CultusAs time marches on, the skills of the software developer must evolve. Each day software evolves and gets more robust and the old software and it ways of doing business solutions just aren’t able to keep up with emerging integration needs, trends, and technologies.
With our growing needs and demands as consumers comes a pressure for systems and developers to produce new products in ways that were never imagined before. For the web developer, the need to stay informed and in front on the industries’ latest trends is imperative.
Mobile development
Finding someone who does not have a mobile phone these days is similar to finding a twenty dollar bill in your jacket pocket that you’d forgotten about. While it’s not unheard of, it doesn’t happen very often. (Not nearly as often as we’d like with the twenty, that is!)
Phones these days are used for far more than calling and chatting, and today even more than texting and emailing. People are taking pictures, and making videos, and paying bills, and organizing their entire lives with their phones.
Mobile development goes far beyond phones now, though. Tablets and e-readers also fall into this category. If you’re a developer, and you think there’s no future in mobile development, you’re sadly mistaken.
Windows 8
While still not a big favorite among Microsoft users, this product has already got a foot hold in the industry. Windows 8 offers the functionality that most other mobile products do, but couples with that the productivity side that business users of Windows products have come to expect, and that products like the iPad and Android tablets lack.
Windows 8 has come to the game a little late, but it is offering an appealing talent to both the mobile and the non-mobile field that is a major advantage to the system, and the fact that the Windows online app store is far less crowded than the others means a much larger piece of the pie for developers of Windows 8 apps.
Often times, the first app is the most popular in the long run. Users tend to find what app does what they need and they stick with it. If they find they don’t like it, they may look for something else, but they’re likely to try the original again somewhere down the road.
JavaScript
In the past, JavaScript was largely a web only language, useful only to those running software and such from the web, like games on Facebook. This is no longer the case, and Windows 8 provides a place for JavaScript-based applications to run on a desktop or a tablet.
HTML5
Included in the emerging technologies leveraged in the latest Microsoft products is HTML5, and it’s quickly becoming an industry leader. Internet explorer 10 allows the user to experience the full potential of what HTML5 can do, and reviews have been favorable. HTML5 is a fantastic companion to JavaScript. Get into learning HTML5 as soon as you can, because now in its early stages, your stage will be set.
NoSQL
The tech world has been creating databases of all sizes for countless reasons in SQL for many years now. NoSQL (which stands for “Not Only SQL” as opposed to NO SQL) allows for greater analytics, redundancy, scalability, ease of design and quicker development.
Anything in CyberSecurity
Thousands of devices are connected to the Internet every day. The size of the web is increasing dramatically, so too are the opportunities for security breach. Every day there are countless stories of people losing astronomical amounts of money due to hackings, security breaches, identity theft and other cybercrimes.
Simple anti-virus isn’t enough, and hasn’t been for a very long time. It’s all too common to find computers infected with malware of one kind or another, even though they had antivirus protection that was active and up to date. Most viruses and spyware products are actually designed specifically to target certain antiviruses and disable.
In Conclusion
We no longer have static web pages written in basic HTML, unless it’s used as a “before” picture. Progress made in web development has made our lives more efficient, more secure, and more interactive, and more dangerous.
The web development world, much like the physical world, does not stand still. Improvements are made constantly, and if you’re not able to keep abreast of the industry trends, and learn to use the latest tools, you will get left behind.
About the Author:
Donna Lee Studied Computer science and arts and on graduation shortly moving in to the technology side of social networking, building analytics tools for the 2nd generation social networks like Friendster and MySpace (the first time around). Now Donna works in client onboarding at Edictive, a film production and events management software and technology company.
