Each of your personal projects should have these five aspects in order to get you that first Junior Developer role.
Having an empty Git repo can be intimidating. This is mostly because you don't have work experience and your Git repository is barren as the desert of Arrakis. It's always a good idea to enrich your resume with personal projects when preparing for an interview. But, what should these projects be?
Uploading applications you wrote following tutorials can be a starting point, but it won't get you far. You'll end up with the same projects as every other junior out there.
Therefore, I have decided to write down some advice that I would've liked to receive when I was building up my junior resume. These are my personal opinions, feel free to read through the article and decide for yourself what to include in your projects.
1. Choose a Good Subject
Avoid mimicking endless online tutorials with tic-tac-toe games or to-do lists.
Instead, try making the project about yourself: about things you are passionate about. It can be something about the sport you practice, the music you listen to, or about coding itself.
Some people may say the employer will not be interested in this topic and that you should implement something that is relevant to them - for instance, an issue tracking application.
I believe that choosing a personal and original project idea might help you in the long run. Firstly, because you know exactly what to build and what features you would like to have. Secondly, you can use the extra motivation of working on something you're passionate about to get the project done.
2. The Project is Complete
Working software! Start from a small and simple idea and add complexity along the way.
It is common between developers to start never-ending personal projects. Don't fall into this trap! Keep your tasks small and simple.
Use feature branches and make sure you can always start the app from the master branch easily, for a quick demo.
3. Clean Code
The interviewer will look over this code. Try to keep it as clean and well organized as possible.
If you are not sure about it, read some articles about coding conventions and best practices and double-check if you are following them.
For instance, I wrote a short article about the SOLID Principles - understanding them will greatly improve your code quality.
Your code should be as SOLID as a rock. Photo by Winggo Tse on UnsplashAdditionally, you can use IDE extensions for code quality such as Sonar Lint. This way, you can eliminate code smells and potential bugs.
After that, ask a friend who is already working as a developer for a code review. If you don't know whom to ask, send me a message - I'll be happy to take a look!
4. The Project is Accessible
You will invest time and effort to ensure the code quality is high. Therefore, you'll have to make sure the source code is available and up to date, in a public Git repository.
Photo by Roman Synkevych 🇺🇦 on UnsplashMoreover, the interviewer can see not only the code itself but also that you can efficiently work with Git.
You can have a readme.md file where you present the general idea of your project and the design of your application.
Besides, if your project is a Web Application, you can even deploy it to a free hosting platform such as Heroku. I believe this would be big a plus.
5. Be Realistic
Your idea should have a real-world application. Avoid coding games and try to focus on small things that can help you on a daily basis.
For instance, you can think of an application that you use often and try to implement a feature that is missing.
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