A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers • Hacker News Board

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#41

Post by jcampbell1 » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:23 PM UTC

greghinch wrote: post #33

I personally would prefer to see this divide: - Product developer - implements the functionality, from the database to the functional UI. Lives in Ruby/Python/PHP/etc. AND Javascript - UI designer - creates and implements visual designs. Lives in Photoshop and HTML/CSS - Dev Ops - maintains the infrastructure, optimizes resources, manages deployment. Lives on the command line Of course, all these rolls have crossover…

> Being good at the first two is a completely separate skill from being able to write and design software in a programming language like JS.

If find to write good JS view code, you need to be able to write html/css yourself. If you are implementing something like auto-suggest, a designer's html isn't likely to be much help. To write the view properly, you need to know how to position the suggest box relative to the input or cursor without interference from the rest of the DOM.

I don't think you can claim to be a good front end JS developer, and suck at HTML/CSS. I constantly find situations like: "how am I going to make this design work if the user name is 20 characters long?... Okay I'll float this, right text align this, overflow hide this, then a long-title plus a long username will automatically push the content down a bit". It is clearly a programming puzzle that needs to get solved by someone other than a designer.

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#42

Post by tocomment » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:26 PM UTC

michaelochurch wrote: post #16

Zed Shaw already solved this problem: http://programming-motherfucker.com . What made programming great (before the Douchebag Invasion came in and we were divided into these stupid warring camps) is now what makes "data science" attractive: the generalist flair and the ability to pick your projects and move around the economy by your own sail. By the way, I personally hate the term "software engineer", at least as co…

As an aside about CRUD apps. I've been kicking around the idea of building and selling a universal CRUD app. Do you think there would be a market for that? How would I sell it?

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#43

Post by michaelochurch » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:31 PM UTC

codegeek wrote: post #27

michaelochurch wrote: post #16

Zed Shaw already solved this problem: http://programming-motherfucker.com . What made programming great (before the Douchebag Invasion came in and we were divided into these stupid warring camps) is now what makes "data science" attractive: the generalist flair and the ability to pick your projects and move around the economy by your own sail. By the way, I personally hate the term "software engineer", at least as co…

"If you answer to managers.." I know you usually have good comments on HN, but is it just me or you really have something against "management". Anyway, the fact is that everyone answers to someone in some ways when it comes to money which we need to make to survive in this world unless you have family inheritance. Having said that, I am not saying that managers are necessarily the best thing in this world but i don't…

I wrote about my views on management, here: http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/04/30/gervais-macle...

Essentially, "manager" is a conflation of several corporate needs: (a) mentoring junior hires, (b) protecting the company from bad-faith employees, (c) protecting good employees from bad ones, (d) setting project priorities, and (e) putting a public face on the company (e.g. CEOs). Some of these jobs are more fun than others. There are huge conflicts of interest within what is called a "manager" and ultimately, employees get shafted.

Managers ultimately end up as the internal police force, because they're the ones who make firing and promotion decisions. However, there are a huge number of dirty cops. Most of them, in fact, are dirty. There are a few sadists who enjoy using the badge-and-gun just to fuck with people. There are others (much more common) who go full-on extortionist and use their power to build an image of outsized performance so they can hop out of cop work and into an executive or high-level strategic position. Rare is what police are supposed to be: principled public servants.

I don't have a problem with police. Society needs them. However, if the police started acting like the mob (with them making most of their income "on the economy") then I would. Corporate management is mostly dirty cops.

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#44

Post by wambotron » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:31 PM UTC

I do a good deal of both, can I be an Appliui Develotion?

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#45

Post by greghinch » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:33 PM UTC

jcampbell1 wrote: post #41

greghinch wrote: post #33

I personally would prefer to see this divide: - Product developer - implements the functionality, from the database to the functional UI. Lives in Ruby/Python/PHP/etc. AND Javascript - UI designer - creates and implements visual designs. Lives in Photoshop and HTML/CSS - Dev Ops - maintains the infrastructure, optimizes resources, manages deployment. Lives on the command line Of course, all these rolls have crossover…

> Being good at the first two is a completely separate skill from being able to write and design software in a programming language like JS. If find to write good JS view code, you need to be able to write html/css yourself. If you are implementing something like auto-suggest, a designer's html isn't likely to be much help. To write the view properly, you need to know how to position the suggest box relative to the i…

Yes, as I mentioned, there should be crossover, and everyone should know a something of the other side where that happens. So the Product dev should be able to certainly write HTML/CSS and understand how they work, but the Designer would be typically better at building a full template with optimized CSS. Put another way, good designers know their mediums, which should includes HTML and CSS, and doesn't stop at Photoshop.

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#46

Post by adregan » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:35 PM UTC

michaelochurch wrote: post #16

Zed Shaw already solved this problem: http://programming-motherfucker.com . What made programming great (before the Douchebag Invasion came in and we were divided into these stupid warring camps) is now what makes "data science" attractive: the generalist flair and the ability to pick your projects and move around the economy by your own sail. By the way, I personally hate the term "software engineer", at least as co…

What is "the Douchebag Invasion"?

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#47

Post by jfb » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:42 PM UTC

codegeek wrote: post #27

michaelochurch wrote: post #16

Zed Shaw already solved this problem: http://programming-motherfucker.com . What made programming great (before the Douchebag Invasion came in and we were divided into these stupid warring camps) is now what makes "data science" attractive: the generalist flair and the ability to pick your projects and move around the economy by your own sail. By the way, I personally hate the term "software engineer", at least as co…

"If you answer to managers.." I know you usually have good comments on HN, but is it just me or you really have something against "management". Anyway, the fact is that everyone answers to someone in some ways when it comes to money which we need to make to survive in this world unless you have family inheritance. Having said that, I am not saying that managers are necessarily the best thing in this world but i don't…

Code quality clearly isn't important, or we would have better tools. More controversially, why should it be important? Software quality is ineffable, unmeasurable, and therefore impossible to manage. So organizations just kick the ball downfield and accumulate technical debt by the bucketload, and they're arguably correct to do so. The only people who suffer are the programmers, and they're plenty of those, and more every day.

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#48

Post by rbosinger » Fri, May 03, 2013, 2:53 PM UTC

I'm down. I also hate saying "frontend" and "backend" too much. It sounds kind of dirty. "She's working hard on the frontend while I try to find these holes in the backend!". I always have to pause before using these terms to see if the sentence will be funny.

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#49

Post by bchjam » Fri, May 03, 2013, 3:26 PM UTC

michaelochurch wrote: post #28

edw519 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you answer to managers and build CRUD apps to support their careers rather than your own, then you're not a professional. Pretty amazing statement from someone whose comments are otherwise among the best here on Hacker News. 1. CRUD apps run the world. They were here long before all this sexy unnecssary stuff and will be here long after these fads pass. 2. Whether you want to admit it or not, everyone answers to s…

1. CRUD apps run the world. They were here long before all this sexy unnecssary stuff and will be here long after these fads pass. Fair point. "CRUD" is a straw man. Actually, most apps should be simple. That's just good design. If CRUD is enough to solve the problem, then one shouldn't do more if it compromises simplicity or conceptual integrity. 2. Whether you want to admit it or not, everyone answers to someone. S…

I've refused to do things I found unethical in the past (bulk spamming, lying to vendors to get better discounts/terms/freebies). I also have to argue the merits of technical solutions with my manager. Sometimes I help out on projects where solutions seem sub-optimal but if it's flat out wrong I'll be loud about it until people catch on and it gets changed. I've decided to use a different language on a project and had it eventually become the default language for new development (from VB.NET to C#). And I've never had my employment threatened doing any of these things, though most of them have occurred in a corporate setting, working on a framework for enterprise crud apps. So I definitely feel that there's room for being ethical (or at least relatively true to yourself) within a corporate environment without getting totally screwed over in short order.

Re: A Proposal: Renaming Backend/Frontend to Application/UI Developers

#50

Post by michaelochurch » Fri, May 03, 2013, 3:29 PM UTC

adregan wrote: post #46

michaelochurch wrote: post #16

Zed Shaw already solved this problem: http://programming-motherfucker.com . What made programming great (before the Douchebag Invasion came in and we were divided into these stupid warring camps) is now what makes "data science" attractive: the generalist flair and the ability to pick your projects and move around the economy by your own sail. By the way, I personally hate the term "software engineer", at least as co…

What is "the Douchebag Invasion"?

Douchebag Invasion: when we as a tribe lost the high-autonomy blue-sky R&D environment and it became the reality for most of us to answer to clueless douchebags who lack any respect for what we do.