Technology plays a pivotal role in our lives, perhaps even more than we can fathom. From the most basic apps to revolutionary inventions, each and every piece of software exists because of a web developer.
But what does being a web developer actually mean? And what exactly is meant by web development?
Although to someone who is not tech-savvy at all, the mere concept of web development can seem like an alien and complicated field. So to make it easier for you we are here to shed some light into this wondrous field and tell you all you need to know about web development and what exactly does being a web developer entitle.
What is web development?
Web development is essentially the process of building or creating websites and applications for either the internet or a private network (the intranet). Contrary to popular belief web development isn’t related to the design of websites, rather it deals with the coding and programming behind how the website functions.
From the most basic and primary static web site pages to interactive social media platforms, e commerce sites and content management systems, everything on the internet has been at some point developed, coded and programmed by a web developer.
Web development has three fundamental layers to it
- Client-side coding (Also known as frontend coding)
- Server-side coding (backend coding)
- Database technology
How to differentiate between Web development and Web design?
Although these terms are often used interchangeably they are two entirely different things.
For instance, imagine that a web designer and web developer are working together to make a sports bike. The web developer would essentially be concerned about how the functional components of the bike, like how the engine will work, what kind of wheels and the gears etc. On the other hand the web designer is taking care of the visual features end. How the bike looks? Is it cool enough to be a sports bike? How does the seat feel? What kind of experience will the whole bike ride provide to the user and much more!
Similarly web designers also design how the website is supposed to look like and feel like. They try to model and represent the website in such a way that it is user friendly and easy to navigate with little or no technical knowledge. A web designer will have to consider all the visual features such as what kind of color schemes to use? What kind of buttons, scroll-down menus to include? How to design a web site that is easy on the eye, As well as is simple to navigate by a typical user?
It is the web developer’s job to take the web designer’s vision and turn into a fully functioning website. A frontend website developer uses coding languages such as HTML, CSS and JavaScript to make the visual design of the website. A backend website developer has the task of building and programming the more advanced functions of the website such as the checkout function on an ecommerce website.
To sum it up, a web designer can in essence be considered the architect of a building whilst the web developer can be considered to be the builder or engineer.
What is the role of a web developer?
The basic roles of a web developer are to firstly build then maintain websites. If you plan on becoming a web developer then you also have the option of either working in-house with a business or even freelance. Whilst most developers are either frontend or backend but there are also full stack developers that specialize in both frontend and backend programming.
Web developers are in charge of building a website that caters to both the client’s needs as well as the needs of the end user. In order to create a full functioning website a web developer will often have to work in partnership with other stakeholders, potential clients as well as web designers.
Most of the time web developer roles will also involve finding out and getting rid of bugs in the website in order to help the website run smoothly.
Of course for being a web developer one has to be an expert and proficient in a variety of programming languages. On the other hand, each developer has to work with a different language that depends on their job specification as well as area of expertise.
So now that you have a basic idea of what web development is and what does is the job of a web developer, we move on to
How can you become a web developer?
Although it seems like a daunting task, trust us when we say that a career in web development is one of the most stable careers you can choose. Even though it is a challenging field but it is also very financially rewarding as there has always been a demand for experts in web development and with time the demand is only going up.
The first and foremost most important step for starting a career in web development is to start learning the required programming languages as well as the libraries and frameworks of web development.
In regards to what languages you will need to learn, well it all depends on what kind of programming you are interested in, is it backend? Frontend or you want to be a full stack developer. Nevertheless all web developers usually have to be proficient in the following languages
- HTML
- CSS
- JavaScript
So if you are interested in starting a career in web development then you can start off by learning these three basic programming languages and see where your programming journey and creativity takes you from there