Not sure I want a web dev job

That sounds like a great entry-level job to be honest. Seems like you lucked out!

Sorry, this post just comes across as whiny. Why would you think that web dev is any different than doing dev in the 90’s?

The tools may change, the technology may progress, but WORK remains the same. Some days are good and some days are bad - you choose to keep going or to stop. There’s nothing magic about being a web dev.

Pairs programming is not for everyone (I rarely encounter it here).

If you can’t tolerate regular code reviews, you are either too arrogant or too insecure. Code reviews are a chance to get better at your craft. Do you have anything you do and practice a lot? Do you ever get coaching on it? That’s what a code review should be.

So don’t do open source. Easy answer.

You sound like you were expecting something magical about this. It’s not magic. It’s just work.

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I suspect it isn’t, and in fact it may be worse in some ways. That’s why I’m interested in how working pros are actually spending their time these days.

Indeed, and this is the crux of it for me. I’ve spent the past 15 years working for myself and doing reasonably well at it. I’ve reached a point where I can choose whether or not to keep working, and I’m pondering a return to programming, but if it’s too much like what I remember I may do something else entirely.

I do and I have, but only when I feel like I’d benefit from the feedback. If I’m not in the mood to hear it, I might as well be a pig getting singing lessons. When it comes to programming, I’ve got a long list of weaknesses I’m well aware of (and likely many I’m not), but seemingly endless resources to use for self-improvement. What I worry about is having a protracted discussion with every pull request - just the idea of it makes me tired - and dealing with advice I haven’t asked for. At the moment, I’m in the incredibly fortunate position to be able to learn whatever I want, whenever I want, and I’m reluctant to sacrifice that freedom to the constraints of a job. Like you say, it’s work. Would you continue to work at programming if you didn’t have to?

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Thanks for your reply, your current work environment sounds like it’d be a good fit for me. However, I spent just about a decade as a more-or-less full-time developer, and the truly interesting problems I encountered were so few and far between I can still remember each one vividly. The rest of the time I spent doing all of the completely necessary but ultimately dull chores that real, working software requires. Can you talk about the ratio of challenging to routine tasks in your current job?

Would you continue to work at programming if you didn’t have to?

I don’t know.

Positives:

  • I can’t think of another “job” I’d prefer
  • It pays well
  • I get to do interesting things often enough to keep my attention
  • It’s far less demanding than past careers I’ve had
  • My time is pretty flexible
  • I can move almost anywhere and find a good paying “job”
  • I derive enjoyment from problem solving, and I get to do that pretty regularly
  • I don’t take work home unless I choose to do so
  • The times when I’ve had to deal with poor work environment (for whatever reason), it is easy enough to find another

Some other thoughts:
When I started, I took whatever, whenever (and I still would if it came down to it - nothing is permanent), and stumbled into good jobs and bad. I came to realize that I had to find something where I could fit in and I’m not referring to technical skills.

Job postings rarely sound interesting, so i usually only focus on relevant facts (location, pay, tech stack). I reserve actual judgment for the interviews, which I treat as mutual interviews. I’m just as interested in their process of filling this role as I am of the team. I will only accept based on what I consider to be a good fit for me.

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So you have received quite a few responses. I figured one more response cannot hurt.
I’m currently a computer science student but I have worked as a software engineering intern. I have also been meeting and exploring a plethora of companies in preparation for graduation. I want to share my experience at my internship because it is so different then some of what has been described. I will likely come off as overly confident in what I am saying. I just want to provide one more lens for you to look through.

Note: During my internship I was treating just like a newly hired employee, I was working on real projects with a real team.

What was the working environment like?
The working environment was incredible. No cubicles, you can wear headphones, and if you get bored go enjoy one of the many amenities. Our desks were in rows side by side to encourage communication with your team. The energy was very “work hard play hard”. It was definitely recommended that you did not become locked into your “silo”.

No one complained if you worked from home, a lot of people did this at least once every two weeks.

How much of it is coding?
I noticed someone on this thread mentioned that they had started a new job and was told she/he would not be programming for 2 months. That at least was not the case for me. As an intern I was permitted to take stories up on my own and complete them. I even was able to code review.

A majority of certain days were filled with meetings. This usually happened at the end of a “sprint”. This was not all bad. Food was always catered, we showed the higher-ups what we were working on, and planned for the next go around. I can see how it can be boring but this was once every two weeks.

Short answer, 2-7 hours of programming a day. If you took the average of every day probably about 5 hours.

What was agile like?

We used Scrum which is a commonly employed variant of Agile. Like others have mentioned, we had a daily stand up. For most teams this was at around 10:00am. These meetings would last for about 15-30 minutes.
Code reviews were implemented via Github. You pull request and someone needs to approve it before your code is automatically deployed. These were not bad and they very informative. Sure you can learn a lot online but this is usually self-directed. People will notice problems with your code that you did not know were problems. Sometimes they just want you to explain your code. Like, “I see you did this such and such way I’ve never seen that. What are the benefits?” I think this helped push what I was doing from developing to engineering. By this I mean I had consider multiple solutions to a single problem and pick what I felt was the proper one because I knew I would have to stand by it in the future. I only paired programmed when learning or when I really felt like it for whatever reason.

Advice for code reviews: Do smaller more frequent commits/branches/pull requests. This way you are not going to have a days worth of work teared down.

Conclusion:

I’m very green but I was welcomed into a programming heavy role. There were some criticisms but I think they were good. Code reviews were fairly painless. I’m sure you can escape paired programming. I have heard of places that do not do agile, i.e. companies that are contracted by the government. If you can prove an ROI in some form then you can likely start or recommend projects to the business side of the company. Just try it. Shop around if you have time on your hands. There are so many companies. The variety of employers is there. It is actually ridiculous how many flavors this industry seems to come in.

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The job can certainly be soul sucking at times… But hopefully there is a lot of good that balances it out. 2 months of not getting to write any code seems pretty weird, typically companies will have newbies get their feet wet by fixing some small bugs. It can take a long time to get familiar with a large code base. I’m not sure if my experience is a reflection of all companies, but at the large company I worked for I spent a lot of time in meetings and checking in with higher ups. At the small company I work for I rarely interact with my boss more than once or twice a week, it’s all about autonomy and ownership.

What kind of “dull chores” do you mean? We had one guy who handled all the build related stuff, so that’s one chore I don’t have to mess around with. I’d say a good 95% of my time is spent in the code. Of that I probably spend 30% of my time fixing bugs and 70% working on new features. By “new features” I mean from the ground up from thinking about design through the whole implementation. Since we’re small, typically each developer has their own new feature that they’re working on. I suppose “interesting” is subjective, but I can say there are probably 2 times a year when I get a problem that I have no clue how I’m going to solve, but in the end I get through it. I’d say those are the most challenging times. But really any new feature is interesting to me since I get to start from the ground up and figure it all out for myself. I really don’t mind the bug fixes either because after working on a new features for days on end it’s a nice break and an easy way to check something off my list so I feel like I’m making progress. I also get maybe one customer support email per week that our usually support guy doesn’t know how to answer and sometimes those can be interesting issues since they’re typically a little trickier. That other 5% I’m in a meeting, commenting on bugs, or talking to the product manager.
You might want to aim for a small company or a startup where 1. They likely won’t have rigid systems and processes set up. 2. You’ll get to write lots of new features and really feel like you’re owning the code. 3. You’ll feel like you have real inupt.
Keep in mind not every job is all roses. Some people prefer the back end, others front, some people like the huge tasks and others like small ones… You’ll probably end up with a mix. It’s good that you have an idea of what you like and what you dislike so you can target that in your job search. Good luck!

I am not sure if my experience as a front end dev is normal, but here is a brief rundown:

  • I work at a small private university
  • I have my own office
  • I decide what tools and tech stack I use
  • No one ever reviews my code before it goes live
  • My commute is less than 10 minutes
  • My workday is 7 hours with an hour for lunch
  • I get all holidays off and only have to work on weekends for emergencies, which are rare
  • The only downside is that my pay is below average for what I do, but the cost of living in my area is low so it works out.

I also get to live stream during work every day, which is awesome!

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I’m not a developer (at least, not a professional one), but I think my experience is relevant since I was in a similar position not too long ago.

I had played around with some HTML and CSS in high school and college, but never took it very seriously. A couple years ago, I started really getting into it in hopes that I could get out of a terrible office job that was making my life miserable. A few months in, I started feeling the same way - I enjoyed it, but didn’t think it was something I wanted to do full time.

Shortly after, I got a job as a technical writer with a web hosting company. I wrote a lot of documentation on backend tools and systems stuff (which was great experience), but the things I had learned about web development helped a ton. I would write code sometimes to make my job easier, and knowing how the front end works can be really helpful in figuring out why some things on the backend are configured the way they are.

I’m still working as a technical writer (still within the tech industry, although a different company now) and loving it.

You don’t have to be a full-time developer to use these skills. You don’t even have to be part time or do freelance - there are a lot of ways to use what you know. Another example is marketing. There’s a good amount of HTML and CSS involved in creating landing pages, and a lot of companies won’t allocate developer time to stuff like that. Knowing how ads will show up on certain pages is more than just graphic design.

If you don’t want to be a developer, that’s okay. Nothing against people who do want that for themselves of course - it’s a great way to change your life and we do need more devs - but I think people should be learning to code because they enjoy it, above all else. It’s up to you how you apply your coding skills, and there are a whole lot more ways to do that than a lot of people realize.

EDIT: I should also add that I still write a lot of code in my free time. In my opinion, not being a full-time developer helps me enjoy it more. I know plenty of devs who work on side projects, but I think I would personally get burnt out on it after a while.

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Glad to hear, you got work with all the time you spend on freecodecamp, I guess you might be really smart. For a 21 year old, getting hired, earning money is a good thing, yeah there might be lack of fun and care free times, well, that is work. But choice is your’s either to stay or not. It takes courage to drop out of college and go for something you wanted to pursue. So maybe you can make a strong decision for yourself. I’m 22 and still in tech school, and haven’t yet figured out what I’m gonna do after graduation. Good luck!

My experience on a front-end web app (400+ components) team is like this:

Overview:

  • Our team of 3-5 (varied over time) FE coders work in one-week periods called “sprints”
  • Product Manager/Designers decide on an agenda for each sprint, consisting of new features, bug-fixes, and polish issues. Each task/issue has a Github issue created and assigned

Individua Week/Day:

  • If critical bugs exist, find and fix those first (as soon as they come back from testing team)
  • A simple feature might just require adding some code to existing component(s) or state modules to handle new functionality
  • A complex feature might require creating a new component which itself contains multiple components, new state management module, and multiple API calls.
  • After new code is merged to master, test team checks it out and flags any new bugs to fix before it goes online. Ideally any bugs blocking new feature’s approval for going online are dealt with in the same sprint.

Range of Tasks:

  • Fixing bugs is diving through sometimes unfamiliar existing code base and use dev tools to find source and make a solution
  • Simple feature is maybe like the subject of one video in the React Udemy course I took (i.e. “now let’s add a new API call for this page so that this Todo item is saved offline” or "let’s add a new display that shows “data x”)
  • Large feature can be like coding the whole Todo app on your own in a couple of days (and often more complicated)

Misc Environment/Culture/Work Exp

  • It’s funny how some people are lamenting cubicles and praise open office. I’m at the point where I absolutely hate open office environment: designers are constantly getting into loud discussions and vociferous debates right behind me while I’m trying to focus on an issue, and I can’t afford $300 noise-canceling headphones at the moment. We’re also packed in like sardines, so lots of chair-bumping when people get up and move around. I find myself physically relaxing when most people go to lunch at 12, and I can finally focus for that hour.
  • I came to this job after 8 years working in non-technical roles (translation/marketing). I achieve the most “flow state” of any job doing this, so it’s great. I’m actually quitting this company just about at my first year mark for cultural and management reasons, and I could only have lasted this long because the work–when I have a good issue to sink my teeth into–is so absorbing.
  • Having been responsible for creative decisions in previous jobs, I find I am personally relieved to have less creative control. Give me a mock-up with all the dimensions and colors just as you want, and I’ll just hack it away. I think the anxiety or difficulty of my creative process was a big driver for me leaving my previous career. YMMV.
  • We do code review for new team members/juniors, then once they prove their capabilities, stop. I’m sure this varies shop to shop.
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This is going to sound incredibly patronising, but - welcome to working. You are 21 years old. You shouldn’t expect all of life’s glories to be handed to you, you need to work for it. You are going to have shit jobs at first. If you don’t want to work hard and achieve - someone else will instead. But if you do get your head down, you will find in time that either your current role becomes much more fulfilling, or you’ll be offered a much better role elsewhere.

Also, if you want creative freedom then become a designer/marketeer. As a developer, you may be in a position to add your opinion and experience, but you are there to work for the company, and implement their requirements whether you like it or not.

Apologies to be harsh, I wish you all the best.

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I work for a start-up. I’m the only person on front-end for the website (I do have a senior for when something is beyond my abilities…normally a bug from something a predecessor coded).

Work is in two week sprints. I have a variety of tickets, some are simply updating text/images, others are investigating and fixing bugs on the website, sometimes there are large rebuilding projects which can take most of my time up for weeks - I use HTML, CSS, JavaScript and jQuery mostly. I am also being trained on AngularJS (well, I am training myself more like) so I can provide back-up to the apps we have when my manager is on holiday.

I am free to do them in whatever order, with a view to releasing a new version of the website every fortnight, though occasionally something urgent crops up.

I need to work with the back-end guys to make sure I have all I require in the API, and I work closely with the product team to advise what is possible in terms of coding their proposed website updates, timescales, etc.

I used to work in finance. This is so much more fun, so much more challenging - I do have a great office environment to work in too (bar the lack of sunlight) - free beer, cakes, breakfast and all that jazz. Being in the centre of the universe helps too (London).

I’m not smart bro. I was just highly motivated, and anti-social. :stuck_out_tongue: But thank you. And good luck to you! Although, I do have to ask you, why do you say that “Well, that is work”? I don’t understand that. If “that is work”, why don’t we change the concept of work? (being the connotation is negative).

I understand what your saying man. And it’s kind of hard to avoid being patronizing when saying something as you said, so no apology really needed. Although, I do have to ask you, why do you say that “welcome to working”? I don’t understand that. If that is work, why don’t we change the concept of work? (being that the connotation is negative). And, why do I have to work hard to get a relaxing and comfortable environment where I have a lot of free time to spend how I want? Honestly, I really don’t understand that concept that I have to earn my place (that place not necessarily being a high paying one, but a more relaxing one). I just don’t understand the suffering beforehand. Why not suffering afterhand if you DO do something that makes you not adequate for that position. I’m not really asking for you to have an answer, I’m just trying to give you a perspective on my thoughts. Why don’t we try dessert before dinner? Ya know?

You have to work for what you want. If you want to not work long and hard hours to get what you want, someone else will have to end up doing the work. Nothing is free and if you want to make more money so that you don’t have to work as much then you have to put the effort in now to attain your dream.

Saying let’s change the concept of work isn’t going to change the amount of work that is actually needing to be done on a large scale. So in essence, you want more compensation or time off for the amount of effort or work you’re putting in. No matter what area of life you end up working in, you’re going to have to put hard work in to get the outcome you desire.

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