So you want to be a Web Developer? (Part 4/4)

And now for the final segment! We've covered the front-end, back-end and database technologies you'll need in web development. But those are merely the technical aspects of the job. Arguably, the most important part of the job is temperament.

What's "temperament" got to do with anything?

To answer that, let me just ask a few simple, searching questions.

Is it hard to take a urine sample? No, it's just icky.

Is it hard to draw someone's blood? Not if you have the correct training and enough practice, and don't faint at the sight of blood.

Is it hard to help an infirm person take a bath? It's not difficult per se, but boy is it tedious.

Got your attention?

Those are just three out of the numerous little tasks nurses do daily. Would you say any of it is difficult? Maybe not. But would you want to make a living doing that? No? Why not? It's a noble profession. But perhaps - just perhaps - it's not you. Perhaps you're thinking, screw all that, I just want an office job.

Almost every profession attracts people with a certain temperament. Accountancy attracts the number-crunchers, sports attracts the athletic, law attracts the argumentative. OK, if any of you reading these are accountants, sportsmen or lawyers, bear with me. I'm generalizing here. My point is, web development is like any other profession - it requires a certain temperament for it to work. Especially web development, because there's nothing about web development that is rocket science. Any kid with an average IQ can pick it up, it's a matter of whether they want to.

So what's a web developer's temperament? Let's examine this.

This is how you should be
approaching your work.

Love what you do

Unlike medicine, sports or astrophysics, web development is a field in which you don't have to be extremely smart, strong or fast. But you do have to be interested. There are professions in which one can get by on natural talent, and zero interest. Web development is not one of them. If you don't love it, you won't last a week.

Web development isn't glamorous. And unless you turn out to be another Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg, it's not going to make you rich and famous. You can earn a decent living, but before you get to that stage, it's a lot of shitty working hours and crap pay. And web development is definitely not the kind of job where you can turn in a nine-to-five performance, do the bare minimum and coast till you reach retirement age.

Some people want to be managers. They want to take home a 5-figure salary. Or they just want to work till they're in their 50s, and then retire with kids and grandchildren. There's absolutely nothing wrong with any of that. But buddy, if all you wanna do is make a living, there are far more effective ways to do so. There are better ways to achieve the glamor of holding a high position somewhere. And there are definitely far more likely avenues to big money. The only feasible reason to make web development your living, is to love it.

Keep up, honey.

Keep improving

There's always something new over the horizon. When you get into web development, there's no time to rest on your laurels. It's a state of constantly honing your craft, one way or another. You don't learn a couple things and then get to ride on them for the next few years, because there are many technologies associated with web development, and all of them undergo changes every few months.

Do you want to be in an industry where the ground keeps shifting beneath your feet? Would you enjoy it?

The whole point of learning so much stuff is this: in web development, there are no blanket solutions. Some technologies are more suited for certain needs. That's precisely why web development is the wonderfully diverse field it is today. However, in order to flourish, you have to like learning new shit all the time. You have to like constantly honing your craft. Because if you don't, keeping up is gonna be a gigantic drag.

You can be untalented. I've met developers who couldn't tell the difference between Comic Sans Serif and Arial. You can be dumb. Everything has a learning curve to it, and if yours happens to be steeper, so be it. But you cannot, under any circumstances, refuse to improve.

Yep. Back in those days...

Give to your craft, and it will give to you

Web development has been good to me. It can be good to you, too. But before you get something, most of the time you have to give something. I've given long hours of my life figuring stuff out. Taken pay cuts. Worked for some really demanding taskmasters. Sacrificed three girlfriends to the cause (because let's face it, no self-respecting woman appreciates being shafted aside on a weekend, for PHP and AJAX).

And I would do it all over again, in a heartbeat.

No one threatened me with dismissal if I didn't work during weekends, public holidays and put in 12-hour workdays. Certainly no one pointed a gun to my head and forced me to keep coding. I did it all because I loved what I do, and I wanted to be good at it. "Work-life balance"? What's that?

I'm not saying you have to make the exact same sacrifices. But what are you willing to give to be a web developer, and how much?

Conclusion

Again. web developers are the bricklayers of web development. If you're looking for tips on how to climb the corporate ladder, have the good sense to look somewhere else. If you want to make big money... hey, you know what makes big money? Peddling cocaine. Go sell some fucking cocaine and leave me alone, yeah?

Every recommendation I've given here, technical or otherwise, is just that - a recommendation. Web development's diverse enough that you could conceivably ignore everything I've said here and do it your own way. But as a starting point, give it a chance. Hey, you could do worse.

So you want to be a web developer? Get out there and <br> a leg!
T___T