Ask HN: A modern web development workflow?

Hi HN,

I'm embarrassed when looking at my web development work flow, that basically hasn't changed ever since I started programming as a hobby ten years ago. I have never moved beyond writing my code, testing it locally with a standard version of WAMP and then dragging my files into an FTP client, uploading them to some unspectacular web hosting service, as if it was just another folder on my computer.

[Web development was never priority for me (I studied design and I work as a designer now), but I both enjoy working on small project on the side and also believe that it is my duty as a good designer to understand what it means to implement the things that I come up with.]

If I ever wanted to develop something that is more than just a little personal experiment on the side, I would miserably fail, because my knowledge of a serious workflow is just non existent.

So this is where I'm asking for your help: It's hard to learn about something that you hardly know anything about. I don't even know where to start. I would greatly appreciate to get your opinions on a good, not too complex (keep in mind that I'm not exactly trying to build the next big thing here), modern and professional workflow that shows me a more serious side of web development than Notepad and Filezilla. What are the keywords I can use to start learning about this? What are the programs and technologies that you use yourself and that you would recommend? What are the absolute nonos, that expose an absolute amateur?

Thanks!

I think rails tutorial is great even if you aren't interested in Rails. It covers git, heroku, and testing.

http://ruby.railstutorial.org/ruby-on-rails-tutorial-book

Version control. You can observe the benefits even working alone on relatively small projects. And it's one of the pillars to experiment with more reliable ways of deploying software

whats a good one to use for single devs/small teams?

If a lot of your projects end up on shared hosting solutions, it's difficult to streamline effectively. Depending on the provider and the hosting tier (single domain, unlimited, whatever), SSH access may be available or not. For a lot of those hosting arrangements, a process centered around FTP is the safest.

Given that limitation, I would definitely echo the importance of version control, and then highlight that a text editor capable of edits over an FTP connection can save a lot of trouble. I like UltraEdit, although it's commercial - it does have a full use trial period though. On Windows, I believe Notepad++ and Crimson Editor will also support edits over FTP. Be careful with an FTP capable text editor though, it's easy to make changes outside of your vcs this way.