There are many terms you hear when we talk about web development. E.g: Front end developer, Backend developer.

Front end developer: A front end developer is responsible for visualising the business logic using HTML, CSS and JavaScript. They are experts at designing the website and adding functionalities using JavaScript or similar scripting languages.

Backend developer: As the name tells they are responsible for communicating the frontend to the backend services such as databases and APIs. Most of the time they deal with databases, API services, and other web architectures. However, they are comfortable with front end designing as well.

FullStack developer: They are responsible to develop frontend and backend of a web application. They are capable of designing the website and communicating the website with databases and APIs.

Here is my web developer Skill Sheet,

Learn HTML,CSS and JavaScript
There’s no doubt HTML, CSS and JavaScript powers almost all websites in the world. Even if you are writing the markup in any other technologies It’ll always convert into HTML markup to render in a browser.

So you must master these languages before diving into other frameworks and backend technologies. This will also help you to get a solid understanding of how web pages are rendered in a browser and how tags are arranged in the document object model(DOM).

2. JavaScript libraries & Frameworks


JavaScript is a client-side as well as a server-side scripting language that helps developers to add functionalities to a website. Traditional JavaScript is built for web development. There are tons of features which can help you to manipulate dom, capture events, change behaviour and many more.

It’s always a good idea to master one of the JavaScript libraries or frameworks to make your web development life easier and faster. There are plenty of libraries and frameworks already available in the market and the majority of all are open source.

I have listed some of the popular libraries and frameworks you should consider learning,

Angular – Single page web and mobile applications. There is a steep learning curve to master it.

React – Progressive web and mobile applications. Much easier synatx and logic compared to master compared to angular.

Vue – Progressive web applications. The syntax is easy compared to react and angular but relatively new to JS frameworks.

NodeJS – JavaScript runtime environment for server-side scripting. Most of the Js frameworks require NodeJS to work.

ExpressJS – Creating a web server in NodeJS has never been so easy like express.

3. CSS Frameworks and preprocessors


CSS used to style a webpage. As a web developer, you should master at least one CSS framework. This will help you to follow a standard approach to style the pages and also save your time when it comes to style common components like navbar, header, and divisions. There are many CSS frameworks to choose from. Some of them are listed below,

Bootstrap

Fountain UI

Semantic UI

Material UI

Writing CSS is one of the tedious tasks for almost all web developers. Sometimes we need to repeat the same CSS for different elements. There come CSS preprocessors. A CSS preprocessor is a scripting language which helps you to write CSS faster and efficiently. We can store CSS codes in variables and use those in the entire CSS file.

E.g: SASS

4. Databases

Do I need to learn database as a web developer? Indeed yes. Having knowledge of databases will help you to become a backend or a full stack developer. Databases are vital in developing any application. They are used to exchange data between the server and client-side browsers.

So as a web developer I will suggest you learn at least one querying language and an RDBM System. SQL is one of the widely used querying languages and supported by mostly all server-side scripting languages.

Most used SQL databases are:

MySQL

PostgreSQL

SQLite

Apart from SQL, there is document-based database languages as well. They don’t use SQL to store and manipulate data. Instead, they use JavaScript object-based approach to store data. They are very useful when developing applications with node-based platforms.

Eg: MongoDB

5. Version control system



You have probably heard of Git version control. They are pretty much useful to keep track changes done to a codebase. Version control systems are helpful when a project is managed by multiple developers across remote locations.

Most used version control systems are,

Git

SVN

Bit bucket

6. Linux

Linux is one of the favourite operating systems among developers. Linux is fast, free from malware and provide shell access to manage files and connections remotely. As a web developer, I strongly suggest you to learn Linux and dealing with terminal or console.

You may wonder why I should learn Linux as a web developer. Well, I also had the same confusion earlier. The first reason I would say is Linux is open source. That means you have the freedom of editing whatever you want. Also, the Linux shell is far more superior to the windows command line. And it provides native support for SSH connections to manage computers remotely.

Also, It’s quite easy to manage databases and web servers in Linux distros. And shell scripting also attracts developers from using other operating systems for web development.

7. Backend languages

Well, HTML, CSS and JavaScript will help you to become a web designer. But to become a web developer you should consider learning at least one server-side scripting language. These languages are used to connect the front end design to the databases and API services. There are many languages to choose as a backend language.

But I would suggest you learn NodeJS as it’s most trending and helps you to manage the entire codebase in a single language stack eg: MERN and MEAN Stack. Apart from Node, there are other languages as well.

E.g:

PHP

Python

Java

ASP.NET

These are the most essential skills one should consider learning to become a web developer. Also, there are things like learning basic image and video editing will also be quite useful.

If you liked this article feel free to comment your views and share with your friends and thanks for reading. Good luck!

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