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Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

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Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#81

Post by tynpeddler »

tptacek wrote: post #63

I understand this is opinionated and "personal", but on the off chance that this might make React less intimidating, let me chime in and say that you can do professional work (and build pretty much any reasonable application) without: - really understanding "semantic HTML" (if you know what div's and span's are, you're ready to get to work), - understanding flexbox (you can, and many pro developers do, just use a CSS…

>- design patterns --- in fact, I might argue that you're better off not reading about design patterns, which are kind of an architectural blind alley,

I have to disagree with this one. People who don't know design patterns are doomed to reinvent them anyways... badly. Even worse, without a common language to describe code structure, communication with team members is harder than it needs to be. Design patterns often get a bad rap because some people get really excited when they learn them and they try to use them inappropriately. But the correct usage of design patterns is the difference between inexperienced devs and experienced devs.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#82

Post by sbjs »

avip wrote: post #78
sbjs wrote: post #27

This chart is over complicated and I feel like it's meant to throw you off and make you feel like React programming is over complicated, which it isn't. Don't let this scare you away from React. React is simple. Remember, React is just the view layer. You can do whatever you want outside of React. You don't have to buy into anything else. And if you want to, you can buy into them piecemeal. You're not locked into any…

Now convert that into a blog and post it to HN. The fight vs. bloatelitists has just begun!

Good idea! What's a good free easy to use blogging platform for software devs?

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#83

Post by zampano »

I feel like this does a disservice to a prospective React developer in that, the hard part isn't finding what all the options are for each of these areas, its finding the one to start with. I'd love to see an _opinionated_ roadmap that tells you what to learn and in what order, and then informs you of other options at your disposal.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#84

Post by tchaffee »

I only have time for a quick brain dump, but I hope my observations are useful to someone:

- It needs a "happy path" with the very minimum you need to learn to get started. Something like create-react-app and what you'd need to learn after that. This diagram is too scary for beginners. Bury the full diagram further down in the README.

- Each of the tools listed relieves a real pain point in large applications. You need to know what that pain point is and if you even need that relief. Understanding when you need each of those tools is important but missing info from the roadmap.

- It does represent most the types of tools you would be using for a very big app on a large team. Frontend is just as complex as backend these days, and complex in a good way not a bad way. The tools aren't there to look cool. You need them in a huge app.

- It is super helpful to understand which tools solve the same problem. But this should be explained better for beginners looking to use the road map. "Oh, I don't need to learn Jest, Mocha, Sinon, Enzyme, and Chai, they all scratch the same itch" (mostly, let's not get pedantic).

- The other comments that say none of this is necessary, just use React, are great comments. It's true of a one person team for a small app. More of this kind of thinking should go into the minimal "happy path" roadmap.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#85

Post by robertAngst »

swoongoonz wrote: post #22

I'm torn. I don't think the aim should be "become a ${framework} developer" but just become a solid programmer with specialization in front-end technologies. If I needed to bounce out of front-end and into another tech role, I wouldn't have too hard of a time because I'm familiar with more than Javascript (I started learning programming with Ruby and Rails, but got my first professional gig doing analytics/seo). I fe…

Heck, I feel like once you are a programmer, you are a programmer.

Even after a decade of programming, it still takes me a few days to learn new concepts/libraries.

My thing is, if you already know it, copy paste and edit. If you dont know it, build the code for the first time. I feel like this is the difference between a 10 year programmer and 2 year programmer.

I have the foundation for sql databases, so it would take me mere moments to write a new full stack if I already had the code.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#86

Post by RussianCow »

robertAngst wrote: post #85
swoongoonz wrote: post #22

I'm torn. I don't think the aim should be "become a ${framework} developer" but just become a solid programmer with specialization in front-end technologies. If I needed to bounce out of front-end and into another tech role, I wouldn't have too hard of a time because I'm familiar with more than Javascript (I started learning programming with Ruby and Rails, but got my first professional gig doing analytics/seo). I fe…

Heck, I feel like once you are a programmer, you are a programmer. Even after a decade of programming, it still takes me a few days to learn new concepts/libraries. My thing is, if you already know it, copy paste and edit. If you dont know it, build the code for the first time. I feel like this is the difference between a 10 year programmer and 2 year programmer. I have the foundation for sql databases, so it would t…

This is true to some extent, but sometimes you really do need a specialist. Some fields, such as databases and machine learning, are deep enough that there is a huge difference between someone learning it on the job and someone who has been doing it for 10 years.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#87

Post by robertAngst »

tchaffee wrote: post #84

I only have time for a quick brain dump, but I hope my observations are useful to someone: - It needs a "happy path" with the very minimum you need to learn to get started. Something like create-react-app and what you'd need to learn after that. This diagram is too scary for beginners. Bury the full diagram further down in the README. - Each of the tools listed relieves a real pain point in large applications. You ne…

Im building my first(or maybe technically second) full stack app.

6 months later, back end is done, front end is RN and is almost done.

This roadmap gave me a shot of excitement because I'm at APIs.

I finally can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#88

Post by danielmason »

tptacek wrote: post #63

I understand this is opinionated and "personal", but on the off chance that this might make React less intimidating, let me chime in and say that you can do professional work (and build pretty much any reasonable application) without: - really understanding "semantic HTML" (if you know what div's and span's are, you're ready to get to work), - understanding flexbox (you can, and many pro developers do, just use a CSS…

As someone who's pretty far down the rabbit hole on a bunch of these fronts, I think this is wonderful advice. Many of these are tools to solve very specific problems, and you should make sure you have those problems first.

The only thing I'd differ on is the semantic HTML advice. What you're saying is true modulo accessibility, but accessibility is (well, should be) table stakes for professional work. And while the community has come up with some really nice individual abstractions around tricky a11y concerns, I haven't seen a way to get good results without at least some knowledge of HTML semantics. I'm not implying you don't care about a11y -- it's totally possible I've missed some better ways of doing things.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#89

Post by bodas »

wetpaws wrote: post #72
brlewis wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now is a good time to learn front-end tech. Skipping YUI was good, but you should learn at least one of Mithril, React, Preact, Inferno. I recommend Mithril for learning and React for job opportunities. It's OK to have skipped CoffeeScript, but you don't want to skip TypeScript in 2018. The past couple of years have been good as it has increasingly harmonized with ES6.

You can work perfectly fine in the industry without typescript.

Not for much longer. TypeScript is such an easy productivity boost compared to JavaScript.

Re: Roadmap to becoming a React developer in 2018

#90

Post by RussianCow »

wesleytodd wrote: post #70

I am a professional developer who primarily uses React and I actively avoid most of this. I keep up with the community so know (or at least know about) almost all of this, but choose not to use it all. The direction I have seen react go is exactly the opposite of the reason I liked it in the first place. It was simple and JUST A VIEW LAYER. How it became all of this is just typical software devs over complicating thi…

This is too dismissive of the reasons the ecosystem is the way it is. Sure, there is definitely some amount of over-engineering and NIH going on in the community, but every solution exists for a reason, and if a lot of people are using something (e.g. Redux), chances are that it solves a very real problem for those people.

There are times this backfires (AngularJS, react-router), but to say that all these tools popping up "is just typical software devs over complicating things" is a bit short-sighted. If they didn't solve problems, they wouldn't be as popular as they are.

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