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This has been a question of mine for a couple of days now. With the emergence of AI and the abundance of junior developers, it can be easy to re-think wanting to become a developer.

Should You Be a Developer?

Being a developer is a lot more than coding simple Python syntax or adding a cool h1 tag to a website. I can’t answer this question for everyone, sometimes it just boils down to “Do I even want to be a developer?”.

The Pros

High demand

There is a high demand for developers because, after all, the shift towards technology, it’s almost impossible to create a business or company without a website or app.

Great pay

You can expect to get paid (as a junior developer in the US) $70,000 to $90,000.

Remote work

Because most developers spend most of their time on their computers, most developers can work from home.

Creativity

It is a requirement to be creative if you want to be a developer. As I said in my article:
Sketch2Code | Is The Need For Web Developers Dying?
I said that the main reason AI is not taking web (or really any) developers’ jobs is because of originality and creativity. AI is just a bunch of algorithms, so it’s not like AI can create 100% original and creative websites as I said in my article:
ChatGPT SUCKS At Coding Websites

The Cons

Repetition

Debugging is essentially 90% of coding, which can be repetitive and lead to burnout.

Work-life balance

As a junior developer (especially for start-ups), you will work late nights and grueling hours.

How to be a web developer

After deciding if you want to be a developer, you have to figure out how you will be a developer.

How I Would Be a Full-Stack Developer (If I Could Start Over)

Don’t worry if you want to be a front-end developer or if you want to lean more into the back-end; I will label if you need to learn some things front-end or back-end.

The Roadmap (In order):

Learn the Front-End

-HTML (Front-End)
-CSS (Front-End)
-JavaScript (Front-End)
-JavaScript’s DOM (Front-End)
-APIs (Front-End)

-Learn how to use the Terminal

Learn the Back-End

-Node.JS (Back-End)
-The database basics (Back-End)
-React.JS (Front-End)
-TypeScript (Front-End)
-Learn Networks
-Learn how to use Cloud
-Learn about security
-Learn SSR

Conclusion

In conclusion, I think being a developer is a great idea.

It’s better to start now than later, because more and more people are starting to learn how to code and there are lots of junior developers, and the more junior developers, the more money the company wastes.

Let me elaborate. See, when a company hires someone, they need someone to teach you things. Not only is that company paying you to basically do nothing, they are also spending their time and energy with you until you are ready. This might not apply for every company, but you get my point. Companies are becoming very weary when it comes for junior developers, so you will need to stand out.

There are many ways to learn how to code, you can use platform like YouTube and Freecodecamp (which as both helped me a ton), you can pay for some classes or courses, or you can go to college and learn there. There are many ways to learn how to code, sometimes they take days, weeks, months, or even years depending on what you take.

Suggestions

If you have no idea what you want to do, here are some free and self-paced suggestions to jumpstart your coding career:
Freecodecamp.org
Coursera
Codecademy
PluralSight