I‘ve just seen another job spec posted on line for a web developer job. It is supposedly for a developer, and yet in this advert they cite knowledge of PHP or MySQL as only being desirable, rather than required. The only required skills they do refer to are HTML and CSS.
Frankly, I think that assigning the title of developer to such a narrow role sells the profession of software development and the role of developer short by a country mile. The word developer is used to cover far too many roles. The term web developer is itself overloaded.
Let‘s look at the definition of a web developer from Wikipedia.
A web developer is a software developer or software engineer who is specifically engaged in the development of World Wide Web applications, or distributed network applications that are run over the HTTP from a web server to a web browser.
Let‘s look a little closer at what this says, ”a software developer or software engineer”. Ok, so a web developer is a software developer?
A software developer is a person or organization concerned with facets of the software development process wider than design and coding, a somewhat broader scope of computer programming or a specialty of project managing including some aspects of software product management.
Hmm… so a software developer is a big picture, multi-skilled kinda guy with a role or skills in multiple areas of the software development process. That doesn‘t sound like someone who‘ll just be interested in HTML and CSS, however challenging it is.
The age old building–a–house analogy
Would you call a plasterer an architect? Even if he was really, really good at plastering? Even if he was an absolute wizard plasterer, the best there was?
The answer is no, you wouldn‘t. You‘d give the plasterer due respect and full credit for the achievements in his profession. You may even be able to afford to hire him to plaster your house for you. You wouldn‘t dream of asking him to design it for you.
Similarly for all those HTML/CSS experts out there. Some of them are very, very good at what they do. Give them respect and due credit. Give them a job building your next site. Call them web builders or even page engineers. But don't call them developers.
First published on Dec 22, 2009. Last updated on: Dec 29, 2009.
I'm Elwyn Malethan and this is my blog. I am a software craftsman with over 10
years of commercial experience. When I'm not doing my day job at
