Author: vallish

AWS developer toolkit: In-demand skills, learning resources, online courses, interview prep, books & more

Posted on by vallish

Cloud computing has changed the infrastructural architecture of the internet in far more ways than any other technology has. And among all major cloud platforms, AWS or Amazon Web Services takes the giant share. 

To give you an idea, AWS owns more share of the cloud market than four of its closest competitors combined. The ubiquity of the AWS platform is why there is such a huge demand for AWS developers. There is a good chance that any software engineer job requirement will list AWS as a required or expected skill. If you take the time to understand AWS development, you will be a distinguishable and highly valued developer at any organization. 

As the functionality and number of services in AWS are in the hundreds, it can be overwhelming to find the right resources. This AWS developer toolkit is your complete guide for the best resources to learn AWS development.

  1. Deployment: The most basic but essential AWS skill is deployment. There are numerous ways to deploy an application on AWS. It would help if you kept learning AWS deployment because it is frequently upgraded to accommodate technological advancements. You must know concepts like EC2 instance, CloudFormation, Elastic Beanstalk, Elastic Container Service (ECS), and Elastic Kubernetes Service.
  2. AWS SDK: For any application to interact with AWS, it needs to connect with the AWS Software Development Kit. If you have experience with application interactions, you know how APIs are used to collect two applications. The API layer in AWS SDK is vast, and even pros are surprised to find how much can be accomplished with it. As an AWS developer, you must understand how to work with the SDK. Using AWS for your applications becomes easier when you know everyday AWS SDK tasks, such as connecting to a DynamoDB table or pulling down an object from an S3 bucket.
  3. Security: While AWS can open a new frontier of scalability and decentralization, it also comes with specific challenges. You are on your own when creating a production environment, and it is essential to understand the ins and outs of the AWS security model and Identity Access Management or IAM. Most of the bugs arising in AWS result from developers’ misunderstanding of IAM. As a developer, you are expected to understand how Roles and Policies work.
  4. Serverless: More and more developers are relying on AWS’ serverless services like Lambda and API Gateway to solve their problems. Understanding when and why to use serverless solutions is essential for any AWS developer. According to Amazon, “A serverless architecture is a way to build and run applications and services without having to manage infrastructure. Your application runs on servers, but AWS manages all the servers.”

Developers who understand serverless are more in demand as they know how to utilize the modern infrastructure to create systems that scale as the requirement arises. A Serverless Framework is one critical open-source framework that makes it more accessible. As a developer, you must be familiar with Serverless Framework.

Official resources 

Online courses and tutorials for AWS developers 

It is the best course to get started with an overview of the features, capabilities, and benefits of Amazon Web Services. The AWS fundamentals specialization course teaches all core services of the platform and its vital security concepts. It also discusses the basics of building serverless applications with AWS.

Udemy offers this AWS course for developers. It covers the end-to-end implementation of the significant components of AWS. It moves on from the part about how to get started with the AWS technologies to more complex concepts such as SSHING. 

For any cloud engineer, security is one of the most important concepts to master. This AWS course teaches developers the fundamentals of cloud security, compliance, and the shared responsibility model of AWS. There are several AWS services covered in this course, such as Amazon GuardDuty, Amazon CloudWatch, Amazon VPC, AWS Security Hub, AWS Secrets Manager, and Amazon S3.

FreeCodeCamp offers this YouTube tutorial. Its practical guide approach to teaching AWS cloud platform is different from other courses. It teaches startups to get started with a cloud platform, create an account, deploy the application, and budget scale.

Books for AWS developers 

Online communities for AWS developers 

Podcasts for AWS developers

  1. Communication: Good communication is necessary for every professional. Developers are no exceptions. When working on a complex project, they need to work with others. Effective communication is essential to ensure everyone on the team is on the same page and that all deadlines are met. Apart from nurturing your technical skills as an AWS developer, it would help if you worked on speaking clearly and confidently too.
  2. Patience: It is not uncommon behavior for developers to get frustrated. Bugs are a routine for developers and can easily lead to frustration. However, it is a weak emotion, and you must practice patience. Best software engineers know how to handle pressure and keep a calm demeanor even when things seem worse. When you are patient, you are in a better position to make rational decisions and lead teams.
  3. Problem-solving / critical thinking: These skills are paramount to software development. Out of all the soft skills, this one has the most significant effect on the career graph of a developer. Your ability to think outside the box makes you unique as a developer. The difference between us and computers is that we are not set to follow an algorithmic path. We can use unimaginable creativity to solve problems.

Here are more resources to learn about essential soft skills.

Conclusion 

AWS is the market leader in cloud computing, and it makes sense to focus on becoming an AWS developer. AWS is a highly lucrative skill, and we hope this AWS developer toolkit provides you with all the essential learning and interview preparation resources you require.

Talent500 is the platform that AWS developers can use to find career re-defining opportunities at global companies. Sign up here and be job ready.

 

How to get your app featured on Google Play or Apple Store

Posted on by vallish

As per 2022 stats, The App Store has more than 1.8 million apps, while the Google Playstore has 2.59 million published apps. Both the platforms are overly crowded. However, some apps stand out when included in App Store’s Today Tab or Google Play Store’s ‘For You’ section.

What do these featured apps do differently to occupy such a prominent position in terms of visibility in the app stores?

The answer is multi-faceted. Without any specific requirements from Apple or Google, we must rely on the wisdom of other app developers and marketing experts. In this article, we will detail the aspects and features that apps must uphold to increase their chances of being featured on the Google Play Store and App Store.

 

Why is the inclusion in the featured section beneficial for an app? 

With millions of apps competing for the users’ attention and space on their smartphones, earning a place in the featured section on Google Play Store or App Store will give your app the visibility and boost it requires to stand out.

According to Apple, when an app is featured in the “Today” app section, its downloads and re-downloads increase multifold.

Here is the performance of GoNoodle, an activity app for kids, when it was featured as the “App of the Day.” The download for the app nearly tripled when it appeared in the coveted featured section.

While there is no detailed list to follow, we are about to share some essential factors contributing to the likelihood of an app appearing as a featured recommendation.

 

Create unique features 

Study the apps that regularly feature as the editor’s choice to evaluate the features unique to these apps. Install relevant apps on your phone and analyze the design, user experience, functionality, and features that make them stand out. 

Also, discover gaps between the target audience’s demand and the solution provided by existing apps. This will be the sweet spot that you can fill. Ensure you provide the required features in your app to make it popular. 

 

Focus on Android Vitals

To be featured in the Play Store, an app must meet all of Google’s basic quality requirements. There are several policies for an app to follow to have a chance to be recommended by the Play Store. Here are the most important ones:

Policy Practices

Launch Checklist

Design Guidelines

Core Quality Guidelines

Google implements these policies to ensure that users have a seamless experience and that app build quality is high.

You must include all the optimizations in your mobile app development to ensure that the app performs well with Android Vitals indicators.

The Android Vitals is an initiative by Google to improve the stability and performance of apps on smart devices. According to Google’s official statement, “exhibiting bad behaviour in vitals will negatively affect the user experience in your app and is likely to result in bad ratings and poor discoverability on the Play Store.”

The four most crucial Android Vital indicators are the Application Not Responding (ANR) rates, Excessive wakeups, Crash rates, and Stuck partial wake locks.

 

App optimizations for the App Store

For optimizing an iOS app, you can take a hint from Apple’s indication for editors to follow when selecting an app to be included in the Today tab.

Apple editors focus on the following:

  • Usability, appeal, and overall build quality of the app
  • Uniqueness and innovation
  • Localizations: the app must be relevant to the target audience
  • Well-integrated features for the best accessibility
  • The App store product page must have compelling screenshots, descriptions, and app previews

From all the above-listed factors, the “uniqueness” of the app is harder to quantify; the rest are measurable elements that can be improved.


Localization

With over 6 billion active smartphone users, localization will help you incentivize users other than English speakers. You tend to rank higher due to the multi-lingual UI and UX design approach when you don’t restrict your app to a particular audience or geographical location. 

Plan on offering your app in different languages to increase your chances of featuring in the top sections of the App Store and the Play Store. You can refer to this Localization Checklist from Google to make your app accessible globally.

 

Ensure security of users 

There has been a 62% increase in mobile malware attacks since 2021. This underlines the requirement for security-focused mobile app development. App platforms continuously monitor apps for security breaches. If your app has to appear in the coveted featured section, it must follow the best security protocols. Some essential features to include are: 

  • Disabled debug mode 
  • No logging of sensitive data 
  • Regular integrity checks 
  • Auto jailbreak detection 
  • Source code encryption to prevent reverse engineering 
  • Enable multi-factor authentication 

 

Conclusion 

By following these mobile app development and optimization practices, there is a multi-fold increase in chances for an app to appear as a featured recommendation. And if you believe that your app has adhered to all the best practices but still does not appear as a featured app, you can get in touch with Apple and Google app-editors here:

App Store contact form

Play Store contact form

You can directly submit your app for expert review using these above-listed contact forms.

Talent500 is a platform for app developers to discover career redefining opportunities. Join our elite pool of app developers and get access to resources that make you job-ready.

5 best UI/UX design tools in 2022

Posted on by vallish

Most of the visual creativity in the software industry is concentrated in UI/UX design. Front-end designers have a vast range of design tools to choose from. These tools can achieve everything from creating wireframes, mockups, and prototypes to rendering realistic product images.

But how do you know the best UX UI design tools in 2022?

Modern design tools as compared to their older versions offer cloud storage and real-time team collaboration. Older UX/UI design tools lacked this feature.

Here we list such UI UX design tools that are hand-picked by our experts.

1. Adobe XD

Unsurprisingly, our experts picked Adobe XD as the first design tool for this list. The brand is known for its feature-rich design tools that are industry standards, such as Photoshop and Illustrator.

Adobe XD is a comparatively new addition to the suite of highly robust design tools offered by Adobe, but it’s much lighter (smaller in size and uses fewer CPU resources) than Photoshop or Illustrator. This lightweight architecture makes it suitable for UX/UI designers.

Primarily it is available as a desktop tool. However, it supports Creative Cloud, the signature Adobe cloud-based collaboration infrastructure that allows real-time collaboration between designers. Adobe XD is now available for Windows and Mac OS users, but Linux users can use its web platform.

Adobe XD has a 7-days free trial, and its paid subscription starts at $9.99/month.

2. Figma 

Figma is a compelling and user-friendly UX/UI design platform due to its simple-to-use interface. It is a cloud-based tool that comes with all the essential features that you require to design a mobile app or a website. From basic wireframes to user flows and working UI prototypes, all can be created with Figma quickly.

It offers real-time collaboration over design projects so large UX/UI design teams can work on the same project simultaneously without conflicts. This robustness does not imply that Figma is unsuitable for individuals or freelancers. Out of the box, Figma is primarily focused on vector designs and prototyping, but you can quickly expand its scope by installing additional plug-ins.

Figma works on all operating systems, including Mac, Windows, and Linux, and a web version of the app is also available. The software is free to use for creating unlimited personal designs and up to 3 shared Figma and FigJam files.

3. Sketch

Sketch is a feature-rich UX/UI design tool trusted by designers at Google, MIT, and Xbox. The primary objective is to help designers create vector wireframes, designs, and prototypes. Given its lightweight and fast processing, it is surprising that it has all the functionalities that designers need to create wireframes and convert them into fully polished user interfaces. The prototyping features allow you to incorporate motion and transitions to develop comprehensive illustrations.

With this design tool, you can manage your design team, review documentation, and access design resources by logging into Sketch in the browser. However, to edit the design documents, you must use the desktop app, which is only available for Mac OS. Recently, Sketch released a real-time collaboration feature that allows large teams to work on a single project.

Like Figma, the functionality of Sketch can be extended using plug-ins that allow you to do so much more, such as adding stock images, creating portable design files, and incorporating JSON data.

You can try Sketch for free for 30 days, after which you have to subscribe to a paid plan (starting at $9/month).

4. Lucidchart

Lucidchart is a highly efficient UX/UI design tool for creating wireframes. It has various visual elements that can make your illustrations much more intuitive. This design tool can be an excellent addition to your toolkit to create information architecture and workflows or organize the structure of the website or software design.

Unlike other UI/UX design tools on the list, Lucidchart is not available as a desktop or mobile app but only as a web application. You can use its free version for up to 3 editable documents and hundred professional templates. For unlimited editable documents, you can subscribe to one of the paid plans that starts at $7.95/month.

5. Framer

One of the core responsibilities of UX/UI designers is prototyping. Whenever you design an interactive element like drop-downs, checkboxes, or radio buttons, they pose a challenge during testing sessions. This is where Framer stands out as a prototyping tool.

Any interactive element you code in your prototypes with Framer, you can test these elements in a highly realistic testing environment to create a user-friendly experience. You can still design highly interactive prototypes, even if you are not a coder, as this design tool allows collaboration. You can invite your team developers to work with you on a project.

You can create and publish unlimited sites with the Framer app or subscribe to paid plans starting at $15/site for additional functionalities.

Conclusion 

The best UX/UI design tool is the one that empowers you to unleash your creativity and effectively convert it into deployable products. We hope these design tools will accommodate all your front-end design needs.

Talent500 is the platform for front-end designers to find career redefining opportunities with fast-growing start-ups and Fortune 500 companies. Sign up here to explore more.

 

 

5 simple tricks to improve your logic in coding

Posted on by vallish

Programming has several elements. It’s not just syntax to instruct processors to act on, but smartly put together logic that achieves the most complex operations. Developers are in a niche where continuous learning is the only way to remain relevant. Keeping getting better at logical coding, that is, developing logic, is an essential requirement.

Learning programming languages gives you the skills to write code with correct syntax, but the core functionality is based on data structures, algorithms, and different programming paradigms. Logic building is another requisite to be able to solve problems efficiently.

In this article, we explore ways to improve your logic in coding.

1. Master the concepts for better programming 

When you are given a problem to solve programmatically, you have to understand the context of the solution by breaking it down to the basic building blocks. The secret to writing logic for any problem is having in-depth knowledge of algorithms and working on sample problems as much as possible. Coding practice will expose you to challenges that will help you write better logic. 

All the theoretical knowledge you gain from reading articles, blogs, tutorials, and other essential developer toolkits will build your concepts. Applying concepts can quickly solve challenges you will face in your professional career. Practice the concept you learn. That’s how you improve your logical programming.

2. Get solutions evaluated by other developers

Programming assignments can involve challenges that other developers might have dealt with. Check for solutions available online. It is not to copy and paste the code but to learn how to handle programming challenges. This is especially true in understanding the logic behind the solutions because developers sharing their solutions in communities and forums explain why a certain logic is used and how it was built.

Your focus must be on the “why” because if you want to improve your logical programming, you need to know how a program’s logic functions and affects the outcome. Several resources to learn are available on GitHub. You can participate in open-source projects to learn from them as well.

A mistake most learners commit is to keep wasting their time on a problem. There’s no harm in learning from available solutions. Learning how others build logic to solve a problem will allow you to re-enact the process if required.

3. Pen and paper approach

One way to become stronger in logical coding is to practice on paper. If you start coding on the IDE directly, your attention will be divided between syntax, formatting, and logic. However, when you write the pseudo code or algorithm on paper, you focus only on getting the logic right. The pen and paper approach is what made Google the mammoth of search engines. It’s an inspiring story of two of the best Google engineers, Jeff Dean and Sanjay Ghemawat, who changed the company’s course for the better. The legend is that the two engineers maintain a text in which they solve the biggest challenges of writing logic on paper. If the approach is good enough for them, it’s suitable for any other developer.

4. Follow step-by-step approach

Like every other skill, you must take things step-by-step to improve your logical coding ability. Gradually moving up the challenge is how you will improve logic in your programs. Start from basic and then move on to advanced problems. For instance, you can practice in a set of 10 problems – 5 easy ones, 3 medium levels, and 2 hard questions.

It would help if you did not give up when faced with such challenges or lose confidence in your skills. Complex programming challenges will keep arising; your focus must be on learning. If you plan to get good at logical coding, you must face complex problems with optimism. Refer to the solutions in books and other resources if you get stuck. Keep in mind that developers are occupationally required to solve challenging problems strategically step-by-step, which is why they are some of the highest-paid professionals.

5. Keep learning new things

As a software developer, you will be expected to solve myriad challenges throughout your career. This is why you must keep learning new things as your career progresses. Taking the same solution path to solving problems repeatedly will limit your creativity and intuition.

Programmers can only expand their logic-building skills by tackling new challenges and topics. Delve into unknown territories and explore new ways to solve problems. Don’t be too rigid in your learning. Accept that there is no set way to build logic to solve a problem. There can be multiple approaches to solving a problem. You must keep trying new issues and algorithms to improve your logic-building skills.

Conclusion 

Be consistent at implementing these simple tricks, and you will gradually improve your logical coding skills. Patience and continuous learning must be your virtue when enhancing your programming skills.

Talent500 is the platform for Fortune 500 companies to build their engineering teams. Join our elite pool of developers to get the best job opportunities.

 

5 developer tools to boost productivity

Posted on by vallish

A developer’s workflow must be uninterrupted to ensure the quality of code is not affected, but it’s hardly ever without potential interruptions and context switches. Fortunately, developer tools can help programmers maintain consistent flow states. These productivity tools allow developers to create more productive workflows.

Here we list the best productivity tools for developers picked by expert software engineers at Talent500.

1. Tuple: Productivity tool for remote pair programming 

Collaboration apps like Zoom or Slack might be appropriate for team meetings and project discussions, but for remote pair programming, they fail to provide the much-needed workflow sync. Tuple is a dedicated developer tool explicitly designed for pair programming.

It features a pair programming-focused screen sharing UI and the ability to control remote machines on low-latency connections. Tuple is one of the best developer tools to work for remote programmers to collaborate when writing code. It offers a 5k-quality video stream, HD quality audio, and efficient CPU usage. For comparison, an average Tuple call uses fewer CPU resources than Chrome when it sits idle.

2. Codestream: Easy code-level discussion

One important task that boosts productivity is effortless knowledge sharing between developers when working on a project. A developer must work outside his bubble and ensure that others know what their code does or what changes they’ve made. Such communication is essential for streamlining team workflows and producing valuable work.

Codestream is a productivity tool that captures all the discussions around code and makes it effortless to do code reviews. Codestream can work with any IDE and supports every programming language, which is why any developer can use it. One of the distinguishing features of this developer tool is that it allows discussion on a code without ever requiring a pull request. All you have to do is to highlight a code block and add a comment. Codestream strengthens the quality of your code base by allowing live discussion within the production environment.

3. f.lux: For giving your eyes a break

Programming can be unforgiving to your eyes and hamper your productivity if you write code for long stretches without giving your eyes a break. f.lux offers a solution to help developers reduce eye strain when writing code in dim light or at night. The tool intelligently adapts your screen’s display color according to different times of the day to ensure that your eyes are not overly strained.

f.lux works on all operating systems – Windows, Linux, Mac, and iOS devices. To set up f.lux, you need to tell the tool what kind of lighting you are working in and where you live; the rest the tool will handle automatically. It is a fully customizable developer tool that can be adjusted to fit your work routine.

4. Lightrun: Automate logs

Bugs are unavoidable for developers; no matter how well planned and impressively coded software is, it will eventually encounter bugs. The most time-consuming activity of fixing bugs is tracking the logs to replicate the bug. While it is an essential step to fix a problem, manually tracking log files is tedious. When there are no logs, things get more complicated, and reproducing the bug becomes much more difficult without enough information.

Thankfully, Lightrun is here to help developers add logs, metrics, and traces to the code base directly into the IDE or CLI in real-time. It provides the capability to developers to have code-level observability without deploying the code to a live environment. This saves much time that is wasted on testing the code after deployment. Lightrun works on monolith microservices, Kubernetes, Docker Swarms, serverless, ECS, Big Data works, and more.

5. Asana: For team and project management

Asana is one of the most widely used workplace management tools. It is utilized for streamlining communication across companies and teams. Developers are benefited from using Asana as it allows them to break down projects into tasks and set clear goals for teams. It can be integrated with hundreds of other productivity tools such as Google Drive, Outlook, and Slack. Customizing its features allows developers to change Asana per their project requirements.

Asana is one of the best productivity tools to improve communication within development teams. Analyzing and monitoring project issues eliminates the constant need for meetings, email updates, and memos. It offers customizable dashboards; activity feeds, prioritization, email integration, focus mode and individual task lists, custom calendars, notifications, and more.

Conclusion

For developers, focus and maintained workflow is critical. We hope these productivity tools can help you avoid distractions and help you manage time and tasks much more efficiently. Developers can improve code quality, collaboration, and project management. For more productivity hacks, check out this article.

Talent500 is a platform for Indian developers to find career-redefining opportunities with fast-growing startups and Fortune 500 companies. Sign up here to join our pool of elite talent.

 

 

5 essential Git tips for software engineers

Posted on by vallish

Without a version control system, it’s virtually impossible to maintain source code and share it between teams without conflict. Version control is important to keep track of what changes were made to the code base, by who, and what was the reason for these changes. A software developer needs version control, irrespective of their language. Of all the available version control tools, Git is the most popular choice. It is why Git has over 85% source code management market share.

Chances are you are already familiar with Git if you are a developer. If you are a beginner, mastering Git will provide you with a crucial skill employers look for. Git is a free, open-source distributed version control system that is used to manage source code and introduce parallel changes while keeping track of every change made.

Here we list some helpful Git tips that are optimal for beginners to master.

1. Git aliases

You will use Git multiple times during a coding session. Type commands every time can be too time-consuming. Fortunately, Git allows you to create aliases that improve your daily workflow.

While you can create an alias for any possible Git command, here are the aliases for the three most-used Git commands – checkout, branch, and commit.

git config –global alias.co checkout

git config –global alias.ci commit

git config –global alias.br branch

Next time you have to use these commands in the terminal; instead of typing the full command, for instance, git checkout master, you only need to type git co master.

To add aliases in Git, you can include them in the ~/.gitconfig file directly like this:

[alias]

   co = checkout

   ci = commit

   br = branch

2. Easy way to compare commits 

You don’t have to download different versions of the same file to make a comparison. Git allows developers to compare the difference between two commits or versions using the git diff command.

As a beginner, you must learn how to compare files between commits. It will save you much time as you can find any changes quickly.

To compare the same file between different commits, you use the following command:

$ git diff $start_commit..$end_commit — path/to/file

And to compare all the changes between two commits, you use:

$ git diff $start_commit..$end_commit

When you use these Git commands, the diff view will open inside the terminal. For a more visual picture, you can use git difftool. A much more comprehensive way to visually compare diffs is Meld.

You can configure Meld with this command:

$ git config –global diff.tool git-meld

To view diffs in Meld use:

$ git difftool $start_commit..$end_commit — path/to/file

or

$ git difftool $start_commit..$end_commit

3. Way to easily pull changes from the <main_branch> to a local branch

To pull or download all the newest changes made to the main branch of the code base on the local branch, you can use the git merge or rebase command to update the local brand. Both perform the same function, but beginners are advised to use rebase carefully or stick with the merge command. It is because Git rebase pulls the changes at a much higher hierarchical level than git merge. Here’s a great resource to learn the difference between merging and rebasing.

How to use Git rebase:

git stash -u //stash all your working files

git checkout <main_branch>

git pull

git checkout <your_branch>

git rebase <main_branch>

git stash pop //re-apply all your changes

The same function using the merge command: 

git stash -u //stash all your working files

git checkout <main_branch>

git pull

git checkout <your_branch>

git merge <main_branch>

git stash pop //re-apply all your changes

4. Stashing uncommitted changes

Sometimes you might have to work on an emergency fix in the middle of whatever task you handle. It puts you in a fix, as the situation demands immediate action, but you don’t want to lose your current changes either.

What do you do?

You use the git stash command to remove the changes you are working on temporarily. It is one of the essential Git tips for beginners. Learn to use the stash command, and you will be able to handle any change at any moment without losing your work.

With the $ git stash command, you hide the unfinished changes and have a clean working directory. It allows you to switch to a new brand to fix bugs or make updates without committing to incomplete changes.

Once you have fixed the error; you can revisit the last changes you were working on using:

$ git stash pop

This command recovers all the changes. If you do not need the changes anymore, you can clear the stash stack with:

$ git stash drop

5. Pull frequently

It can take longer to implement the changes when working on a large project or a significant feature. Unexperienced developers wait for the feature to be fully implemented before pulling the changes to the local branch. It is a bad practice, and you should make it a habit to pull changes frequently. It will help you avoid any significant conflicts as you can solve them early on as they arise. When done right, it improves the workflow and makes the merging of branches easier.

To learn more about Git. here are 7 GitHub repositories for new developers.

Conclusion 

Git is an essential tool to master for any developer. These five programmer tips will help you make better use of Git to improve your productivity and collaboration.

Talent500 is the platform for developers to discover global job opportunities with the best companies. Sign up here to know more.

 

Top 6 web design tools for developers in 2022

Posted on by vallish

Web design tools do more than just format the text and images within a web page. Modern web development transforms concepts into live, revenue-driven websites and applications. It requires action that goes beyond raw editing and HTML syntax. Modern web design tools are compelling software applications that can transform any idea into reality within the web space.

The decision can be mind-boggling when cornered to choosing between all the available web design tools. To help you with the choice, we have compiled a list of the top six web design tools for developers in 2022.

Let’s get started.

1. Sketch

Sketch is only for macOS designers as it does not support other operating systems. Still, it is one of the most popular web design tools among designers because it includes many features without being complicated to use. As a native macOS app, it looks like Apple’s Xcode IDE that iOS developers and designers use.

Besides the essential functions like constraint resizing and vector editing, Sketch offers many more tools to generate designs based on concepts and export them directly into a development project. For example, designers can use its Smart Layout functionality to create designs with adaptive resizing characteristics by default. It also offers options for teams through its collaborative tools.

2. Figma

If you are part of a large design team, then Figma is your best web design tool. Its increasing popularity is because of its capability to let designers collaborate on a design.

Figma is one of the most comprehensive web design tools available as a drag-and-drop editor to build anything from interfaces to website designs. Developers can directly include code snippets in the design with this tool. From ideation to implementation, it is the tool you can use to keep the design process running smoothly while keeping track of all the revisions made along the way. 

You get a homogenized set of tools for font and color designing that you can use to create interfaces that stand out.

While Figma offers value for single-developer projects, it’s much more beneficial for teams or projects that scale with time.

3. Affinity Designer

Adobe might be the industry leader in the web designing sector, but Serif’s Affinity Designer gives Adobe a run for its money.  

Affinity Designer has built a vast user base because of his stellar design principles and attractive pricing model. This web design tool is available for Macs, Windows, and iPad. It offers all features you get with Adobe Illustrator or any other web design tool for a fraction of money. You can work with vectors, rasterization, create layers, and more. While Affinity Designer offers designers all the editing and conceptualization features expected from a quality web design tool, it lacks cloud-based infrastructure. As such, you have no option to store your work or share it with other designers and all stakeholders through the cloud.

4. Google Web Designer

One of the most underrated web design tools is Google Web Designer. It is a free webpage design tool that developers can use to create interactive and engaging websites. You can create HTML5-based interactive web designs using this tool. The designs and motion graphics created using Google Web Designer are compatible with any device and run seamlessly on desktops, laptops, and smartphones. Developers can simultaneously edit HTML, CSS, and JavaScript directly from the editing screen. It gives you the freedom from the requirement to open each file individually.

5. InVision Studio

InVision Studio markets itself as a “screen design” app, and its functionalities and capabilities justify its campaign. It is a web design tool that offers an intuitive layer-based editor for all web design needs. You can do much more than web design, prototyping, and creating animations with InVision Studio. For instance, you can link artboards with screens together with a single click. This is an excellent feature for building animations as part of the design process.

Another great feature of this web design tool is its shared component libraries and global syncing options. These two features allow the entire team to work on a project within InVision Studio.

6. CodePen or JSFiddle 

For web designers, one crucial requirement is to be able to write and test the code snippet quickly without impacting the workflow of the entire project. This approach accelerates the design process.

CodePen and JSFiddle are two excellent text editors that work for testing HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Before implementing it into your main project, you can test the code snippet and see how it affects your design in a live environment. You can also create a shareable link to the code snippets you are trying for other designers and developers to work on. Both these text editors are included in our list of top web design tools in 2022 because of the online IDE environment they offer to facilitate the design process.

Conclusion

For web design projects, like any other development project, time and resources are of importance. Familiarizing yourself with multiple web design tools allows you to select the best tool according to the project’s requirements without wasting too much time on research.

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Top 4 mistakes you should avoid as a junior developer

Posted on by vallish

Whether you are beginning your career or switching fields, starting at a junior level is usually daunting. You expectedly know less than your peers and are bound to make mistakes. Junior developers are not expected to know everything, but there are some common developer mistakes they must avoid. When you start, you must keep a learner’s outlook, try to learn, and prevent imposter syndrome. Rather than faking it, try to learn through your mistakes.

In this article, we are listing the most common mistakes that junior developers tend to make and how these developer mistakes can be avoided.

1. Googling rather than reading documentation

Indeed, Google has made it a lot easier for developers to find solutions when they are stuck. It is quicker to Google the answer rather than reading the official documentation. We understand it’s boring to go through the documentation, and it’s not as fast as Googling the solution.

However, as a beginner, you are depriving yourself of learning the broader side of development by depending on Google. Documentation is one of the best ways to learn about several user cases and possible bugs.

Contrary to what most junior developers believe, reading docs provide better insight. It saves you a lot of time that would be otherwise wasted on Googling dozens of answers. 

When you read the docs, you know what to search in Google. Furthermore, referencing documentation is a great habit that helps you become a better developer.

When you start a new project or join one in the middle of the development lifecycle, you will most likely depend on the Readme documentation to understand the requirements and scope of the project.

2. Not asking for help when needed

One of the most common problems a junior developer faces is not knowing when to ask for help. You might start working on a project and decide to deliver results on your own without taking assistance from peers. As a beginner, you will get stuck with a problem, and after a few tries, you will find the solution, but it might not always be the case. Some issues will be too hard to solve on your own, no matter how much time you spend trying to solve them.

While repeatedly trying to solve a problem is part of learning, you need to know when you need help. There will be issues beyond your knowledge’s scope and require clarification. You cannot waste too much time on a single problem as your team needs to move forward with the project. 

When the deadline is looming, or you have tried everything in your capability and are still stuck with the problem, be open to help. Seek help from your peers and senior developers and ask them to explain the solution to you.

3. No risks, only comfort

Not only for developers, but comfort is a growth-kill for any profession. Junior developers pick easy and comfortable tasks and enter a comfort zone that hinders their growth. You get a false sense of accomplishment when you only stick with the easy development tasks. It will put you in the habit of not challenging yourself to take responsibility for your growth.

Junior developers who do not challenge themselves for growth and get complacent in their comfort zone hardly move up the career ladder. If you do not want to be stuck at the same level, it is necessary to punch above your weight. Proactively ask for challenging tasks but not all the time. You must balance easy and challenging tasks to avoid your comfort zone and not get overwhelmed by the challenges too often.

4. Stop watching tutorial videos

Tutorials are great for learning new technologies, but watching tutorial videos and not practicing actual code will not do any good. While tutorial videos are fun to watch, a reason why many junior programmers try to learn through video tutorials but they forget that it’s a costly venture. 

When you stick with video tutorials, you are trading time to watch those videos. You will have much less time to code and learn by doing.

When you code yourself, your progress is much more accelerated. Junior developers should start a project and ‘learn with a purpose.’ There is no point in randomly watching tutorials if you are never going to use what you see. 

This is why it is essential to use the information you learn from the tutorials by implementing it in your code. When you work on a project, you have a reason to search for tutorials and implement what you learn immediately.

Apart from nurturing technical skills, junior developers must also focus on essential soft skills.

Conclusion 

As a junior developer, you are prone to make these mistakes. We hope you understand what causes these mistakes and what can be done to avoid them.

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4 great examples of React Native apps in the market

Posted on by vallish

React Native is the leading JavaScript framework for creating native iOS and Android apps. Based on Facebook’s React library, JavaScript developers are given the freedom to develop a native for both platforms with a single code base. React Native is the world’s second most widely used framework for app development. Many companies have shown what can be achieved with this framework.

This article will list some top React Native apps that deliver excellent services to end users and drive company profits.

Let’s get started.

1. Instagram

Instagram is the most downloaded app on the Google Play Store and App Store. It is developed in React Native and uses the same code for Android and iOS operating systems. The app essentially has three components – Feed, Explore, and Profile. With over a billion downloads and multi-billion users worldwide, it is astonishing to know that Instagram was built entirely with a handful of developers in under nine months. Such is the efficiency and scope of React Native. But today, it is not such a surprising feat anymore as some companies have developed their apps in shorter duration.

React Native is exceptionally scalable; that’s how Instagram can handle 500 million daily active users. Also, the app takes 1 billion daily searches, more than Bing, Google, and Yahoo combined. Without a doubt, Instagram is a live example of what can be achieved by leveraging the features of React Native for app development.

2. Shopify

Shopify’s leading eCommerce SaaS platform uses React Native framework for its iOS and Android applications. The engineering team at Shopify recognized the framework’s potential early on and created multiple apps for their retail customers based on React Native. 

Shopify refuses to convert its native app into a React Native application because it lacks first-class Android support.

Shopify uses React Native for three applications: Arrive, Point of Sale, and Compass. Shopify could maintain smaller teams for the three applications, as over 80% of the code was shared between Android and iOS versions of the applications. Also, engineering teams could maintain a lower CPU threshold for the applications using React Native, which makes these apps faster. Shopify is actively using React Native to build high-performing applications to meet the requirements of retail merchants. 

3. UberEats

UberEats is a highly popular application that lets you order food from restaurants in the nearby area. It tracks your order in real time while it is delivered to you. After delivery, you can rate the driver and food quality. The app is built using React Native for the front end, while it uses multiple platforms for the backend services. 

With over 11 million downloads, UberEats is highly rated for customer experience among restaurant delivery apps. UberEats’ engineering team was not confident about using any 3rd party tools for creating apps that could expose them to bad user experience and delayed updates. They chose React Native as Facebook engineers, and the open-source community supports it. Also, React Native is easy to add to any platform that further extends its scope. 

4. Skype

Nobody needs an introduction to Skype. Being one of the most popular VOIP calling applications, it was the leader before other web apps started supporting internet calling. Skype mobile app is built using React Native and has over 1 billion downloads. The success of Skype’s consistent experience with both Android and iOS is driven by the cross-platform compatibility of React Native framework. Again, it has witnessed great success due to the framework’s scalability. The Skype app has to handle 25 million users making calls every day. On average, there are 300 minutes of video and voice calling per second on Skype,

Skype needed a robust framework that could drive the success of its applications across both mobile platforms without the need to maintain separate code bases. React Native was the obvious answer as it has a proven record of empowering scalable enterprise-level app development.

Conclusion 

You don’t need too many developers to create apps with this framework. As you can use the same code for both Android and iOS apps, you don’t need native developers. It also supports JavaScript out-of-the-box, which implies it can easily integrate with any existing backend service. Furthermore, with React Native, you don’t have to wait for an app to be built and installed on an app for testing; the framework provides instant feedback as compared to other mobile SDKs. These are some reasons why you should consider React Native for your next app development project.

Talent500 is a global remote team-building platform that Fortune 500 companies and innovative startups trust to hire engineering talent. Join our elite pool of talent to discover career-redefining opportunities.

 

Flutter developer toolkit: In-demand skills, learning resources, online courses, interview prep, books & more

Posted on by vallish

Google launched Flutter in 2018 as a framework to develop apps for multiple operating systems. In only four years, Flutter has been used by thousands of developers for mobile application development for both Android, iOS, and web platforms. One of the reasons for the popularity of Flutter is its capacity for cost-saving. Instead of building several apps to run on Android, iOS, and web browsers, a single app can be made on the same code base to work on all the platforms.

However, Flutter is relatively new compared to other app development frameworks on the market. This Flutter developer toolkit is created to help developers find all the needed Flutter resources in one place.

Prior knowledge of native programming languages 

Flutter is a framework rather than a programming language. Flutter developers must understand mobile application programming languages such as Java, C#, C++, Swift, and Kotlin. Of all the languages, Kotlin has emerged as a preferred choice for Android development. Google has already made Kotlin the official programming language for the Android platform. Knowledge of Kotlin will help you develop apps faster with Flutter. We have a few toolkits that you can explore to learn about the essential programming languages:

C# developer toolkit

Java developer toolkit

Being familiar with these programming languages will help you quickly take up Flutter and fully utilize its features.

Knowledge of Dart

Dart is the client-based programming language used to write scripts in Flutter. Google has also conditioned it to allow developers to introduce Flutter into cross-platform compatibility applications universally. Dart is a multidimensional programming language for web, mobile, desktop, and server development. Most job openings for Flutter developers ask for knowledge or experience in Dart. Learning this programming language is necessary for landing a job as a Flutter developer.

Experience in SQLite

SQLite is a popular database for multiplatform application development. It stores persisting data much more efficiently than other databases. However, in Flutter, SQLite offers an additional advantage. With the use of the sqflite plugin, SQLite can be easily integrated into Flutter to perform multiple operations such as read, write, update, and insert. Another reason why SQLite is the preferred database for Flutter application is the immense support from the Flutter community and the wide range of information available.

Knowledge of Git

Git is a tool that’s essential for every developer. Irrespective of the framework or programming language, knowledge of Git is mandatory. Flutter developers actively use Git and GitHub to collaborate with other developers. As a version control system, Git provides the capability to keep track of the changes made in the code. Companies expect developers to know Git and its command so that project management can be done quickly. 

52 Flutter developer interview questions

10 essential mobile app Interview questions

Top Flutter interview questions

29 Flutter interview questions mobile devs need to know

16 tricky Java developer interview questions and how to answer them

Top 41 Flutter interview questions and answers

Official resources 

Flutter official site

Flutter documentation

Flutter dev community

Flutter official learning guide

Flutter on Twitter

Online courses and tutorials for Flutter developers 

Flutter bootcamp with Dr Angela Yue

An excellent online course for beginners or developers unfamiliar with Flutter and Dart, this Udemy Flutter course was created in conjunction with the Google Flutter team and led by Dr. Angela Yue. Learners are taught the essential concepts and overall structure of Flutter using Dart through developing increasingly complex apps. By the end of the course, you would have built 15 apps with Flutter using Firebase to store and manage data.

Flutter and Dart developer course by Maximilian Schwarzmüller

Maximilian Schwarzmüller is one of the best programming instructors on Udemy. His Flutter and Dart developer course is an advanced course that takes learners from level zero to advanced level, teaching them the basics of Flutter and Dart before diving into some advanced concepts like maps, cameras, and authentication. Developers will build around five applications and learn how to publish apps in Google Play and Apple App Store.

Flutter course by Stephen Grider

Instead of an app building approach like other online Flutter courses, this course is split by topics. Stephen Grider is a former software architect who explains complex topics excellently. This course shares information that will help in building quality applications. It is one of the best online Flutter courses to learn complex concepts such as BLOC state management, Reactive Programming, offline data storage, SQLite, and animations.

The Flutter Way

The Flutter Way is a free YouTube channel that teaches how to build quality UIs with Flutter. It is an excellent resource for front-end developers interested in learning the concepts of UI/UX development for Flutter apps.

Filled Stacks

Filled Stacks is another YouTube channel that can help Flutter developers dive deeper into the nuances of Flutter development. It discusses and explores high-quality architectural issues through detailed tutorials.

Books for Flutter developers 

Beginning app development with Flutter

Beginning Flutter: a hands-on guide to app development

Flutter apprentice

Flutter complete reference

Flutter libraries we love

Google Flutter mobile development quick start guide

Managing state in Flutter pragmatically

Online communities for Flutter developers 

Flutter Discord community

Flutter Slack community

Flutter on Stack Overflow

Flutter Reddit community

Google Developer Groups

Podcasts for Flutter developers

Flutter 101 Podcast

It’s all Widgets

Flying High with Flutter

Learning Flutter

Communication: Listening and communicating are essential for developers. Listening is not just hearing what other teammates or stakeholders say but also anticipating and understanding their viewpoint. Also, your conversations must be concise and unambiguous such that there is no ambiguity to create confusion or anxiety within the team.

Patience: Software development is a complex effort that often includes long processes. Hundreds of intangible tasks must be managed from project kick-off to project development. Learn to be patient with the process and allow yourself enough time to build applications and anticipate the overall requirement so there is less room for error.

Open-mindedness and adaptability: Steven Job’s famous Stanford commencement statement, “Stay hungry. Stay foolish,” has a deep meaning. He implies that open-mindedness in being receptive to other people’s feedback. As a developer, you will have to listen and adapt not only to new ideas but to new technologies, frameworks, and development methodologies.

Here are some additional resources to learn more about essential developer soft skills:

7 most valuable soft skills of exceptional software engineers

6 soft skills that still impress employers in 2022

How soft skills transitioned to become the new power skills

Conclusion 

Although not a definitive list, this Flutter developer toolkit has the best resources to help you gain a deeper understanding of Flutter. Engineers at Talent500 handpick the listed Flutter resources. If you are an aspiring Flutter developer looking for a platform to kickstart your career with the best companies, we can help. Join us today and find a job at the best company.

 

 

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