DEV Community: Harshad Prajapati

Common Job Hunting Hack – Guessing Work Emails Professionally

Harshad Prajapati — Sat, 05 Jul 2025 16:39:52 +0000

So it's a common situation.

Many of us are applying for jobs, hoping for a referral, or trying to connect with someone who’s already working at a company we admire.

But sometimes, LinkedIn doesn’t show a "Message" option — or we’re not connected yet.

In such cases, guessing a professional work email (ethically and respectfully) can help us reach out directly.

Let’s understand how this works 👇

The Setup
You know someone’s full name:
Example: John Doe

And the company they work at uses a domain like:
examplecompany.com

Just like how CSS has layout patterns, email formats often follow common structures too.

Most Common Email Patterns
Here are the patterns most companies use:

Format Guessed Email
john@examplecompany.com firstname
john.doe@examplecompany.com firstname.lastname
j.doe@examplecompany.com firstinitial.lastname
john.d@examplecompany.com firstname.lastinitial
johndoe@examplecompany.com full name, no separator
j_doe@examplecompany.com firstname_lastname
jdoe@examplecompany.com firstinitial+lastname

Try a few of these combinations if you’re writing a polite, respectful cold email.

(Just remember to use BCC when trying multiple guesses.)

Use It Respectfully 💡
This is not about spamming — it’s about professional networking.

You’re simply trying to reach out to someone with similar interests, or to learn more about an opportunity.

Like in CSS:

opacity: 0 → It's there but not visible

display: none → It’s not rendered at all

Be like opacity: 0. Present, polite, and non-intrusive.

Bonus Prompt for AI
If you're using AI tools like ChatGPT, here’s a simple prompt:

“Given the name ‘John Doe’ and the domain ‘examplecompany.com’, list the top 10 most likely corporate email formats for reaching out professionally.”

Final Thought
This trick won’t always work, but it’s worth trying — especially if you’re genuinely interested and respectful in your approach.

Sometimes, one thoughtful email is all it takes to open a door.

All the best 😊

Common CSS Interview questions - Opacity Zero vs Display none

Harshad Prajapati — Wed, 12 Jul 2023 07:19:50 +0000

So it's a common question.

Many of you are familiar with it.

However, having information can be beneficial not only for interviews but also for our actual development.

Opacity - zero
Imagine a dark room with no light. You are present inside, but you cannot see anything. Nevertheless, that room does exist in reality.

Therefore, in the end, something is present, but it remains unseen.

Display none
In this case, there is no room at all. You cannot enter the room, and it simply does not exist.

All the best 😊

Node.js and Express.js with env variable

Harshad Prajapati — Tue, 08 Mar 2022 21:38:24 +0000

Hey There!

Just a sharing my knowledge on below
Topic: Node.js, Express.js

Where I used
Package dotenv

Great! It looks like to know more about this...

I got one requirement, Where I have run my Node.js App with env variable.

So with the help of dotenv package, I achieved this

Where you have to follow these steps;

Add Package
npm install dotenv --save (will add package on your project)
Change in package.json file
node -r dotenv/config your_script.js (change your package.json start or dev script what you want trigger)
Add .env file
add env file in the root of your project and add your favorite variable

That's it run npm start (or npm run dev as per your script).

You will see that your app running with provided .env file's variable

So while working with this I extracted basic code to run Node.js app with env and pushed it to Github.

https://github.com/iamharshad/beginner-node-express-env-port