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General Discussion

Posted by Maxwell DeMers
Maxwell DeMers
6,853 Points

Am I missing something?

I am learning a ton on the front end web developer track, and I am really enjoying it. I am hoping to take full advantage of treehouse's career help once I finish the track, and build some projects. But, when I think of things to build, I am often stumped with how to bring my ideas to life, because I don't know any backend programming language(other than using Javascript with node), or I don't know what to do about using a server. Based on my understanding, the front end track doesn't teach anything on full interaction with a server(I am at the AJAX section). This leads me to wonder, "Am I missing something?" I read about different people creating websites and web applications that seem to require some sort of backend help, but I am sure they didn't get that from the front end course. Is there an expectation that what I build should involve more than the front end aspect?

2 Answers

Luciano Bruzzoni
Luciano Bruzzoni
15,518 Points
Luciano Bruzzoni
Luciano Bruzzoni
15,518 Points

Hey Maxwell, you don't really need to know backend to come with ideas to code. Working with API's, now that you are learning ajax, will give you hundreds of ideas. If you really must use a database then you could maybe checkout https://www.firebase.com/. They take care of the back-end work for you while you work on front end things. Eventually you would want to learn some back-end language if your ideas are really complex though (which is what im working on now!). Good luck!

Jacob Mishkin
Jacob Mishkin
23,118 Points
Jacob Mishkin
Jacob Mishkin
23,118 Points

Maxwell, Most frontend developers know at least JS, and many know one backend language as well. You can achieve a lot with just frontend work, but to take the step outside of static sites, you should learn at least one backend language. Take a look at PHP, Its very versatile and most of the web is programmed in it. My suggestion is know JS then find a backend language that you like. You need to know OOP, for sure.