01 PM - 19 Feb 2020
5) Get a study buddy!
6) You can learn a lot from your mistakes.
Ned Whitman@nedwinsaidso@eggheadio you learn by making mistakes and debugging them23:03 PM - 18 Feb 2020
7) You don't have to chase the newest thing.
@eggheadio You donât have to jump to what everyone says is the next new thing. Focus in an area, learn it well, grow from there.23:21 PM - 18 Feb 2020
8) Build things you don't think you're ready for.
Mmrodriguez@mm_rodriguez_@eggheadio Don't try to remember every little thing or take a bunch of notes. Just practice rebuilding projects you're learning from courses. And definitely try building projects you don't think you're ready for. And Google.03:36 AM - 20 Feb 2020
9) It gets easier with time.
Rasheed Shina@iamshinarasheed@eggheadio Understand the basics. Don't be too hard on yourself. It gets easy with time and practice. Don't try to know everything.13:03 PM - 19 Feb 2020
10) Don't forget to network.
Gerard@gerardgenovese@eggheadio Network. Having skills is irrelevant if you canât get interviews that lead to a position.13:38 PM - 19 Feb 2020
11) Communication is important.
Zachary Straub đ§˘@zacharyastraub@eggheadio For every new thing you learn, force yourself to explain what it is you learned in simple terms.
A large part of tech boils down to human relationships and facilitating to non-technical people.
Poor communication kills projects, no matter how good they are.07:38 AM - 19 Feb 2020
12) Don't compare yourself to others.
Alexis đ¤@alexiswatsondevDon't compare your Level 1 to someone else's Level 50. You're not going to learn it all in a week, a month, or a year, and that's okay.
Besides, every senior+ dev I know still struggles sometimes, too. twitter.com/eggheadio/statâŚ16:07 PM - 19 Feb 2020egghead.io @eggheadioWhat advice would you give to someone new to web development?
13) Don't worry about what you don't know yet.
Focus on what youâre learning now. Donât worry about things you donât know yet.
Write down questions you have, experiment with code to see if you can answer it yourself, write it down. If you canât do it yet, try to find the answer and put it next to what you asked. twitter.com/eggheadio/statâŚ23:19 PM - 18 Feb 2020egghead.io @eggheadioWhat advice would you give to someone new to web development?
14) Keep on building.
23:15 PM - 18 Feb 2020egghead.io @eggheadioWhat advice would you give to someone new to web development?
15) Don't give up.
Keep going. twitter.com/eggheadio/statâŚ23:13 PM - 18 Feb 2020egghead.io @eggheadioWhat advice would you give to someone new to web development?
Of course this wasn't all of the great advice from this thread. Check it out if you want to read them all.
Share any advice you have for new developers in the comments.
Discussion (8)
Great advice!!!
After several years I get a feedback that my most useful advice was directing a person towards tools I personally use and like. Depending on a specific situation, I often talked with them about how just simple paper calendars, quick retrospectives or boards like kanbantool.com/kanban-guide/person... may be used to support you, being a newbie in the area. Of course it's not limited to people starting web development route but I think it may really help them. Starting something totally new sometimes makes you forget about some basic things in life ;)
Thank you, great advices
Make sure you enjoy solving problems.
Don't get into programming only for the money.
Trust the process.
Expertise takes time.
You'll get there if your persist.
Well said Emmanuel Okiche
I'm a web developer, and I will recommend something else like mobile or IOT or anything else. Because being a good web developer takes too much time, around 5 years or more.
But being a good mobile developer doesn't?
"It's hard" isn't a reason not to do something.