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I landed my first dev job after 6 months of building projects. Here's my story!

Pranav Birajdar on May 31, 2021

It's official y'all, I got hired as a front-end developer!!! I am starting tomorrow and I am so pumped to share this news with the dev community. ...
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Edgar X. González Cortés

Hey Pranav, I've been following your posts since I saw you posting templates for next.js. The couple of jobs I've had I landed them the same way, through knowing other people. I'm so glad things turned out so well for you!

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Pranav Birajdar

Hey Edgar, thank you for the kind words. And yes, networking has been key to meet new people and explore new opportunities .

I hope to write more about benefits of networking instead of applying on job-boards to get a job in the future!

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elpmid • Edited

Congrats man! Being able to code and write blog is amazing. I enjoyed reading your story. I wish I can write as good as you. I am a developer and want to be a writer like you but my english is broken. But I will try my best. Good luck on your job!

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you!

Writing is just like coding; the more you do, the better you get. Keep writing mate, your English is really good. It'll only keep improving!

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Georgey • Edited

Hey Pranav,
I had a similar story
First one month wasted on Binge watching
Then I had this realisation I'm just wasting time
Took out my pc and bought a course
And today a full stack developer, but figuring out a way to earn

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Pranav Birajdar

Good luck, mate! Keep at it.

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Joseph

Hello Pranav, I think I resonate with your story a lot, the difference is I've not gotten my big break yet. Well done!! You did great.

Can you provide the API you fetched th data for the COVID-19 project?. I want to build something similar but for Nigeria.

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Pranav Birajdar

You'll get there Joseph! Keep at it.

I used the following API: api.covid19tracker.ca/docs/1.0/ove...

It seems like it's a Canada only API. I'm sure there are tons of other APIs out there for Nigeria.

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therepositor profile image
Joseph

Thank you

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yukoliesh

Very inspiring and very well written! I love your story and I'm so happy for you that you found a new job! Congrats! I will be looking for a new job soon so I will bookmark your page! Thanks for sharing!!
One question (or two): how did you prepare the code challenges by not knowing what you will be asked? I'd get so nervous for the live session that I get blanked out. Is there any suggestion on that? Thanks!

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Pranav Birajdar

Mostly practise. I didn't have the best coding challenge either. I just made sure to explain them my thought process throughout the challenge.

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yukoliesh

Great advice! Thanks!

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Pai

I had a similar situation with yours in 2020. I took a couple React courses, again it is so true about you do not just watch and type along.

Anyway, I got into three final interviews in 2020 but I did not get anything.

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Pranav Birajdar

Keep pushing! You'll get there.

There's a certain amount of luck involved in every opportunity and I was incredibly lucky to be at the right place at the right time!

I'll happen to you too! :)

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Eljay-Adobe

Congratulations!

From the time when I started to learn to program to when I landed my first programming job was 9 years. In comparison, you are on the fast track. :-)

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Pranav Birajdar

Kudos to you for putting in the work for 9 years! That shows so much commitment.

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Eljay-Adobe

I started programming when I was 10 years old. The very first program I worked on — as a contributor, not the original creator — was Oregon Trail. That was on an HP 2000 minicomputer; before Chuck Peddle & company had gotten the 6502-based personal computers on the market.

I taught myself BASIC. Then taught myself 6502 assembly. Then 65816 assembly. Then Pascal. Then C.

And then got a job programming in MAI BusinessBASIC, while also starting college. I got a 2nd job programming in FORTRAN, for the physics department at college. Two jobs at the same time, and full time college student, majoring in physics, with a strong interest in quantum mechanics, special relativity, and general relativity. Then after 3 years, switched majors to linguistics, with a focus on semantics and artificial intelligence (the subfields of neural networks, and expert systems; not so much robotics, or simulating a human brain subfields). Then after 3 more years, switched majors to computer science.

Along the way, also picked up LISP & Scheme, 68000 assembly (which was super-fun!), Prolog, C++, Objective-C, SQL, C#, F#, Lua, Python, Perl (not my favorite), and dozens of others. I like learning a new programming language every year. Still doing C++ after 31 years.

Worked at Adobe, on Premiere Pro. Worked at Microsoft, on Visual Studio, then on Internet Explorer 10 & 11. And currently working back at Adobe, on Photoshop.

I would have done computer science from the start, but my father was against me going into computer science because, "There's no future in computers." (He has since recanted.)

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Pranav Birajdar • Edited

It's incredible what you have achieved so far! It's funny what your dad said because that's literally what mine said too and forced me to pursue mechanical engineering.

He has since recanted as well!

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Emeka Orji

@prnvbirajdar Thank you for this post! You have an awesome resilience. I started my journey into web Dev at the same time you did yours, but I think for a long time I have had the wrong mindset towards it. I have believed that I have to have spend so many years learning before I can start out my first job. But this has increased confidence in me, I can do this in six months from now.

I can only imagine how hard it'd have been for you as a married man to strive

You've also taught me something that I have lacked, that is the being immersed into the Developer Community. You have really inspired me and it will be evident in days to come

👍

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Pranav Birajdar

Honestly, even I was not sure about my abilities and was planning to go to school full-time. I decided to interview for a few months before I went to back to determine if the market accepts a self-taught dev.

Definitely get involved in the dev community. It'll only help you grow.

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devcoder

great info! also i cant believe they made you build a calculator as a coding challenge

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Pranav Birajdar

I was surprised too. But it's a good mini-project to judge one's basic understanding of state management.

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Danny Kim

Congrats! It is impressive how much you learned in a year. Can you tell me which meetups you went to? I am a developer in Toronto too, and I'd like to network with other developers near me.

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Pranav Birajdar

Toronto JS and TechTo are my favorites. Join those and come say hi!

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Danny Kim

Thanks! I will look for you there if I get to come by.

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rbhogal

We followed similar paths (but I'm still looking for a job). I however started learning in 2020 couple months before covid hit and covered HTML and CSS part-time and JS full-time (mostly). In 2021 I spent it learning React and just doing projects and creating a portfolio. Been applying since November of 2021. Pre-pandemic I saw self-taught devs getting jobs by just applying. Now every single time I see anyone who landed one as a self-taught has been by networking and getting referrals. So I guess that's what I'm doing.

You're right on with getting started with making projects soon as you finished your course or whatever. I also I think it's good to follow at least one tutorial before you do so though so you understand how all the pieces fit whole. I started a project got stuck, did one or two follow along projects on youtube, came back and was able to finish it.

I haven't landed a job yet but here's some courses that worked for me so far though in terms of learning (but I also supplmented with many other resources (youtube, codepen, etc.)). I hope it can help others:

  1. Jona's JavaScript course on Udemy: The most recommended JS course I found and definitely lived up to the hype (he just updated it recently btw). He also gives you great resources.
  2. Maximilian's React - The Complete Guide (incl Hooks, React Router, Redux) on Udemy: I actually took Stephen Grider's course and regret it. I needed to supplement. It's outdated (No offense to Grider I know it's hard to keep up with React's changes). But he focused too much on class components and not much on functional and left out a lot that Max covers in his. Max also teaches you typescript, and a deep dive into Next.js, and I found that issues I ran into making my own react project, Max had covered in his course.
  3. Frontend Mentor: Solve real-world HTML, CSS and JavaScript challenges whilst working to professional designs. This is closest to a professional workflow and it's better than trying to recreate a website (as a beginner) because you might not know if it's too hard or too easy of a challenge. This was the one I did. This was my first serious project on my own but this is getting kind of long so I won't talk more about my experience with it but this is how it turned out.
  4. Mastering CSS Flexbox and Grid: Not exactly one place I learned it but challenging yourself by doing projects (after two I felt really comfortable with it) is the best way + Jona's Advanced CSS and Sass: Flexbox, Grid, Animations and More! but I only did the last project to get a good understanding of CSS grid. For the fundamentals though I did freeCodeCamp.
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Saumya Nayak

Projects are everything !

Had a question how did you implement the blog section in you portfolio site.

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Pranav Birajdar

I agree!

I used the DEV.to CMS for my blog. Whenever I post something here, my site redeploys and the new blog gets pushed. That's possible because of Next.js and ISR.

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Saumya Nayak

Is it deployed on Vercel ?

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Pranav Birajdar

Yep.

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devcoder

what api did you use for the movies?

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Pranav Birajdar

It's the TMDb API.

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devcoder

was going through your code, and thought you might want to know....

const refinedMovies = response?.data?.results.filter((movie) => {
return movie?.backdrop_path !== null || "" || undefined;
});
this can be shortened just by checking if its truthy like this
return movie?.backdrop_path

!== null || "" || undefined is not needed as truthy checks all those.

Your post has inspired me!

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Pranav Birajdar

Thanks.

I haven't refactored my code in a long time and I'm sure I've written some janky, rookie code back then!

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Parth Kawatra

Congratulations!!
Your post made me feel motivated to do this stuff more because I have been trying to get into Web Development since few years, I know basics of HTML and CSS, JS but I am not really confident in my abilities. My learning process has been really slow because I am deaf guy, I feel hard to move on with these technologies. But I am hopeful that I will overcome these challenges.
I really need to get out of my comfort zone and tutorial hell.

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Pranav Birajdar

Start working on some interesting projects. It's best way out of tutorial hell!

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Prasanna Silva

Hi Pranav, that is an inspirational!! i wish you the success from the bottom of my heart. you know what, to be honest, i am a visual artist in profession but a lover for coding things. specially, i love coding as a hobby and also to work as a freelancing after that.
nowadays i am learning myself backend development. so your story made me inspired.

Thank you 😊

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Pranav Birajdar

Keep coding mate! Thank you for the kind words and good luck with your journey.

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ugorji michael murph

Great write Up ! Really motivating. Thank you also for the resources. How do I leverage LinkedIn and join local meetups around my locality. I'm from Nigeria.

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Pranav Birajdar

You're welcome!

Meetup.com for meetups, and there are tons of LinkedIn videos on YouTube.

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Vitor Acacio

Congratulations, Pranav! Very inspiring story and I'm glad it worked out for you. Good luck on the new job!

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Pranav Birajdar • Edited

Thank you, Vitor!

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ReubenDickson

This is so inspiring. Thanks alot.

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Ankit Garg

Hey Pranav, nice post. Can you share which tutorial did you use for the Netflix clone? Thanks!

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Pranav Birajdar

It's a Florin Pop movie video. I think I shared it with you on LinekedIn.

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gourav66638

Wow, amazing

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Pranav Birajdar

Thanks!

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Jeff Chavez

Wow. What an inspiring story. Thanks for sharing. I am also starting my journey as a self-taught dev.

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Pranav Birajdar

All the best, mate!

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Aya Bouchiha

Very valuable information 🙏

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Pranav Birajdar

Glad you found it useful!

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Farhan Hasin Chowdhury

I really enjoyed reading about your journey. Nothing less than an adventure short story. Well done on your projects and congratulations on landing your first dev job. Best of luck.

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you!

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Habdul Hazeez

There is no better way to learn than building projects.

Now, the journey begins.

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Pranav Birajdar

Absolutely!

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nshimiye_emmy

what a great story mn, congratulations

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you!

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David Herbert💻🚀

Congrats Pranav, your article was a motivation.🥳

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you, David!

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Mehdi Aoussiad

Very inspiring! Thanks for sharing your experience and good luck for you!

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you, Mehdi!

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Yuri Filatov

this is a very interesting and instructive story!

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Pranav Birajdar

Glad you liked it! 😄

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ocomarissa2020

Congratulations. I'm taking the same path. I really love your posts. This is so inspiring. Thank you. :)

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you and you're very welcome!

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Pranav Birajdar

I have shared the links of all of my projects in section 5 above. Good luck with your journey!

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Anderson Osayerie

Very motivating story. Congratulations on the new job

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Pranav Birajdar

Thank you, mate!

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ramsai

Hi Pranav,
Nice article i really liked it and by the way what is the youtube link you have followed to build clone of ReactJs with hooks. Can you give that link please.
Thanks In Advance

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Pranav Birajdar

youtu.be/sZ0bZGfg_m4

Here you go!