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Upnishad pandya
Upnishad pandya

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am i too late ??

i turned 22 and i'm new to coding world, started to learn from html want to become front-end dev.
my question is - am i too late to step into coding world ???

Top comments (14)

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kristiandupont profile image
Kristian Dupont • Edited

No.

I don't know if you mean "too late in my life", or "too late as the world has moved on" but in either case, the answer is a resounding no.

I started coding when I was somewhat younger than you (I am almost twice your age), which means that I know a bunch of weird stuff like what "protected mode" meant on the 80286 processor. Fun, but completely useless today. I am currently making UI with Tailwind CSS and writing Typescript, stuff that I had to learn within the past two years or so. That doesn't mean that my experience is useless of course, far from it, but it shows how much the industry moves and how you might very well learn a valuable skill that someone with more experience lacks.

If you are asking about whether it's too late because of the industry somehow, the answer is even clearer. You might think that the NoCode trend looks scary or that AI is going to take over soon or whatever. The AI part I can't speak to, but certainly there has never been a greater demand for developers and I don't see that stopping in any near future. The thing is, developing software is really about expressing concepts to a machine in a way that satisfies users. Tools constantly help us do that more efficiently but that in turns creates demand for more sophisticated products. Learn how to build those and you will always be able to find a way to make yourself valuable.

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joostkiens profile image
Joost Kiens

Naaa, not at all. I wrote my first line of HTML when I was 27, now I'm 42 and very happy with my chosen profession.

If you enjoy what you do, enjoy learning new stuff, making awesome stuff, and have some technical aptitude, you will be absolutely fine 😁

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thorstenhirsch profile image
Thorsten Hirsch

Seems like a safe bet to become a frontend developer. They've been the biggest developer group in most retail projects I've been working on, because a beautiful and functional UI is critical for a successful product, right?

Well... on the other side there are literally millions of your fellow countrymen who are (currently) better frontend developers than you. Even if you're more talented and learn harder than most of them, you might be disappointed in a few years with your career perspectives. And I think being an average frontend developer is very risky in India. If things don't go well in a project and the first wave of layoffs is coming - who do you think they're letting go? 4 of the 6 frontend developers or 1 of the 1 backend developer?

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upnishad09 profile image
Upnishad pandya

Then what do you suggest ???

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thorstenhirsch profile image
Thorsten Hirsch

Look at Gartner's hype cycle charts. Find an interesting technology that will become mainstream in 3 to 5 years. Make sure that there are enough resources available on the Internet to master this technology within 3 to 5 years, e.g. code should be open source, blogs/tutorials/documentation should already exist, maybe even some online training courses.

Of course it's hard to know which technology will become mainstream in 3 to 5 years. It's a bet. So make sure that you can earn enough money to survive if it takes more than 5 years until your technology becomes mainstream. It's easier than it sounds, e.g. you can probably work as a database/backend developer when your goal is to become a data analyst.

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dorshinar profile image
Dor Shinar

Definitely not. It's never too late to start. Get a good grasp of the fundamentals - HTML, CSS and JS, make a few demo projects to show off your skills and you're good to go.

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upnishad09 profile image
Upnishad pandya

Thanks for the tip and motivation mate.

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giorgosk profile image
Giorgos Kontopoulos 👀

Even if you said you are 50 I would say no it is not too late. But I would say the same thing for anything that you wanted to learn and check out this similar thread dev.to/jac_menz/i-m-23-years-old-i...

How to get started ?
Don't start or don't get stuck on new shiny frontend frameworks/technologies. Try to get as much of HTML/CSS/JS knowledge practice before learning any other things. Almost everything else on front-end development is build on this foundation.

Later on you can focus on frameworks and more advanced stuff. See all around on what things you can focus on there is many threads that can get you started dev.to/nas5w/what-languages-framew...

Git knowledge would be a must as well. Would be very helpful in order to be compatible with any team you might end up working with.

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ziizium profile image
Habdul Hazeez

Too late? I don't think so.

I wrote a series of articles about Web development with a final project hosted on GitHub pages you can go through it, mind you, the reading time of some articles are quite long (e.g.18mins) because I tried to explain some stuff in great detail.

If you need help in understanding any article in the series let me know via message or drop a comment in the article and hopefully, we'll solve it together.

Here is the link to the articles:

Do you want to talk about front-end dev in general? My inbox is open, send me a message.

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ekafyi profile image
Eka

I got into professional web dev from completely non-technical background (no bootcamp) & a bunch of previous non-tech jobs in my late 20s. In my early thirties now and in a decent full-time dev role. Definitely not too late. However you do need to improve your morale/motivation & not compare yourself to others, because you might at times feel demotivated looking at peers your age who had started earlier who are way ahead of you. Good luck!

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thomasbnt profile image
Thomas Bnt ☕

Nope, never late for learn news things !

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maniflames profile image
Maniflames

absolutely not, go for it 🔥

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joellau profile image
Joel Lau

Just do it

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violet profile image
Elena

Too late at 22? :)

First of all you are never late. There's also time to change your career, especially if you come from a position of fulfillment with your current job.

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