This is a guest post from Sonja Parsell. Enjoy. Dear Developer, Don't misinterpret a small distraction, or even a big disaster, as a "sign" that coding isn't for you. There were definitely times in my journey when a break in learning was completely justified, but by no means should I have seen it as a … Continue reading But First, Don’t Do the Dishes
Dear new developer, Kindness is an unsung virtue for software development. I touched on it in this post on empathy, but wanted to emphasize it again. Practice kindness. When I was young, I thought scoring points and being right were important. They are, but being kind and a good human is even more important. Be … Continue reading Be kind
This is a guest post from Dan Walkes. Enjoy. Dear developer, I was thinking this week about my Great Uncle, Bob Van Gerpen, who died of pancreatic cancer in 2011. Bob was my Grandma’s youngest brother and similar in age to my Dad. He was a big part of my parent’s life as they experienced … Continue reading Uncle Bob’s Ski School
Dear new developer, I had a friend who brought me into a club. The specifics of the club don't matter, but like most clubs, it had a variety of executive roles. Someone had to run the meeting, other people had to take notes, someone needed to keep track of the finances. As I took on … Continue reading Always be replacing yourself
Dear new developer, In certain areas of software operations, the concept of an error budget makes an appearance. An error budget is a way of tracking how often errors occur. When the budget is exceeded, you spend time and energy to decrease them. Having a number like this is a good way to align different … Continue reading Think about your career risk budget
This is a guest post from Jerrin Samuel. Enjoy. Dear new developer, Software development is a field that evolves quickly and constantly. These changes keep things exciting and interesting, but can also make you feel like you are falling behind all the time. Engaging in continuous learning is one of the solutions you can look … Continue reading Why Developers Should Engage in Continuous Learning
This is a guest post from Adam Steel. Enjoy. Dear New Developer, Getting your first developer job can feel like a big accomplishment. And it is! It can feel so big and you can feel so relieved to have any job at all that you might start to develop your worldview around that one job. … Continue reading Take jobs that help you grow
Dear new developer, I'd like you to close your eyes and put yourself in a couple of situations. First, think about a car you have owned. If you haven't, think of something else that you own and take care of. I have owned an automobile. I changed the oil regularly in my car; okay, that's … Continue reading Act like an owner
Dear new developer, One thing I love about software development is that you'll always be learning. This is because of two things. First, there's better and different hardware. It is possible that this pace will subside sometime, but looking at the variety of new computing hardware, sensors and components that have been created over the … Continue reading You’ll always be learning
Dear new developer, If you interact with web APIs at your job, learning curl is a good investment. Curl is a flexible, powerful, command line utility which lets you make HTTP requests. In my current job, I build a lot of API requests. Side note: I'm going to use the shorthand API for web based, … Continue reading Learn curl
Letters To A New Developer 