Our Twitch.tv channel has a virtual jukebox. When you’re there watching us code, you can request literally any song available on Youtube, and it will be queued up and played as background music on our stream.
And despite the millions of songs out there, one song seems to come up again and again. This English-language song was posted 6 months ago with little fanfare by a German software developer named Patrick Hund (@Wiekatz on Twitter). Give it a listen:
For those of you without headphones handy (or with the compulsion to immediately stop it), I’ve transcribed the full lyrics to “JavaScript Coder”:
The meeting with the product owner is finally done
I spent most of it browsing Twitter for news on the latest libs and frameworks.
Now I’m back at my desk
I put my headphones on
Now the terminal input prompt heeds my command
I do a catchup merge from the Github Origin
Got a grunt watch waiting for me to do the task at hand
Chorus:
I’m a Javascript Coder
I code JavaScript
I’m in the zone right now
Feel like an alchemist
Give me gulp or grunt?
Give me backbone marionette
Should I go for Angular or Ember.js?
Knockout, react or Vue?
To make a single page web app
The planet’s awesomest yet
There’s a world of wonders out there on the world wide web
So much to try out and so little time
Scrum master stay off my back
I need to figure this out step by step
(Chorus)
(spoken) Require.js, Knockout.js, Backbone Marionette, ES6, Underscore.js, Gulp, React.js, Angular.js, Ember.js, Grunt, Web Components, Lo-dash, Express.js, jQuery
I’m just a middle aged guy with two daughters and a wife
I love them dearly with all of my heart
I’m a regular family man
But when I open up my Macbook Pro, it’s a different life
(Chorus)
I’m a JavaScript coder
I’m living the dream
I build worlds with my code
And I do it for my team
“JavaScript Coder” probably won’t win any Grammy Awards, but it does provide insight into the life of a pretty representative JavaScript coder. The author is “just a middle aged guy with two daughters and a wife” who works in software development.
Similarly, most of Free Code Camp’s developers-in-training are over 30, and many of them have kids. If they don’t already spend their work days in meetings and at a desk with headphones on, they soon will.
The central conflict of “JavaScript Coder” is the series of tooling dilemmas that pervade the JavaScript world. JavaScript recently became the most popular language, and is experiencing an unprecedented Cambrian explosion of “libs and frameworks”. “Give me gulp or grunt?” and “Should I go for Angular or Ember.js?” are common tooling questions. Staying up to date with these tools is serious work, hence the author’s Twitter research creeping into his meeting time.
“JavaScript Coder” also talks about the mainstays of the agile development workflow. The office he works with uses Scrum, the most popular agile methodology. His day is peppered with meetings with the Product Owner and Scrum Master. For more details on how Scrum works, watch this excellent 15-minute video:
Most importantly, “JavaScript Coder” conveys the passion that JavaScript coders feel toward their work. Lines like “when I open up my Macbook Pro, it’s a different life”, and “I build worlds with my code / and I do it for my team” reflect the constructive, collaborative ethos of today’s web developer.
He even goes so far as to allude to being “in the zone” This is more than just an expression for being in a productive state. It’s akin to entering a “flow state”. Flow states are the brainchild of Claremont Professor Mihály Csíkszentmihályiare, and the subject of a growing body of psychology literature. To reach flow state, you need difficult creative work that demands your full attention and effort. It’s a state of extreme productivity that writers, composers, and yes, coders, strive to achieve.
The exhilaration of his flow state shines through in the video’s illustrations:
It gives us great joy to christen “JavaScript Coder” as Free Code Camp’s official theme song. Can you write a better song about JavaScript? Tweet us a link, or better yet, come to our Twitch.tv channel chat room and request it on our infinite jukebox.