I grew up as a curious kid, picking up books I could lay my hands on, driving screwdrivers at electrical gadgets in the home. This, I would say, fueled my drive to get into tech as a self-learning frontend developer. However, my journey has been stalled by quite a number of challenges, major one being self-doubt (as much as I hate to admit) and in turn has made finding consistency a tough nut to crack.
In this writing, I pointed out a number of challenges that I faced as a self-learning junior developer and how I managed to crawl out of those pitfalls.
Tutorial cycle- I started my journey as a self-taught developer watching YouTube tutorials and coding along. As educative and informative as these videos may be, they do not fully encompass the fundamentals of certain tech concepts. To put it in context, while I learnt to build react native projects, I always got stuck midway through the videos, why? This is because I was watching a tutorial made some 3 months ago in a field where stacks are getting updated on a daily basis. As much as you could learn a handful from tutorials, you need to ask yourself the question, do I genuinely understand the basics of this code or am I blindly following along?
Documentation- I have discovered that there is no easier way to understand a framework or library than reading the docs. The docs were written by expert technical writers and have bridged the gap between complex technical concepts and easy-to-follow documentation. So to grow maximally as a self-taught developer, you need to learn to read and understand the docs.
Engage in tasks and challenges- Another way to learn how to code is to practice your skills on tasks and challenges. There are several of these coding challenges, an example is Frontend Mentor. This, I believe, will equip you with a skill that’s very ingenious to developers, problem-solving.
Pick your niche- Web development is as broad as you can think of, most definitely broader than you can think of. So it is very important to pick your poison and stick by it. Starting off, I was pretty much confused, I loved the aesthetics of Awwwards landing pages, I also had a kink for building mobile apps, and oh, there’s a number three, Threejs, I saw a reel of a 3D website and I couldn’t help myself but want to learn. However, it is not impossible to be good in all of these, but as a self-learning developer, it will really help to stick with a niche and go all out on it.
Community and mentorship- Being in an active community or having a mentor can go a long way in your tech journey as a self-learning developer. These will push you to go the extra mile at bettering yourself.
These are the bits that influenced my journey as a self-learned developer, and I’ve not put my foot off the gas yet. I’m still on this journey, and so should you. Watch this space, I’ve got something exciting coming out in a few days.
Top comments (13)
Very nicely written, but i contest your pick a nice stance. I am a self taught backend developer that dabbles in frontends now and then noting has helped me more then to try out new things and play with them. Tauri, wails.io, rust, go, bun and htmx. Every new thing teaches you parts of the web and made things Click for me. Just my two cents...
Keep writing inlike the style.😉
I share your journey I am a victim of internet info flooding. I read everything and every language hence no one is interested in me. I am using Python a lot but I know some JS. I want to stick with these two. I love Python but I am not sure if I will find a job.
Anyway, building websites is my easy pick for now. Setting up the back end and payment system. I love react node js angular type script bootstrap and nest js. I want to hammer it. No luck for a job.
You got to try .net based development, there are opportunities, especially if you plan ahead and land a job in Middle East, especially now with .net core supporting multiple OS and C# becoming the do all language.
Oh really? Have no idea why .net, thanks I will sure do that.
Great advice! My niche is really Flask web dev and Discourse development in EmberJS.
I've always stayed away from JS frameworks, since they're their own big topic (e.g. React). Ember was my first, and just looking at the docs, I've barely dipped my toes in the water.
I can relate . I have been a victim of skipping from one tech stack to the other in search of a perfect combo. But I have come to learn that there is no match made in heaven. Every stack has its own strength and flaws, and being a great 👍 software developer means understanding the flaws and knowing how to work around them.
In my own experience, reading the source code of my favorite tools prooved to be a great way of learning coding best-practices. It also inspires me to create my own software.
I think you find the thing you love and master it. Then you try to apply it and seek work and discover you lack x, y and z, so you learn them and bring it all together. Then you apply it and seek work and you get a job and after 6 - 12 months you have money in your pocket doing what you love. If you haven't made it by then that's fine, you just keep pursuing. ✊
Nice....I have been struggling all my life with tech and I'm still struggling. The worst case is that if this Tech doesn't work for me, I have no plan B. It seems I'm doomed 😭🤦
Employers are stupid and the promote stupid mamagers. Get some Salesforce certs and you will have job offers galore.
I am like you, brother. Exactly like you. It has been 5 years for me. No major advances.
"dos and don'ts."
And you are only talking about dos?
I also stressed the dont's. Avoid the endless tutorial cycle, avoid trying hands on too many frameworks and languauges.