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Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

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Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#181

Post by emteycz »

Thaxll wrote: post #162
jjice wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see what's so bad. Seems like it would be a convenient way to skip some boiler plate back end code used for CRUD. Probably not optimal for a complex application, but it looks very neat for something quick and small.

If you're learning backend services, don't start by things like postgREST, it's just bad habbit, would be better to start by the basis with API servers / DB ect ...

As a seasoned TypeScript backend/fullstack developer I don't understand

- why is it such a bad tool, and if it is because of the tool and not the concept, it seems possible it will be fixed in the future

- why is it a bad habit; I consider the boilerplate CRUD code I write to be a bad habit that I should've automated years ago, and that's exactly what PostgREST does

- why can't you learn the basics of API services and databases with PostgREST

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#182

Post by iaml »

webreac wrote: post #127

It seems you are good at building web CRUDs, but complains it is boring. It is boring because it is repetitive. Create a web CRUD builder. Computers are there to cope with repetitive tasks. You can put your expertise in the builder. You will continue to earn money by selling web CRUDs, but you should take your art to a higher level. Repetitive tasks are an opportunity to increase abstraction (like in SICP) and write…

To expand on that, if what you are doing is simple crud, it might be possible to completely ditch the backend and use https://hasura.io/ and talk to it directly using graphql. It can also generate typescript definitions which is another suggestion I was going to make. Using it made some parts of js more obvious and gave me a lot of confidence working with it.

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#183

Post by thatcodingdude »

dgb23 wrote: post #156

Hi fellow self-taught web-dev with (almost) a decade of experience. Since we have no formal education we need/want to constantly learn new things in our free time. This is both fun and can be very impactful. Learning for us is a habit, or even kind of an obsession, but we should always look at topics with a pragmatic eye too. All of the things I list here helped me do a better job (qualitatively) in some way or anoth…

Nice, that's really interesting ! How did you touch so many different languages, was it only on personal side-projects or did you learn on the job ?

I'm afraid learning too many different languages just for fun would be detrimental on my main "job" language, like I'd forget the main patterns. But probably not.

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#184

Post by pdubs1 »

nicoburns wrote: post #153

Honestly, in terms of employment you don't need to learn anything at all. Your skillset (which is quite similar to mine) is highly in demand. What you'll probably find is that you can specialise in any of the areas you already have skills in simply by advertising yourself differently. However, it's always good to learn more. I have a couple of suggestions: 1. Rust. The Rust book is an excellent introduction to lower-…

I 2nd the 2nd point above. But I'd say: If you check out the ESP32, also checkout micropython.

"ESP32 Tutorial using MicroPython - Let's Get Started!" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QopRAwUP5ds

A ESP32 mounted on a breakout board is super easy to pickup and run with-- https://www.adafruit.com/product/4172

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#185

Post by thatcodingdude »

rexreed wrote: post #94
halfmatthalfcat wrote: post #69

DevOps, SRE, CloudOps. Things are starting to trend where full stack jobs requires knowing how to build (usually with containers) and deploy (usually into a PaaS) your application. How do you manage a build pipeline, how do you provision appliances in a cloud provider, how do you monitor your applications if shit goes wrong, etc.

Based on his responses elsewhere here, it looks like Ops / Admin oriented things would be his groove.

Indeed, that's what I took away from reading the answers !

This thread has been a great help, I'm thankful for each response.

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#186

Post by tndl »

nicoburns wrote: post #153

Honestly, in terms of employment you don't need to learn anything at all. Your skillset (which is quite similar to mine) is highly in demand. What you'll probably find is that you can specialise in any of the areas you already have skills in simply by advertising yourself differently. However, it's always good to learn more. I have a couple of suggestions: 1. Rust. The Rust book is an excellent introduction to lower-…

I'm in a similar situation to the original poster, and I've chosen Rust. Tim McNamara wrote a compelling post making the case for why Rust is a good choice for your 'novelty budget': https://tim.mcnamara.nz/post/621040767010504704/spend-your-n.... Rust has also made me a way better engineer in the time I've been learning it. I've used it for some dabbling in embedded dev, and the cortex-m support (especially for STM boards) is very good. I think the Rust Programming Language (the Rust Book) is a great intro, but I found that making the jump from JavaScript to Rust was daunting in some places. I put together a little intro blog post that approaches learning from that angle: https://tndl.me/blog/2020/introduction-to-rust/

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#188

Post by iaml »

joshribakoff wrote: post #89
thatcodingdude wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm far from being good enough to contribute to open-source projects unfortunately. I can make lots of things work but I don't know enough advanced patterns and low-level stuff to contribute in a meaningful and maintainable way.

What better way to learn then?

This. I think it's pretty good practice to check out what's going on under the hood in libraries you use, or plan to. Sometimes you find interesting libraries or techiques, things you could improve and in rare instances that you need to stop using it...

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#189

Post by roberthahn »

You have all the skills needed to succeed in a technical level. Maybe look into expanding your expertise in sales, marketing, or running a business.

If that doesn’t float your boat then I suggest getting into woodworking with hand tools.

My point is that you don’t need to spend all your time focused on tech skill development - you might burn out on it.

Re: Ask HN: Self-taught webdev with lots of free time. What should I learn?

#190

Post by Thaxll »

emteycz wrote: post #181
Thaxll wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're learning backend services, don't start by things like postgREST, it's just bad habbit, would be better to start by the basis with API servers / DB ect ...

As a seasoned TypeScript backend/fullstack developer I don't understand - why is it such a bad tool, and if it is because of the tool and not the concept, it seems possible it will be fixed in the future - why is it a bad habit; I consider the boilerplate CRUD code I write to be a bad habit that I should've automated years ago, and that's exactly what PostgREST does - why can't you learn the basics of API services an…

It's a bad habit because of separation of concerns.
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