DevProjects: Are they really worth it?

Hello dear developer,

My goal here is to be as truthful to you as possible. Before I proceed any further, I would like to highlight a few of the many reasons why people learn to code, maybe you can come across one or two that will resonate with you.

1. Coding builds your problem-solving skills
2. It encourages and increases your level of creativity
3. it helps improve your focus and concentration level
4. It is one of the most widely used languages on the planet earth.
5. Coding will even enhance your learning skills
6. It will generate more income for you
7. it gives you time freedom (you can become your own boss, embark on vacations, spend more time with friends and families, etc)
8. Coding skills are required in almost every industry today, IT, Data Analytics, Research, Web Designing, Engineering…etc.
9. You can earn more while working for few hours
10. You can work remotely
11. You can easily make your side project dreams a reality
12. Coding will give you a sense of self-reliance and empowerment

I could go on listing the benefits of learning to code but obviously, we need to end it at some point.

Having seen some of the reasons why coding is the go-to career in the 21st century, lets now discuss the underlying topic

DEV PROJECTS

Disclaimer: The contents below are only for those who are coding as a career or profession. If you are learning to code for the fun of it, this content won’t do you any good… 

For any type of development paradigm(Web Development, Mobile App, Desktop Apps..etc) you decide to take up, there are three levels or stages you must either be at, one time or the other, the first stage is inevitable.

The stages

1. Beginner
2. Intermediate (Junior)
3. Advanced (Senior)

These stages are very significant to every developer. The first is a most while the remaining two are dependent on choice.

Just as every animal started from the infant stage, every developer must start from the beginner level.

Now if been a developer is your career prospect, then you shouldn’t feel relaxed at all or dwell too long at the beginner level because you won’t make any significant impact on that level. No client would want to have anything to do with a beginner developer.

Your aim as a developer should be the Advanced or Senior Developer level. But the truth is you can’t just come out and announce to anyone that you are a senior developer, no one will listen to you because it doesn’t work that way. Your mouth doesn’t do the talking but this does.

Your Portfolio

The definition of a developer’s portfolio is directly proportional to the number of projects completed.

This is the truth dear developer, one of the popular questions clients will ask you after a long discussion in trying to convince them you are the best candidate for the job is: “let me see samples of works(projects) you have done”.

Your chances of landing that project are very slim if you can’t provide answers to the above question. This is the reason why you will hardly find developer jobs on any freelance websites that are for beginner-level developers.

I have seen developers who remain at the beginner level even after 4 years of their developer career. This is because they keep learning without putting what they have learned together to build something.

The best way to improve and test your level of competence as a developer is by completing projects, no matter the kind of project. for example, after learning how the arithmetic operators work in javascript, you can put what you have learned together and build a simple calculator project instead of coming back to your text editor each time just to write a variable that will either add, subtract, multiply or divide two numbers.

Finally, if you really want to excel in your developer career, you need to start getting your hands really dirty in building projects, any new thing you learn in any language should be applied in developing one project. Don’t get stuck in tutorial purgatory, start applying what you have learned in building real-world projects.

The more projects you build, the better you will get and the closer you will get to becoming the best version of yourself.

Now if you ever get stuck in your development journey or career, join the secret society (Developer Community), this is where you will get help from people who reason and think alike.

I will recommend a few below.

1. Github
2. Stack Overflow
3. Hacker News
4. Hackernoon
5. Hashnode
6. Freecodecamp
7. Women who code
8. Codeproject
9. Digital Ocean
10. Reddit
11. Dev.to

Below are some of the popular websites where you can find projects to work on. Projects range from beginner to advanced level and no matter the programming or Scripting language you are proficient in, you will certainly find a lot of projects to complete in your chosen language.

Some of the best platforms in the industry include:

1. Codementor
2. Codewars
3. Hackerrank
4. Exercism
5. Edabit
6. Project Euler
7. Codingame
8. Leetcode
9. Coderbyte
10. Qvault
11. Spoj
12. Topcoder
13. Codier

Conclusion: Don’t let any week pass by without adding another weapon(project) to your arsenal(portfolio).

If you have questions or suggestions, let’s do it the comment section.

Happy Coding!!!

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