Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#101

Post by nfRfqX5n » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:35 PM UTC

casper345 wrote: post #91

Right now yes, in the near future, probably not. As automation and better services come out, website development will be one of the first jobs to be replaced by this. Although services like Wordpress, Wix, have their problems, they get better and better every day. In the future, no one will be coding websites/not a viable career option (people may just code on the side website for really niche things) It is a great l…

i still think engineering will become more and more saturated to where it's a blue collar job, but don't see website builders ever replacing websites until AI is at a level where it's replacing humans everywhere else anyway

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#102

Post by austenallred » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:35 PM UTC

eu2usthrowaway wrote: post #89

austenallred wrote: post #76

Yes. I am the co-founder of Lambda School - (YC S17 - a CS education where the school doesn’t get paid unless you get a good job). Right now we see about 3 students/day get hired. You’ll likely hear a lot of people talking about how the market for juniors is flooded. That is partially true, but it’s flooded with people who cannot code . If you can actually be a productive employee I literally know 100 companies that…

I wanted to PM you but don't know how, hence throwaway. I apologize for not using my real hacker handle. I've just graduated (did 3 IT study programs in total -- 6 years of studying, overkill yes, I didn't have any good career advise via my friends, family or uni). Do you help people from the EU to work in the US? If so, then I'd really consider applying to your school since I am noticing that I can't get there mysel…

We just launched in the EU yesterday, but immigration is very difficult right now, for obvious reasons.

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#103

Post by ArtWomb » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:36 PM UTC

austenallred wrote: post #76

Yes. I am the co-founder of Lambda School - (YC S17 - a CS education where the school doesn’t get paid unless you get a good job). Right now we see about 3 students/day get hired. You’ll likely hear a lot of people talking about how the market for juniors is flooded. That is partially true, but it’s flooded with people who cannot code . If you can actually be a productive employee I literally know 100 companies that…

>>> there is insane demand

I am seeing it as well. And am recommending Lambda School to just about everyone who asks ;)

The main problem I see is the steep learning curve. The intro lessons are facile enough. Anyone can setup VS Code, and install an App Engine SDK. But by the time they get to modules 3-4 ("designing the data schema"). They are ready to throw in the towel.

At some point, a student requires one-to-one mentoring and repeatable reinforcement. Like learning a second language or playing the piano.

Also check out this nice write-up in Dealbook today on Lambda's model:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/08/business/dealbook/educati...

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#104

Post by shortoncash » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:38 PM UTC

leereeves wrote: post #100

milosdog2 wrote: post #98

People say that web dev (the javascript/react/python/c#/java) fullstack kind is boring and mundane. But what else do people actually do? Sure, there's ML and embedded work but aren't most engineers doing CRUD work anyway?

Is ML even a programming job? I see it more like data science, 10% programming 90% math. Edit: 3% programming, 30% math, 67% scrubbing data. Thanks for the correction shortoncash. :)

Most ML jobs are sitting around scrubbing data. The fun math part is like 5% of the job, and usually there's some guy (or a small handful of guys) that's a PhD who is hired to do all of that because he was in the research area before he left academia.

I could be wrong, but this is my experience.

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#105

Post by pennaMan » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:43 PM UTC

NinjaX wrote: post #16

It is viable that's why they are investing in browsers. Hahahha

Who is "they" and how did you get the impression that they are not investing in browsers?

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#106

Post by dpark » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:47 PM UTC

ArtWomb wrote: post #103

austenallred wrote: post #76

Yes. I am the co-founder of Lambda School - (YC S17 - a CS education where the school doesn’t get paid unless you get a good job). Right now we see about 3 students/day get hired. You’ll likely hear a lot of people talking about how the market for juniors is flooded. That is partially true, but it’s flooded with people who cannot code . If you can actually be a productive employee I literally know 100 companies that…

>>> there is insane demand I am seeing it as well. And am recommending Lambda School to just about everyone who asks ;) The main problem I see is the steep learning curve. The intro lessons are facile enough. Anyone can setup VS Code, and install an App Engine SDK. But by the time they get to modules 3-4 ("designing the data schema"). They are ready to throw in the towel. At some point, a student requires one-to-one…

> At some point, a student requires one-to-one mentoring and repeatable reinforcement. Like learning a second language or playing the piano.

It’s entirely possible to be a self-taught pianist. It’s also entirely possible to learn a second language without ever speaking to someone else in that language. What you can’t realistically do is become conversational, because you cannot practice that skill in isolation.

Similarly, it’s entirely possible to learn to develop software independently. You can learn languages and SQL normalization and good design all by yourself. You might learn faster with a teacher, but you can do it independently. You cannot learn to work well with others (properly subdividing designs, dependency ordering, giving good feedback, etc) in isolation, but honestly these are the things you generally learn on the job, because schools also suck at teaching these things.

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#107

Post by cgh » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:48 PM UTC

milosdog2 wrote: post #98

People say that web dev (the javascript/react/python/c#/java) fullstack kind is boring and mundane. But what else do people actually do? Sure, there's ML and embedded work but aren't most engineers doing CRUD work anyway?

I agree that most modern programming work boils down to “put this into the database, take this out of the database”. Probably the biggest exceptions in terms of job numbers are embedded, which often requires an electrical engineering degree, and game development.

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#108

Post by nnd » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:52 PM UTC

throwaway2016a wrote: post #33

gesman wrote: post #10

Solving [business] problems is a viable career choice. Web development could be solving someone's essential business problem or totally non-essential for someone else. The key is to find the customer for whom whatever you're doing will solve essential business problem. Quite often web development is exactly what customer needs but he won't call it this way. He won't use this wording. He won't look for web developer.…

You are making an assumption here they want to freelance or take a consulting position. There are plenty of web development positions available on teams or at agencies that find the customers for you. There is no need for someone just learning web development to go straight into consulting work. In fact, I'd highly recommend against it. You'll get the most out of working with other developers and improving your skill…

If anything it seems that to be successful at freelancing you need to specialize even more compared to a traditional job. Otherwise, your skills would become a commodity in a market saturated with "web developers".

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#109

Post by legohead » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:55 PM UTC

Been a web dev for 20 years.

Yes, but work on learning the full stack. Learn frontend, backend, SQL, sysop. Can you set up a server from a base image and eventually have a full app running reading from a database? Great! Now get familiar with cloud solutions like AWS. That might sound daunting, but it's actually easier in some respects. You don't have to know everything before you get a job, but knowing a little of all will show great promise in an interview.

Don't get attached to any one technology or programming language. This field changes all the time (annoyingly so). There was NOSQL, React, Node, hell I remember the times before Memcache. So keep your eyes and brain open and be ready to adapt. Your current place of work will likely stay stale with whatever they have, but if you don't keep up with the outside world, finding your next job will be much harder.

Re: Ask HN: Is web development still a viable career choice?

#110

Post by dpark » Tue, Jan 08, 2019, 3:59 PM UTC

avar wrote: post #15

gesman wrote: post #10

Solving [business] problems is a viable career choice. Web development could be solving someone's essential business problem or totally non-essential for someone else. The key is to find the customer for whom whatever you're doing will solve essential business problem. Quite often web development is exactly what customer needs but he won't call it this way. He won't use this wording. He won't look for web developer.…

This is just bypassing OP's question. You could similarly ask if plumbing, plastering or tiling is still a viable career choice in construction, or whether one should focus on general carpentry. You'd then try to work on projects where your construction specialty is seen to be more valuable than not, that goes to your comment. But that's an entirety different question than whether a specialty should be pursued, and i…

OP did not ask if they should pursue “web dev” vs “general/other dev”. That’s an assumption you’re making. I read this as “web dev” vs “do something else entirely” and in that light, the parent response is entirely appropriate.

Tangent: “general carpentry” is not a superset of plumbing/tiling/plastering. Carpentry is its own skill related to working with wood and similar products. Maybe you meant general contracting? Although that’s still not actually a superset and you won’t find that most general contractors are licensed for plumbing and electric work.