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Are you trying to recruit a frontend developer and wondering how to identify if you’re dealing with a good candidate? Do you want to know what frontend developer talents you should have?
Perhaps you want to be a frontend developer and are wondering what skills you’ll need to advance your career.
This blog is for you in either circumstance. Continue reading to learn about the essential abilities required for frontend developers and the specifics of this role in the software development process.
Who is a frontend developer?
Frontend developers are in charge of creating all of the visible components of programs and websites. They design the user interface (UI), the things people view and determine how programs or websites operate based on user activities.
Which frontend developer skills are in demand right now?
Frontend development is one of the most straightforward ways to break into the tech business. However, special talents are required to become a frontend developer. Here are the top frontend development skills in demand today.
1. HTML, CSS, JavaScript
These three languages must be understood by a frontend developer. HTML is the primary structural component of every website, whereas CSS is responsible for style. Knowing these tools will allow you to create some basic websites and applications. To make them interactive, though, you must have a rudimentary understanding of JavaScript.
These three languages are essential for anyone interested in a career in frontend development. HTML is a markup language, CSS is a style sheet language, and JavaScript is the only one that can truly be regarded as a programming language.
HTML and CSS identify the page’s presentation, whereas JavaScript determines the function of its elements. JavaScript is required if you want interactive elements like games, scrolling, or animations.
2. Knowledge of CSS and JavaScript frameworks
CSS and JavaScript have already been mentioned. However, because they are such an important aspect of frontend development, you must be familiar with more than just the languages. CSS and JavaScript include a number of frameworks. These are essentially CSS or JavaScript tools that can perform a variety of tasks for you.
The good news for frontend developers is that they do not have to write every feature from scratch. Logging in to a website or using a search bar on a blog are examples of popular functions that can be found in these frameworks.
Frameworks each have their own set of advantages and disadvantages. That is why it is critical to understand which framework is most suited to the type of application you are developing. For example, while some JavaScript frameworks are excellent for creating complicated user interfaces, others are far superior for displaying highly optimized, simple website content such as paragraphs of text and graphics.
Another advantage of this technique is that you may combine multiple frameworks. Many frontend developers, for example, combine the Bootstrap UI framework, which allows them to design page structures faster using ready-to-use components, with a JavaScript framework like Angular, which allows them to deliver high-performance and quick applications. While Angular handles the content, Bootstrap handles the application’s appearance and feel.
Because you will be using CSS and JavaScript in your projects all the time, and many of them will begin with similar elements, knowing these frameworks is critical to becoming an efficient team member. However, it is highly recommended that you have solid fundamentals before diving into those frameworks.
3. CSS preprocessors
While CSS expertise is required, the language might be difficult to understand at times. When your project expands in size and codebase, you may find yourself wasting a lot of time writing repetitive code, messing around with bad file structure, or figuring out what “cascade” in CSS shorthand really means when you accidentally create a few class names with the same name.
CSS preprocessing comes into play here. It’s essentially another method of making your life easier. CSS preprocessors such as SASS, LESS, and Stylus enable developers to create code in the language of the preprocessor. That way, you can accomplish everything that would have been considerably more difficult with plain old CSS. To verify that the code works on your website, the preprocessor will transform it into CSS.
In practice, it looks like this:
Assume you decide to change the hue of red used throughout your website. When you use a CSS preprocessor, you only have to change the hex value once rather than going through all of your CSS code and changing the hex values all over the place, or when you have a block of CSS properties that you want to use in a few classes but it would be messy to duplicate this code and make the CSS file larger and larger. @mixins and @include came in handy here. These variables allow you to declare some code as a variable in one place and utilize it throughout the files by just calling this variable.
4. Version control and other developer tools
Not to mention that a frontend developer will be a member of a development team. That is why it is critical that he or she understands how to use the most popular software development tools.
The work of a frontend developer is complex, and you will almost certainly go through several changes during the development process. If something goes wrong along the way, you don’t want to be forced to restart from scratch. Version control comes into play here.
It is the act of recording and controlling changes in your source code, which ensures that this scenario never occurs. Version control software is used by developers in a variety of ways. Git, an open-source tool that monitors changes for you, is one of the most popular. It allows you to go back to prior versions of your work and figure out what went wrong without taking the entire codebase apart.
5. Responsive design
The days of merely using one device to access a web application are long gone. Consumers increasingly use a variety of devices, many of which are mobile, such as smartphones or tablets.
When it comes to web development, frontend developers must be aware of this and understand the fundamentals of responsive design. When creating a website, you must ensure that its pages will adjust to the device of your users.
Understanding responsive design ideas and how to implement them in your code is critical today. Although responsive design is built into CSS frameworks like Bootstrap, nothing prevents you from creating your own responsive CSS rules.
6. Testing
A bug-free software development process is impossible to achieve. To keep things moving forward, you’ll need to test your codebase for defects along the way. As a result, another key technical talent for a frontend developer is the ability to test and debug.
In software development, various types of tests are utilized. Functional testing, for example, investigates a specific piece of functionality to ensure that it does precisely what you coded it to do. Unit testing, on the other hand, focuses on testing the smallest pieces of code in your application that are only responsible for one thing. Frameworks such as Mocha and Jasmine assist developers in speeding up and simplifying the testing process.
7. Web performance/building and automation tools
Frontend development is comprised of three fundamental tools: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. However, other abilities are required to make them more efficient and operate in your favor. As a result, the most brilliant frontend developers are also knowledgeable about automation tools and web performance.
It makes no difference whether you built an awesome website if it performs slowly on the user’s end. Consumers are ruthless nowadays, and if they have to wait more than a few seconds for a website to load, they will most certainly abandon it.
As a result, astute frontend developers understand how to boost site performance by compressing pictures or deleting all unneeded characters from their code without affecting its usefulness.
Frontend developers use building and automation technologies like Grunt or gulp to avoid spending too much effort optimizing web speed. These programs are useful for automating image optimization and a variety of other site performance tasks.
8. Creativity
Because frontend developers are in charge of how websites and applications look, they must be innovative in order to solve the most prevalent user interface difficulties. They must be able to integrate familiar aspects with novel solutions.
Naturally, it is advantageous for frontend devs to have an open mind and a strong desire to learn new things. Frontend development trends and technologies, like those in every other field of software development, are continually changing. That is why it is critical for frontend developers to keep up with the progress and add as much value to their projects as possible.
9. Communication skills
Frontend developers must be effective communicators because they work closely with UI/UX designers and backend developers during the software development process. Frontend developer skills necessitate strong social skills.
When a team uses agile software development technologies such as Scrum, the process itself often facilitates communication. However, strong communication skills are essential while working with others. That is why frontend developers must be able to easily convey their ideas and generate clear documentation that their team members will like.
10. Teamwork
This point follows from the previous one. Frontend developers must, of course, be skilled collaborators. Because cooperation is a part of a frontend developer’s daily life – even if you wind up as a freelance software developer! – you will need to communicate effectively with the client and collaborate with the complete project team.
Frontend developers must be able to support others, seek guidance when necessary, streamline workflow, and deliver the end product swiftly.
Conclusion
Naturally, this is not an exhaustive list of essential frontend development abilities. After all, the specific abilities required of a frontend developer will vary greatly depending on the project and its specifications.
However, if you want to start a career in frontend development, you will require the abilities listed above.
Also, read the web development choosing guide.
