Distinguish FrontEnd, BackEnd and Fullstack

The front-end part of a website is the part that interacts with the user. Everything you see when navigating on the Internet, from fonts, colors to drop-down menus and sliders, is a combination of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript controlled by the browser. your calculator.

Skills and tools

Front-end programmers are responsible for the look and feel of a website and the architecture of user experiences. To accomplish these goals, front-end developers must master three major languages: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript programming languages. In addition to mastering those languages, front-end developers need to familiarize themselves with frameworks such as Bootstrap, Foundation, Backbone, AngularJS, and EmberJS, to ensure the content is always displayed well on all different devices. , and libraries like jQuery and LESS, pack code into a form that saves time and is more useful. A lot of work for front-end programmers also requires experience with Ajax, a technique widely used by JavaScript to enable pages to load automatically by downloading server data at background part.

A front-end programmer is the person responsible for interior design of the house that was built by a back-end programmer.

Using these tools, front-end developers work closely with designers or user experience analysts to turn mockup, or wireframe, from development to actual product. Good front-end developers can also pinpoint specific issues in the user's experience, providing systematic recommendations and solutions to influence that design. It is important that they are able to collaborate with other groups in the company to understand the specific purpose, needs and opportunities, and then follow those instructions.

This work includes a lot of responsibilities, but it is very worth doing. “I am a technician, but still a visual person, and can manipulate what we see and interact with digital platforms through self-marking and coding. Of course, ”Mikey Ilagan is a front-end programmer with 8 years of experience. "Because of that, I love being able to create an impact on the user interface, aspects of an application or website that users interact with and see."

In general, a front-end programmer is responsible for the interior design of a home that has been built by a back-end programmer. The taste and decoration style is decided by the landlord. According to Greg Matranga, Product Marketing Manager at Apptix, talking about both front-end and back-end programmers that he oversees, "Developers working on front-end are sometimes more excited. about what they do because they can really take advantage of their creativity. ”

For example

Everything you are seeing on this site right now can be done by a front-end programmer. A designer creates logos and graphics, a photographer provides images, a copywriter writes content. But a front-end programmer combines all those pieces and translates it into web language, and creates the experience you have when browsing through each page. To get a specific example, when you scroll the mouse up and down on the homepage of the Udacity website. Did you notice that the "U" disappears and reappears? That is the work of a front-end programmer.

Programmer Back-End

But what helps the front-end of a website work? Where will all the data be stored? That's part of the back end. The back end of a web page includes a server, an application, and a database. A back-end programmer builds and maintains technology that powers those components, allowing the user interface of the site to exist.

Skills and tools

To make servers, applications, and databases communicate with each other, back-end programmers use server-side languages ​​like PHP, Ruby, Python, Java, and .Net to build an application, and tools like MySQL, Oracle, and SQL Server to search, store, or change data and serve back to users in the front-end section. Jobs recruiting back-end programmers also often require experience with PHP frameworks such as Zend, Symfony, and CakePHP; experienced with version management software such as SVN, CVS, or Git; and experience with Linux in system development and deployment.

Back-end programmers use these tools to create or contribute to web applications with clean, portable, and well-documented code. But before writing the code, they need to coordinate with business stakeholders to understand the specific needs, then turn into technical requirements and offer the most effective solutions for technology architecture.

“I always love back-end development because I love data-driven work,” JP Toto is a long-time back-end programmer, currently working at Wildbit. “Recently, public and private API libraries have become an essential part of data exchange between mobile devices, websites, and other connected systems. Making APIs makes the community feel useful as part of my work satisfaction. ”

For example

When you navigate to this site, Udacity's servers send information to your computer or mobile device, and they are converted into the web page you are seeing right now. That process is the result of the work of a back-end programmer. In addition, if you enroll in an Udacity course or a nanodegree course, storing your personal information – and the fact that every time you go back to the site and log in, your data will be called back – that's part of the back-end programmer's job.

Programmer Full Stack

There is usually no clear black-and-white distinction between front-end and back-end development. "Front-end developers often need to learn more about back-end skills, and vice versa, especially in the current economic period," Matranga said. "Developers need to have many different skills and have general knowledge."

Full stack programmers are versatile people.

The concept of full stack programmer is a role that was popularized 4 years ago by the technical department of Facebook. The idea is that a full stack programmer can work inter-function on technology "stack", ie both front end and back end.

"Professional work on both side and client side servers opens up many opportunities," Federico Ulfo, a full stack programmer at Grovo, said. But, of course, developing a full stack is not without its challenges. “To make a delicious dish, you can be good at cooking or good at baking, but to master both of these skills, it takes time and experience. And I'm not talking about just following a formula, because anyone can do that. I'm talking about having ingredients to prepare for something really good. ”

Skills and tools

Full stack programmers work like back-end programmers on the server side of web programming, but they can also master the front-end languages ​​to control what content looks on the side. interface of the website. They are versatile people.

To illustrate the growing complexity of full stack development, the following is an example of the requirements that a full stack must have in the past few years, and compare with the current requirement:

Regardless of which tool to use, depending on the project and the customer, full stack programmers should have knowledge at all levels on how the web works: installing and configuring Linux servers, write server-side APIs, jump into the client-side JavaScript part of an application, and also need the "aesthetic eye" with CSS.

Using these tools, full stack programmers need to be able to immediately determine the responsibilities of the client-side or server-side, and present clearly the pros and cons of different solutions.

For example

A full stack programmer will be responsible for the entire flow of your experience with this blog post, from load time and layout to its interactivity and structure.

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