Side Projects (95)

Hi there, everybody. I was aiming to build a few applications to present in interviews. Last week, I was building a small-scale Spring Boot application with the help of a tutorial. The project I was working on was meant to retrieve data from a database using PostgreSQL to provide multiple choice DSA questions. I was creating an automated study buddy for technical interviews. Unfortunately, I've been trying to figure out some technical issues and database connectivity mishaps for some days, unfortunately to no avail. Currently, I'm working through a Node.Js tutorial to build an application geared to help me keep track of the things I'd like to do during my job search, so I can always stay on task. I don't know if I'm going to run into some more issues that plague me.

The thing is, I'm learning a LOT from both experiences. Now I feel I can have an educated conversation on the trade-offs of monolithic and microservice architectures... and I LOVE what I'm learning. I'd really like to have at least 3 small-scale projects handy that I'm using to automate my own life and make this job search easier for me.

Of course I'm going to continue to try to plow through these issues, and I'm not here to necessarily ask for help with my applications (although I won't say no if someone wants to help). It'd be great if I can explain how I solved these problems, because I know the challenging problems I've solved are what I'd want to highlight to people in an interview.

But let's say if the day comes where I have an interview and DON'T have a "finished" product, yet I still have these code samples that I can defend and show that I've gained a great deal of experience from... would it be a good idea to present these in an interview?

Thanks for the help,

Evan

Questions:

1. Is learning design a worthwhile investment as someone most interested in doing full-stack work at product-based startups?

2. Might working in a small product-based startup be an effective way to pick up design skills while working as a SWE?

3. How can engineers build more complex side projects without any design skills?

Regarding #3:

I’d argue that basic product design skills are critical for building any CRUD application. You can’t build something without defining what it’s going to do first. 

Literally - you can’t write code for a feature if you don’t know how the app will behave during a loading state, an error state, a complex edge case from a wonky user flow, etc.

You can wing the design and iteratively dogfood it to improve its UX - but that’s the same as doing UX design while having zero UX design skills. It’s the software engineering equivalent of writing spaghetti code - except you’re not even improving.

Personally, I find that UI libraries like or are most helpful for solving UI problems like designing a button or a modal. However, they can’t help you decide how a screen in an app should work, nor can they abstract away all design challenges for more custom use cases.

Also, any CRUD application built with poor design will inevitably feel like a crappy database client. 

The design problem applies to backend projects, too. Backends exist to service frontends, so you can’t build a backend without knowing what features the frontend needs - and you can’t do that, either, if you don’t design it first!

These are all challenges I’ve faced working on my own projects.

I suspect the best approach is really to just learn UX design and a design tool like Figma. However, that’d be a hefty investment given UX design is a separate field from SWE - especially if it’s just for a side project.

Also, building cool stuff as a semi-competent engineer is tons more fun (for me) than learning design from scratch!

What are your thoughts on my aforementioned questions?

I have been looking to switch tech stacks for a while now and although i have made progress in upskilling, its quite a slow process. Work responsibilities always take over and leaves me little time for my own learning or side projects. Also i feel like there are tons of things to learn every single time i sit down. Could you help me with some tips to go about learning and deal with overwhelm when it comes to learning in tech?

Also, another reason this is hard is because the reward I get for spending more time on office work is immediate and helps me feel safe in terms of job security, but of course in the longer run it wont keep me happy which is why i need to spend more time on my education outside of work.

Thanks!

I have never contributed to open source but would like to start doing so. I believe this will make a huge difference in landing big tech jobs. Would like some references, steps, directions for beginners to get started in this journey.

I work with a team of 5 engineers amongst whom two are in my timezone. They always work overtime, work over weekends. They dont necessarily create a bigger impact but they are constantly posting on team chat groups about minor issues that they have seen and resolve it over the weekends. And stay late evenings and very late nights talking to the other team members. They spend a great deal of time obsessing over minor details like naming convention, doing repeated tasks.

I cannot keep up with this culture. I would actually like to have a personal life and spend some free time during the week working on side projects or learning something. At some point the opportunities do go to the people who have the most visibility right, no matter how mundane the work they do is? How do I navigate this? I would like to maintain a good reputation and work on interesting things. But I feel like I may be overlooked for promotions due to this. Any advice for me?

I'm ambivalent about attending Taro Networking events. On the one hand, the people I meet there are so talented and nice! On the other hand, what am I really getting by meeting them?

Now, I know I just said something extremely transactional. That I don't seem to "get" anything from meeting people. But let's continue this line of thinking for a bit. In my mind, going to a networking event can get you 3 things:

1. potential job referrals

2. potential partners for side-projects and maybe even a startup (which can be considered a kind of job referral)

3. friends/social-contact

Let's assume that I'm not looking for friends, so only the first 2 are in play.

What should I be doing while networking? What happens is I tell them about what I do - my role, company, stack - they do the same, we'll talk about the industry for a bit, and that's that. It seems to me like I'm not getting much out of it, probably because I'm doing it all wrong.

Here's an excerpt from an email from a Data influencer I follow who makes a similar point:

Traditional networking is like a relic of the past for back when we didn't rely on the internet.

Back then, people only recommended and worked with those they'd met in person.

But in our digital age?

We can instantly find and judge coders, designers, data experts, and marketers online based on their LinkedIn & portfolio sites. 

So, here's an alternative to traditional networking... 

**Build things that matter. 

For example, let's say you wanted to break into genAI, or land an e-commerce job at Amazon, or work in ad-tech at Facebook or Google.

To impress hiring managers and recruiters at these FAANG companies, you could build an AI tool for to help retailers advertise more efficiently.

So his point is to build stuff and use that as the fodder for networking. I'm inclined to agree, since personally, my side-project cupboard is bare. I could be falling into the trap of thinking that I can/should only network once I've reached a threshold of building however.

So to sum this up, how do you balance networking vs. building and can you expand on the relationship between them?

Thanks!

I'm working on my side project. A web app.

I know a little of html and css just the basics but now I want to extend my app and make it more visually attractive and I noticed I went to Udemy to look for Modern CSS course etc.

It will take me 20+ hours just to know what to do plus the time I take doing the work.

This approach is not working for me and not gonna finish the project by the deadline I set myself.

What are your thoughts? How you learn something while applying it at the same time?

Scenario 1: If I share personally identifiable information about myself in great detail, could another user access that or how is my privacy protected?

Scenario 2: If I'm working on a project that could compete with a Microsoft or OpenAi ML project, and I put a data set I’m using into chatgpt and share details about what/how I’m doing stuff, do you think they would bother with flagging something if it was potentially useful for themselves? Asking for a friend.

I work for a consultancy company. The client I was assigned to recently changed to another service provider and all my team (7 contractors including 2 project managers) were put on the bench.

The staffing team is looking for another project where I might be a good fit and they say there's no deadline to assign me to another project, but I'm not sure of that and every day it feels like I will be fired in any moment.

My motivation went from 100% to literally zero. I don't know what to focus on now and I feel lost. It is an odd feeling.

What can I do now?

Things I've done so far:

• Created a side project for helping people manage their finances using Django + PostgreSQL.
• I've been practicing in leetcode and hackerrank. Now I'm reading Elements of programming interviews in python.

I'm a Data Scientist looking to switch company and move to a role closer to ML/LLMs. My plan is to build a side project fine-tuning LLMs to familiarize myself with this field and leverage that experience on my resume. I was wondering if anyone here has experience building similar projects or went through a similar learning process - it would be very helpful to get some insights on skill acquisition and finding a job in this area. Here're some examples of what advice I'm looking for, but please feel free to share other aspects as well - anything will be greatly appreciated:

1. What are some good resources to learn about building LLMs? (currently mostly learning from HF, reddit, and googling)
2. What's the best tech stack to build personal fine-tuned LLM projects? (I'm planning to use Runpod or similar services like Vast for training and inference, but was wondering if there's other better options)
3. I'm looking to get into an early stage company in this field. What kind of project should I build to maximize my chance at getting into such companies? My plan rn is to fine tune a model using literature works (novels, poems, proses, etc.) since training data is relatively abundant and it's aligned with my interests. Are there more impactful use cases (for job hunting) out there?
4. What are some things I should keep in mind when producing deliverables to better showcase my technical and learning abilities? I'm planning to make a series of blog/social media posts documenting my experience building this project. Is there anything in specific that would draw companies' attention?

Thanks in advance and please feel free to share your thoughts!

Hello, I've seen a lot advice on here about doing side projects that are front-end focused and visible to recruiters, and it seems that Android/ iOS apps are a great way of doing that.

I'm in a position right now where I have about 3 years of web development experience and so most of the positions I'm applying for are web dev related, although I'm open to any. I decided to start working on an iOS app because I thought it'd be fun and the app would actually be useful to me + others.

I do have a side-project on my resume I did involving TypeScript/React, and so I was wondering if creating an iOS app with Swift and putting it on my resume would kind of hinder my chances at web dev jobs or would it still be something that could help land me an interviews for those jobs?

Thank you,

Hamza

I am currently seeking to transition into a career as a compiler engineer, a field I find deeply fascinating. The interdisciplinary nature of compiler engineering, bridging areas such as computer architecture and graph theory, intrigues me greatly. Additionally, the sector offers promising financial rewards, especially with companies like Meta, Nvidia, and AMD that are at the forefront of hardware accelerators experiencing significant growth. I am convinced this growth trajectory will continue, making this career path an ideal blend of intellectual fulfillment, professional growth, and competitive compensation.

Due to recent layoffs, I find myself unemployed, and I am seizing this moment to pivot towards compiler engineering. However, I acknowledge that there is a steep learning curve to becoming an ideal candidate for such positions. The required skill set typically includes:

• Proficiency in C++
• Experience with GPUs
• Knowledge of an Intermediate Representation Language (e.g., LLVM)
• Understanding of computer architecture

Previously, I worked as a senior backend engineer, specializing in tool development using functional programming languages such as Scala and Ocaml. My experience spans across FAANG companies and two startups.

To bridge the gap in my skill set, I have been actively contributing to open-source projects similar to LLVM and honing my C++ skills through consistent practice on Leetcode. Despite securing a few interviews for compiler engineering positions, I have not been successful, primarily due to difficulties with compiler-specific questions.

I seek advice on the following:

1. How can I enhance my chances of entering the compiler engineering field, especially without being part of a compiler project community or holding a position of authority within such a project?
2. What strategies can I employ to prepare for and succeed in domain-specific interviews, considering my lack of prior experience in this area?

Any guidance or insights from those who have navigated a similar path would be immensely appreciated.

My goal is to drive traffic to my app by making youtube shorts. Specifically there are interesting facts about compound interest that could be genuinely interesting for people thinking about investing or taking out a loan. The idea is the graphics will be screenshots/video from my app.

What tool do you all use for video overlay screen recording like this? @Rahul you make super bright and colorful graphics for your youtube cover graphics plus in the videos - is this from photoshop or something else? Also you have a lot of stock graphics and video footage - would you mind sharing if that is paid or free?

Thanks!

Adding AI powered responses and searching via embeddings is becoming increasingly popular.

But unless you have the infra to self host or deploy an open source model (plus the time to train) you’ll inevitably be paying the almighty OpenAi/Anthropic.

How do you workout these numbers so you’re providing your users with enough value but on the other hand maintaining reasonable profitability?

Hi all, I'm currently job searching after being laid off (junior engineer with 2.5 years of experience) and I know after browsing around here that side projects are heavily encouraged (especially Android apps) to boost up your portfolio and chances of getting an interview.

What are your opinions on doing certifications? I am making my way through an AWS Solutions Architect course while doing side projects - is it a complete waste of time or is it worth balancing along side project work?

Thank you!

I have been at my current organisation for a year and i just received a good performance rating and a raise. I have been doing pretty well overall. However, over the last two months i have felt that this role doesn't fulfill my intellectual needs and I am not challenged enough. I would like to widen the tech stack that I work on and have more flexibility in impacting the product (it's a big tech company and has a lot of hierarchy). To continue to be good at my work, I need to spend a good amount of time (~50% of the time) doing non-challenging/repeated/admin work. I have started taking courses and my attention has derailed from office work quite a bit.

I realise that if i want to get promoted here, I need to continue to do what I did to get the good rating and do it even better perhaps. But at the same time, I yearn to work on a broader tech stack and take on more challenging work which may or may not come my way at my present org. The reasons to not switch would be : it's just been a year here, I have vested RSUs (spread out over 4 years) and a promotion would be good for my career (and good for my self confidence), also the work life balance is decent. But I have the urge to switch my attention to side projects and eventually to a role and company where I'm challenged more and hopefully make a lot more impact (startups).

Do you have any advice for me?

Today during office hours Rahul talked about this a tiny bit (sans the legal), but I'm curious as I've had many friends who worked at Google previously that discouraged me from applying to Google (like 10 years ago) if I still wanted to do a startup (this was long before Area 120 was a practiced thing). Recently, a friend (VC whose girlfriend works at Google) said many people still build venture/angel funds on the side while still working full time for Google. But of course, don't create your startup company using company property (a la Silicon Valley HBO lessons).

Questions

(1) What companies are flex about having things on the side - a side hustle (but you can't advertise it), examples being two different companies on both ends of the spectrum: Google, Apple etc.)? I've heard some FAANGMULA companies are more stringent than others (Apple being very much against this and super private and only sorta kind supporting open source, vs. others which are all for it and have accelerator/internal incubator programs at the company (Area 120), or even sponsoring ex-employees (a cohort of my class at Verizon Ventures one year was all MIT alumni, ex-Googlers that were sponsored by Google, paid their incorporation fees, I was one of the two weird VR founder people).

(2) I've also heard that from friends if you work at Google, you are not allowed to get paid for speaking gigs on your technical expertise or whatever your functional role is at that company (this differs from from Meta I've heard from other friends). Is this true?

(3) If you go into a FAANGMULA company, what info (legally) what information do you need to provide the the employer? What docs from the state/federal/govt or whatever) that says you have a a DBA, LLC, S/C-Corp etc. What do you need to disclose more specifically and what documentation and legal paperwork do you have to provide?

For example, I currently take consultations and speaking gig money and have revenue (royalties from my book I published years ago) and plan on having an existing app that generates money in the app store that is runs auto-pilot prior to coming into the company. Also note, that I'm aware that this product should not compete with the company's main product lines.**

(4) If you are going to start all this AFTER being hired into FAANGMULA, how do you inform your company employer formally (HR, direct report boss), and that your side hustle does and will not interfere with your primary role at the FAANGMULA company hour wise and that you will still meet all of your core duties/goals/tasks/deadlines for the company and this is sort of 'hack on the weekends thing?'

Have always done dev-based side projects by default and love hearing what others are up to outside of work :)

Hey Everyone,

I’m currently working on an iOS application, that has already been deployed on the App store. I’m still experimenting with it internally with a few friends, but I noticed that for some of them, when the app is installed it is just displayed as a blank screen or with missing icons or default font colors.

The app passed through App store screening before it was deployed, but I suspect that there is a compatibility problem. I was wondering if anyone has suggestions on what the cause might be, and how I may resolve it.

Link to see the screenshots of the normal and buggy versions of the app:

Link to download app:

A little about the application --> It is a security surveillance iOS app that aims to minimize criminal illiteracy by providing citizens with technology for staying aware, secure, and connected. It includes features such as direct messaging, rapid alert system, sensory data monitoring, and a siren observability module.

I'm open to sharing my code too for a review, but only privately. Thank you so much in advance!

TL;DR Contribute to Open Source ML or do side projects for ML. Which do you suggest is the better option?

I just started a new job, but due to circumstances (visa, tough market), I had to take the first job I could take and I ended up in a devops/production support role where I cant really write much code or write any production code (literally dont have access to dev code). I dont plan to stay here long (>6 months).

I read the infamous "" post and wanted to do side projects so that I am not rusty

Context on me: 80% of my background is in Applied ML/Data Science and 20% is software engineering. I am interested in pursuing as an ML Engineer/Data Scientist

Open Source

Pros

• Tons of open source ML stuff supported by big tech companies
  • Meta has a ton of OS projects
• Huggingface is open source
  • Lot of companies use ML models from huggingface (for e.g. BERT for NLP). Would contributing to this on huggingface be seen as impressive?
• Exposure to working on large codebases, good software engineering practice as well

Cons

• Minimal Impact
• Hard to showcase my achievements, especially on LinkedIn

Projects

Pros

• Ability to make and measure impact
• easy to showcase
• learn a lot

Cons

• For ML, projects with impact is hard to do. Most ML applications is based on improving current products using existing data
• Experience from building ML projects might not translate to what I would do on the job as a lot of it involves working with Engineering around data
• It takes time and a lot of effort to have a ton of downloads
• Can end up taking a lot of non-ML work work (web design/frontend) which is not relevant to MLE

Final question: If I were to do open source, what is the best way to showcase on LinkedIn?

• Do you suggest adding the company you did OS for under the experience section and saying "Open Source Contributor"? My concern with this is that it may sound scammy/shady

I've been in the IT industry for 3 years, working on various projects. For the past 1.5 years, I've been heavily involved in Python projects, mainly as a back-end developer using Django. My tasks typically revolved around building or updating APIs as per specific requirements.

Most of these projects were already underway when I joined, so I mostly inherited tasks based on existing project needs. As a result, I wasn't part of the initial database design or project structuring.

Now, I'm starting on my personal project using Django. However, I lack experience in structuring and designing a project from scratch, especially in organizing apps and defining models.

I took a look at other frameworks like Spring Boot and noticed they don't offer the same level of "batteries included" features as Django.

I'm currently dealing with two main challenges:

1. Impact of Learning Django First: I'm concerned that focusing solely on Django might limit my overall understanding of back-end development. Django's comprehensive built-in features might not be present in other frameworks, and that worries me.
2. Project Design and Structure: I'm puzzled about the best practices for structuring and designing a Django project, especially regarding app organization and model structuring.

I'm seeking advice on overcoming these issues and figuring out how to structure my project effectively. I'm also contemplating whether sticking with Django could potentially narrow my overall grasp of back-end development because of its extensive in-built functionalities.

Also, I applied to some companies and most of them are asking for experience in Java back-end development.

Hi Taro Community!

I am in a very similar position as mentioned by someone here: and from the responses it is evident that switching teams/companies will be an unavoidable step soon. I am currently at an entry-level position (will be completing 6 months at current company soon) and wish to look for roles at the next level of hierarchy (for instance my current role is equivalent to SDE 1, I wish to look for roles similar to SDE 2 or equivalent next). Few points:

• I am planning to complete 1 year at my current company, so by the time I switch I shall have ~1 yr of experience as an entry-level software engineer (apart from other experiences as internships/side projects/etc.)
• Firstly, is it realistic to prepare for mid-level at the current position? Do companies hire entry-level SWE's with at most 1 yr of experience for mid-level?
• If yes, is it advisable to apply now (or 6 months down the line)? I do not wish to work as an SDE-1 (entry-level) in another company by leaving my current one as it will only lead to further delays in promotions (I believe it takes at least a few months to set a good impression in a new team that you are capable for a promotion)
• How can I best utilize the next 6 months before I aggressively start applying to companies? I understood the point related to side projects - is it advisable to build side projects in the tech stack my team is using, or should I expand my scope to include new technologies I am interested (but not actively working on right now)?

Any insights/suggestions/interview tips will be really appreciated. I have very less workload right now and really want to make the best use of time to switch further.

Thank you!

Hi, I was creating a website for a local business this fall and was going to ask would you guys recommend using an online template that's already made or should I actually try to code in the template using CSS?  I know that using a template can be easier such as by using squarespace but am unsure of how that will come off on my resume.

Hi all,

With Google Play’s new policy requiring testing by at least 20 people for two weeks before launching an app, many of us will face a new challenge, particularly for those publishing projects for our resumes. What strategies are there for approaching this requirement, and where can we even find 20 willing testers?

Hi all. I got laid off in April from Amazon. I have been looking for a job since then but I am a junior engineer and I haven't been able to get an offer. Someone at Taro suggested that I fill the gap by claiming that I was working on my own startup. This could get me to the mid-level bar.

I thought about doing some personal projects and claiming that I was trying to monetize them but failed. I am concerned that recruiters and hiring managers are going to see right through that though. Side projects are ideally done on the side of my full-time job.

What are some ways that I can fill the employment gap and get to the mid-level before I secure a full time job?

As I watch , I see the slide where it mentioned MVP and just 1 Thing. And also, in the slide, the example of the app is . I have couple questions about this.

1. To come up with the idea of Just 1 Thing application, I believe most of the ideas are already executed before. Is that something I do have to afraid of or not? When I search on app store now, I see similar apps to Random Name Picker. And I'm afraid for how we grow the number of users as most of users choose to use something existing with top rated.
2. If we take number 1 question as a factor (most of users choose to use something existing), how to come up with the idea about something that someone has not executed before?

I want to build on side projects by myself but to come up with something specific with quality. I'm thinking about to do system design doc (define specific requirement, breaking the big task to small task (make it granular, etc)). Try to make a plan before make any execution.

Please let me know if this plan works for me or not. I want to execute on how I can serve something to users that we all think it's useful.

Recently, Rahul has in terms of their ability to deliver business outcomes quickly and with minimal learning. They do look cool!

As a data engineer with some backend experience and no frontend experience, when I think about making a web-app side-project, what should I do first: use a no-code platform to build it, or learn the basics of HTML, CSS, and Javascript (along with a framework like React)? Should my default be to use a low/no code tool?

More broadly, how should I integrate these into side-projects and my work in general?

Thanks!

Git/version control is an important skill for people in tech. What are some ways to get good at it? It's often easy to do things in a hacky way when there is a git command that does exactly what you want to do that will save you a lot of time in the long run. Also, understanding the fundamentals of how Git works can go a long way.

What are some good tips? Other than , of course :)

I've heard 1-1.5x your full-time rate is valid. I know this will likely be context driven, I'm specifically looking for longer-term hourly rates as opposed to short-term / project-based, but would be interested in knowing the differences if there are any.

Thanks in advance folks!

So, some context:

I work as a devops manager (amongst some others, each of us managing a specific workstream). I have not really been that busy due to commercial reasons and thus not learnt much.

I enjoy coding and devops a lot (I was a coder before devops so can code too), and in the mean time, I was approached to work on an app with a friend, which I started. Commercially, that does not seem to be going anywhere due to the proposed high running costs in the cloud (despite automation and taking steps to reduce cost, but the scale and ambition of that app will not come cheap). Anyway, the business domain and requirements I got from said friend make it an interesting project and business problem to solve, with a genuine reason to explore techs I have not explored before (and not just for the sake of my CV).

So I am continuing with this as a development exercise for learning, and I am learning a lot as I am approaching the project maturely (doing documentation, understanding NFRs, etc).

However, some people say that personal projects won't help much etc, so motivation is a problem.

What is your take?

@Alex Earlier you mentioned:

Big Tech open-source is obviously ideal (many engineers got hired at :meta: contributed to their OSS), but it's extremely hard to ramp up on the library and get a major PR landed. And it's not like 1 PR will do it - You'll probably need 5 to 10 to get the attention of hiring managers. However, like with most things, it will get much easier over time (the first one's the hardest).

And here: , you said:

These companies all have a large OSS footprint, and I know several people who got hired into these companies by submitting major PRs into them.

What are the parameters for determining whether something is a major PR in Big Tech Open Source according to you? Am currently working on Microsoft Windows Terminal.

Would you consider the below major PR candidates that would get the attention of hiring managers?

Btw they're both from this list as heroic tasks (7158 on completed tab since I've already completed that one):

To my understanding Major PR means lots of people want it and 7158 has around 100 upvotes so that's Major PR. But there are also some PR's where people make commits with 500 - 1000 lines of code

I'm currently building a side project. I completed my idea of a MVP for the project and I'm looking to market it at some point to get some real users.

I have some ideas on posting on reddit and linkedin, but I'm a little nervous as I've never posted on linkedin before.

My project is a web app.

Hi all,

I recently finished the Masterclasses from Alex & Rahul where Alex & Rahul discussed building apps as side projects to put on resumes. Also in , Alex mentioned he monetized his app & got $100 from premium users.

AFAIK, anything above $400 must be put onto tax return. I'm thinking about developing a small side projects & put maybe ads / premium restrictions on some features. If I do this, how do I avoid conflicts of interest with my 9-5 job, especially if the revenue coming in may way surpass $400? I'm working for a large tech company that essentially do everything hence it's hard to find a business area where the company isn't involved in.

Hi I was wondering whether you know where I could find just entrepreneurial people that try to solve a problem with AI and maybe make a business out of it? I would be interested in working on a project from some entrepreneurial person that tries to solve a problem with AI. I would like to do my own project, since now is the time to build stuff with AI maybe using ChatGPT API. However, I am very extroverted so I can't do my own project - I don't have the motivation, so it's hard to build that way.

Or are these folks mostly in Silicon Valley?

Question was inspired by . In it, he talked about how he was able to get his role at Course Hero because it was a scrappy startup when he joined, and was willing to take bets.

Do you have advice on how to find similar startups? And also connect with startup founders (and not get ghosted)?

Some consequent questions:

1. How do you know if a startup is scrappy or if it is shady/dysfunctional?
2. Are there any resources on Taro to connect with founders?

Thanks for any advice or help!

I'm a Data Engineer. Within the data engineering realm, there are a lot of tools, just like in the software engineering realm. The modern data stack is pretty popular these days. It includes things like Spark for ETL at scale, Docker for virtualized environments, Airflow for orchestration, dbt (data build tool) for transformations in SQL, Fivetran for automated data connectors, Snowflake for data warehousing, and more.

I'm far from knowing all of these tools well, primarily because I use very few of them in my day job. The main reason I want to change jobs is because of this.

I'm worried I'm caught in a catch-22 situation where I don't know the tools so I can't get jobs that have them, which I guess is similar to the new-grad cold start problem.

My question is, how should I think about learning new tools for job interviews? My current instinct is to learn via failure. That is, I have almost all of the above tools on my resume. If someone asks me about them and I'm not able to give a good answer, I will learn that part about the tool so if I'm in the same situation I can answer properly.

Another approach I can think of is to do Udemy courses of them so I have a deeper understanding of how they work. I've learned to be wary of course not tied to projects, though, so I'm hesitant.

I guess I could do projects to learn more about them, but those take time and right now I'm focused on applying to jobs.

I imagine some answers might focus on what my current problem is: can I get interviews or am I failing interviews? I don't think my issue is with failing interviews right now, and certainly not because of specific knowledge people have called me out for for not knowing these tools. I think my issue is more with sourcing interviews currently.

If there's general advice regarding how to think about prepping for an interview when you only have some of the requirements on the Job Description, would love to hear that too.

Thanks!

age: 55

experience: 30 year of on/off programming. 7 years of managing SWEs

After joining Taro, I am motivated to reset my career and not live in depression any more. Also, I think, due to side effects of Taro, my sleep has improved a lot and I am not consuming cheap dopamine any more.

My next tasks are

1. fix my resume and get it to near-perfect.
2. apply at Microsoft
3. while I wait for interview from MS, start programming in Angular / Typescript, .net services c# etc. This will at least help in healthy dopamine and mind set. and help me for future non-FAANG-interviews.
4. if I get interview call from MS, start studying DSA, else continue to do side project in Angular / C# / .net

But I was thinking, at this stage, given AI popularity, should I pivot and start learning AI because even if I get real good at side projects and programming, is it a better career move to be good at programming at this stage of my life? AI is going to get better and better and just being a good programmer is not going to cut it even in near-future?

Thanks for reading.

How can I effectively prioritize my learning as a software engineer in the early stages of my career? I often find myself shifting focus between different technologies and resources online, making it challenging to stay on track and not get overwhelmed. For instance, one day I may work on an Android project, but the next day, I get engrossed in reading a different blog, causing my focus to shift again. Any tips to maintain focus and manage the abundance of online resources to become a proficient software engineer?

I am working on a cool side project (full stack web app) which can genuinely be used and is quite helpful based on feedback I've gotten from friends who have used a prototype version. I want to actually get it out to a user base, and had a few questions:

1. How and where do I host it to keep the costs down?
I've built the backend REST API in Golang and Gin, and it uses a postgres DB to store the data. The frontend I have not started but, it will be built with React with Vite. I'm not sure what the best cost effective way of hosting it is, especially since I am planning on making this app free to use (or perhaps it is time to find a way to monetise it to cover costs). It was originally on AWS but the monthly fees were too much and I had to take it down.

(also note that I am only an intern / grad level engineer, with most of my experience in frontend, so my infrastructure knowledge is very limited)

2. How do I promote it and let people know about it?
How do I market it for free, and let people know about it and try to use it? I have some knowledge in SEO, but that is about it. Social media, Reddit and things like that come to mind, but I don't have a following on anything.

The goal is to build something genuinely helpful for people while having something cool to show off to potential employers, while not costing much money as I have no income right now.

Thank you!!

So I'm looking at exploring contractor roles more seriously. I've been a contractor before but I fell into those roles. I'm trying to be more proactive in finding contractor roles but I wanted to ask for advice as I start to work on this.

What were the most useful things you did to find contractor roles?

When doing a side-project to add to my resume to learn a new tool (e.g. Spark, Airflow, dbt since I'm a Data Engineer) or even a new language, how long should a good side-project take?

I know this question is incredibly ambiguous in that side-projects can have tremendous variability in terms of their depth and breadth, and I know that the best side projects (those with real users) can never end if you're constantly improving them and taking feature requests.

Still, if I'm a beginner to them and am trying to add 2-3 in the next, say, 3 months, how long (in terms of hours) should a decent side-project take?

I believe Gayle Laakmann Mcdowell says you can do a good resume project in a weekend. That's ambiguous (2 hours or 48 hours straight?), but it at least bounds it.

Hi guys to me the most difficult part of building an android apps is coming up with an idea of what to build. To me it feels like there are almost no android apps that I can build that are unique since it feels like almost any android app idea I come up with, someone else has already built it or used my idea. What is your guys advice on this situation especially when I'm trying to build an app with the goal of attracting a lot of users?

Hi guys I wanted to ask your opinion on open source on GitHub and how valuable having a solid portfolio of contributions there can be.

Sometimes we can’t make progress on our tasks due to situations outside our control. For example: waiting someone to review our code, waiting for a permission approval, a meeting that got pushed back, etc.

Are there ways I can continue to make progress and impact while waiting for these?

I considered having a side project and work on it when I can’t progress in my main task, or getting started on a future task to address it more quickly when I officially start it.

What's the right way to think about spending time on your job vs. spending time on side-projects? Once I finish enough work to meet expectations, should I then work on side-projects? Should I think of it more time-bound, and think of my job as the coding I do during the day, and then on my own time I only work on side-projects?

My thoughts are scattered here, but I know that side-projects are key to learning new tech, keeping yourself sharp, and enjoying coding more. On the other hand, linear thinking would say throw yourself entirely at your job, and ride that as high as you can.

Appreciate any insights on the matter.

I’m a Data Engineer at a slow-moving finance company who’s looking for my next job in Big Tech. I just had a recruiter from Stripe reach out about scheduling an interview, which happened because I had a buddy who works at stripe refer me to the role. The position is for backend engineer.

The recruiter says the call will be 20 minutes and I should come prepared with “the most technically complex project” I’ve worked on, and talk about my role, duration, number of engineers, and stakeholders.

I’m nervous about this because my current role is something of a hybrid between data engineer and data analyst and I do a fair bit of data-analyst type work. It’s not that I don’t have projects I can talk about, it’s just that I’m insecure about them and I feel like they are unimpressive to a ‘real’ software engineer and this becomes apparent under sustained scrutiny. So maybe I can get by the 20 minute intro call, but there will surely be an hour-long session later where they want to go into excruciating detail. I do have some experience with backend as well, but it’s already almost 3 years ago now.

My question is this: how can I go about improving my situation? I’m applying for entry-level roles (IC1) and was under the naïve assumption that I just had to get very good at DSA/Leetcode. Obviously, this is not the case.

In order to better handle these project walkthroughs going forward, I see a number of potential approaches, which are not necessarily mutually exclusive:

1. Get better at discussing projects in my current toolkit. Ditch the imposter syndrome and spend more time thinking about what I already have.
2. Invest more in my current job to create better projects with ‘scope’ that are more impressive in interview rounds. Right now, I’m not very committed to my work and coast, doing whatever is assigned to me but in a minimalist way. My current manager has told me how he wants me to be more active in getting things done and taking on a larger role, but as a Tier-3 company, there is no expectation or requirement for me to do so (i.e. very low chance of me being let go), and furthermore, I tell myself I will be leaving soon, so why take on more responsibility? This might ironically contribute to it being harder for me to move since I don’t do the kinds of things that make it easier to interview.
3. Do side-projects outside of work that I can discuss. But here I run into the issue that I’m not working with anyone (unless it’s open source) and this is probably not the best approach unless my side-project is really good with users. I’ve heard Alex and Rahul say this a number of times.

Happy to hear anyone’s thoughts about how I can improve my situation. I probably have the wrong attitude towards my current role, as I’ve been wanting to leave it for over a year. I’ve thought about quitting a lot so I can have more time for interviewing, side-projects, networking, learning, and prep, but everyone says that’s a bad idea (especially in the current climate), so it’s easier to just muddle on in my current role.

Thoughts are welcome!

I spend a lot of my free time working on personal projects, typically sourced from kodeko, the android developer site, and other & mobile developer blogs.

I often find that these projects are good experience, but not in depth enough to deploy. Are there any resources (or advice for creating ideas & development plans) anyone would recommend for building intermediate and advanced applications?

I've read enough answers on this platform to know that Alex and Rahul are huge fans of learning Android, both because it's a well-established area of tech (bigger than web) and because you can see how well your apps do. They always mention learning Android, but from my limited understanding, React Native gets you iOS and web as well, and is similar to regular web-dev (could totally be off here).

Isn't it more bang-for-your-buck to learn React Native and perhaps a better use of time?

I'd like to ask for your feedback on my side project - a full-stack simulation of a ride-hailing app such as Uber or Lyft.

App: 
Blog: 

A bit of background first. I've been wanting to publish a personal full-stack project for a while. These were my main reasons:

• I wanted a platform to explore concepts and tools I don't get to work with in my day job, helping me accelerate my learning.
• I've wanted to break into big tech and thought this project could help me stand out among many applicants.
• I enjoy writing and wanted to get better at it.

Why did I choose a simulation of the Uber/Lyft app? I always found something very attractive about these apps - they're visually appealing and dynamic, with colossal architectures behind them. I thought it would be very cool to re-implement some aspects of such an app. I have also been reading the Uber engineering blog and got a glimpse of the complexity these companies are dealing with.

My final goal with this app was to have an animated map with cars picking up customers, driving them across the map and dropping them off at their destinations. Customers would post ride requests and the system would match them with the nearest drivers. The simulation would run on the backend, and the frontend map would show the action in real-time.

I started working on the project last autumn. I've spent around 300 hours working on it and you can see the result in the links above.

My ask

I'd love to get your feedback to improve or extend this app and my blog, keeping in mind my objectives:

• I plan to apply to big tech companies this summer, and I'd like this project to help me with my applications.
• The project targets both recruiters and hiring managers. With recruiters, the goal is to pass the initial screening and get me to the interview stage (of course, I'll also be trying to secure referrals, but I might not always succeed). With hiring managers, this project might help me score extra points in my final evaluation.
• I might be applying to companies such as Uber or Bolt, but this project is not supposed to impress just the ride-hailing companies.
• I prefer not to put much more time into the project at the moment, as my focus right now has to be on the coding interview prep.

Possible additions or improvements include:

• Splitting the system across multiple machines (perhaps 3), making it truly distributed.
• Adding various components used in large-scale systems such as load-balancer, rate limiter, or message queues. Indeed, these components are not actually needed for the app to function. But by doing so, I could demonstrate my ability to work with them (albeit not necessarily demonstrating deep expertise).
• Adding comprehensive documentation with system diagrams and explaining the choices I made.
• More rigorous testing by adding integration tests (right now, I only have unit tests).

As for my previous background - I've been an engineer for ~4.5 years, most of my experience is from a small startup (series B). I consider myself a full-stack engineer but going forward, I aim to specialize more in the backend. Therefore, the project should strongly communicate my backend skills. For my next role, I also prefer backend positions to full-stack ones.

Recently I watched the great masterclass from Rahul and Alex on side projects. It made me realize that while my project might be interesting from a technical perspective, it has no users. In fact, this app doesn't allow any user interaction by nature. However, what I'm lacking in terms of users, I'm hoping to make up with the degree of technical complexity. Please also share your views on this aspect.

Many thanks if you've read this long post to the end. I'll be very grateful for any tips on how to make this project more appealing 🙏🏼

I am an SDE1 that was recently laid off from AWS (~2 YOE total). Lately, I have been reflecting on what I wanted to do/what really excites me. I really enjoy software development and while I do want to get another job one day, I wanted to use this opportunity to scratch my entrepreneurial itch and create apps/websites/side-projects for fun or for many small business owners I know that need someone to create software for their business. I'm not sure how long this "break" will be but I would say ~2 to 3 months time. Part of this is inspired by Alex Chiou's love for side projects.

I understand that finding a job will take some time as well, so the total gap on my resume that will be filled by this freelance work/applying might be ~6 months total. I understand that there are other posts on Taro that talk about the impact of a career break but this won't necessarily be a break per se. On my resume I will put this down as freelance work I completed for clients and will be prepared to show potential employers a portfolio of what I did.

I was wondering if this would negatively reflect on my application when applying for SDE jobs again/will make it harder for me to land a job. Alternatively, I could begin applying and interview prep now and only work on these projects on the side. Thanks.

The question I had was regarding building side projects such as a calculator using a tutorial and then modifying it to make it unique.  Is it okay to use ChatGPT or Github copilot to add those modifications or should I try coding those modifications on my own so that I gain better lower level programming skills?

Hello,

I am a conventional engineer (mix of startup experience + service industry).

I am thinking of starting a product company but had a few questions.

I think I am comfortable from a technical standpoint and no dearth of ideas.

But my questions are more centered around funding. I have not made a similar effort before and almost all of my experience is mostly technical and not managerial.

For such a scenario, do you think the best best is to be able to garner a large amount of users?

Hello. I did kind of ask about this before, but now it's more prevalent dilemma for me as I'm actively interviewing and many of my best opportunities are asking for someone who ALSO has a software engineering background:

Scenario: This past year at working an AWS Cloud Consulting Partner I only grew my cloud and Terraform skills and it was my first professional role. I didn't have any software engineering mentoring and I had very little programming work outside Terraform, but I got to mess with a few different languages in my spare time and still haven't decided on one to main. So I figure it needs to be a language & framework good for an ambitious one-man project (possibly a PWA) that I can be passionate about which would drive my learning, provide a great and productive developer experience so I can build some epic stuff myself and learn from it.

Basically, I need a versatile, productive, "startupy" programming language that can be my "main" and kill two birds with one stone here as I have entrepreneurial ambitions:

What do I like doing? What am I passionate about? Well, game dev with Godot. But it uses GDscript and job prospects with it are nill. So I'm considering making a game website PWA like the old as a one man show. So definitely a scalable full-stack CRUD project. I want my development experience to be as productive as possible, and for that reason I'm now considering mainly the firs two options here:

1. Ruby on Rails (despite it being the butt of many jokes and claims that its dead) . It being "batteries included" and everything else I hear about it is that its super productive and fun. I have not tried it yet though. It might be an ace because I see a number of "remote work from anywhere" opportunities for ruby devs to work on legacy code, i.e Gitlab, but I'm really wary of it being a bad choice to specialize in for my career.

2. Blazor with NetCore C# - Blazor is new tech with inherent risk, but it would allow me to focus on one language and framework while doing the full stack (I think similar to Ruby with the "batteries included" approach.). There's a risk of Blazor being new, but the Net Core skills I obtain will always be relevant. On the contrary, with javascript I felt like what I knew was never enough, there was always another framework or some abstraction on top of React, or new way to do JS I had to learn, which I found extremely frustrating. I'm really not a Javascript fan because of that, but if I had to, I'd probably try Svelte. But the point is, I'm trying to avoid bouncing around the way I have been. I really need to be an expert with one language and framework, and I'd like to be able to "do it all" with that language and framework for it to have an opinionated way with best practices so I can get up and running quickly and learn the skills I building an awesome project.

3. Golang - I started looking at Golang because of it being said that it has an opinionated way of doing things rather than a 20x ways to do one thing which was very appealing to me. Also it's cloud reputation, compiling down to a binary. BUT - it seems its for microservices rather than an impressive full stack startup project. I'm not sure how motivated I'd be making an API instead of a complete project like the PWA game site I mentioned. I really don't want to have to switch to JS for a React front end to get up and running. For this reason, I'm also not sure if Python is a good choice compared with the first two options. I know it has a templating feature, but can I do it all with that?

Can I get some opinions and advice? I'm looking for a new job and need to build up my core software skills fast as possible:

Speed, productivity, specializing in a worthwhile language and learning core software engineering through making an awesome PWA project are my main targets for this.

I am a frontend focused full-stack engineer with 7 years of relevant experience in the frontend engineering space and a total of 12 years of experience. I am not able to decide where should I invest my time when working on side projects. Should I start picking up mobile (Android/iOS) or continue to sharpen my skills in the frontend development space? To put it another way, should I invest my time in going deep in my current domain or should I invest time learning mobile UI development as that has gained more traction and is viewed as more valuable skill?

I think I am unable to decide whether to go about developing my skills in breadth or depth.

When learning new things, I often find that I don't know this, don't know the best practice in that, and so on. If I go down these rabbit holes, a lot of time is spent and not much progress is made in the original project. If this is a scene at work, usually there are external factors to guide you not to go down these rabbit holes, be it the deadline on a task or advice from colleagues. But how to manage this while building side projects? Especially, time after work is equally precious that you sacrificed doing other things to build a skill, and progress gives motivation. But at the same time, going down these knowledge rabbit holes also builds knowledge, and be more niche. How would you trade off knowing everything vs progress in side projects?

Continuing from the post here:

Would the suggestions in that post be different for my scenario? I have added my details below.

I have a total 12 years of work experience. Currently, I am a SDE II at a fintech company. I have worked at this company for 3 years now and had 3 managers in past 3 years. At my current company, I am being asked to constantly move from one project to another every 6 months. For the last 6 - 7 years I have been working on mostly frontend engineering, including hands-on experience in Angular, React, and Backbone JavaScript libraries. I am looking to make a job switch as a Senior Frontend engineer.

I know that to get to the Senior level, I have to show influence at high levels. After reading the answer to some of the questions in the community, I am not able to decide whether I should focus on building web projects or should I start building an Android app. The advantage of choosing a web project is that I already have expertise in modern frontend frameworks. My initial years of experience is in legacy backend systems(mainframes) which I think is not of much use now in Silicon valley companies.

As far as my interest level goes, I am very much inclined toward the web. But I know that app development is definitely something that helps to attract users to your product. I am a bit lost on what I should invest my time on. Considering that I have 12+ years of experience, should I do both? Will doing both Android and web both open a lot more opportunities for me?

Should I focus on building something where I can show the impact with the number of users rather than thinking about the platform (android or web) for which I start building my side projects. Should I even care about doing side projects considering I have 10+ years of work experience?

Should I target full-stack roles instead of front-end roles?

Looking for suggestions. Apologies if this question comes out as too broad and not very clear. I am open for discussion if that can help to narrow down the response.

Current TC: 220 - 240K

The context: I am looking for a startup to join and realized that most of the opportunities are with NodeJS and TypeScript.

I've been working mostly with .NET for quite some time but JS/TS are not new to me. In fact, TS is written by Microsoft and probably because of that, the syntax is very close to C#. So, I don't see big issue here. But NodeJS is a different world. I have some professional experience with it but don't know it deeply.

I understand if you are a good SWE the stack doesn't matter that much. But we are talking about finding a job here. I will have to convince the interviewer I can do it. And the questions will go for sure deeply about Node env. My motto is if the interview is tough, there is a higher chance that there will be more talented people than usual. But tough interview will make it even more impossible to me.

What are the opportunities?

1. Learning it for few months myself? I am sure will help me to understand it better but it's not like having years of experience with Node.
2. Applying for non-senior positions, sacrificing the payment but learning? I am not sure this is possible actually.

Or smth else?

I'm sure Alex and Rahul talk about this in their , but wondering how to write clean code, particularly in the context of someone who doesn't have technical people available to review my pull requests in my work or in side-projects.

I'm sure this skill is almost entirely developed by working with talented people and writing a lot of code, but is there a place for resources like "Clean Code" the book or courses on Udemy?

I'm a Data Engineer looking to break into FAANG. As such, my time outside of work right now is spent applying to jobs, asking people for referrals, and networking. When I have interviews, my focus shifts to Leetcode.

I really want to build a side-project though both because it's fun and because it will help me perform better at future jobs.

My (common) issue is this: where do I start? Not in terms of the problem I am solving. I have a super-smart friend who's a lawyer and an MBA who's into fantasy sports and he has neither the time nor the ability to create an app. I feel like I could just generate a bunch of different ideas with him and pick the one most interesting to me.

I mean in terms of tech area. Alex and Rahul are both mobile developers and that naturally lends itself to great apps. I know Alex has mentioned that in a vacuum, it's better to focus on front-end for side-projects. I have no experience with front-end or mobile, some back-end dev experience and a fair bit of data.

I could build a data eng project. Start Data Engineering has some great projects on his blog () and there's definitely plenty of examples online (e.g. ).

My question is whether I should build a DE project. I'm not particularly wedded to DE because I feel like I want to do more SWE work and less business analyst work. Above all, I want to get into FAANG for the boost to my learning, career, and comp. DE is prob the easiest way of getting there but again, not wedded to it.

So I see my options as a) doing a DE project (maybe using the projects above to get my feet wet); b) doing a full-stack project (hard to do a back-end only project I think); c) mobile? (Alex and Rahul are tempting me).

Is there any advantage to mobile over a web-dev project?

If I do b or c, I'm concerned about falling into tutorial-hell or at least taking too long to learn before building. I'm tempted by a full-stack course like Zero To Mastery's full stack course, but it's 40 hrs, and I know it's prob not necessary.

Just want to add that I'm a newb for side-projects and I'm aware that I can and will experiment with multiple project types once I get started.

Sorry for the unstructured thoughts here. My brain works on NoSQL, not SQL ;)

Even though starting to work for a big company like Meta, Amazon, Google, etc. I believe is a hard to achieve (I haven't work for) somehow it looks pretty straightforward. Learn for interview, get the job, level up. Yes, I am sure it's hard and not many will do it but still you know what should be done (yes, may don't know how). But let me tell you a different story:

I work in a not that famous country in the EU and non of the top tech companies is there. Actually 90+% of the companies are outsourcing companies. As a SE with 10 years of experience in the outsourcing world I can tell you how it works: you work on a legacy code which is so old and so bad (hundreds of people have tried write code there) you can't see good practice at all, no code reviews (sometimes there is bad it is very rare), no unit tests, performance review is only about client's feedback and so on, you got the point. It's about the money only and nobody cares if you are good or not if the client is happy. In very rare cases I have started something from scratch but all of my colleagues were so bad progmmers like myself that we messed up all. It's a deadlock. After 10 years I realized I am a bad programmer and I've seen so many bad practices that I have no passion to do anything anymore. Now to the questions:

1. Is it possible to apply best standards in an outsourcing company like those in FAANG and if yes, how?
2. How can I fill all the gaps I have at the moment? Can I fill all the gaps with side projects only? How can I fill them when nobody will teach me anything new. Nowone will review my code and like @Alex said, they are the main source to learn :) How would I know is the code good or not? Could it be better?

The ultimate goal of my career (and maybe in life) is to fill the gap not only in my skills but to create a company (product based or outsourcing) where everyone who join to have a chance to become a great programmer. But before helping others, I need to help myslelf. This is how I found Taro.

Hello! Just joined this community yesterday and the information I've seen so far is invaluable! This platform truly is unique!

My question is about the overwhelming and sometimes contradicting information for front-end engineering. I was a backend engineer for 1 year and then switched to a frontend engineer within Mastercard since I love the design and visual aspect of it. It is much more gratifying. We work with Angular in mastercard but I feel like my skillset is very specific to our codebase. I am good at debugging (cause that's what most of my work is recently) but I don't know how that can transfer to other jobs. I also feel like Angular is an older framework. I want to join a proper tech company next year (outside fin-tech) as a senior front-end engineer. What do I need to do to get there?

Should I dive deep into Angular and make tons of projects with Angular? Should I learn React or some other frameworks and make projects with those? Should I look into full-stack roles and brush up on backend (Java)? All of the above??

I am a bit lost and any guidance would be appreciated!

Thank you!!

I am working on a side project. I may use GCP or AWS for it.

tldr of the system : Create a web ui to process input files and generate a tabular output giving the link to the dashboard .

I have a bunch of files generated , about 2GB in size in total , Account ID is the high level directory and inside each account there 50 log files each having specific content .

I want to create a UI using Angular framework . Using the UI I will upload the files to GCS /AWS S3 . Then the backend should trigger complex backend scripts, written will be written in Python or Java and then output file is generated. Using the output file a dashboard with few images embedded is generated.

In the end the UI should have a table which should indicate status of processing to COMPLETE and in another column show point to url of the dashboard.

I want to deal with least amount of security work as I want to avoid studying Oauth 2.0 authentication .

Few additional questions , non-system design questions =>

1. What are the things I should learn in Angular to cover most bases in this project, I am a backend engineer and going over youtube videos . I want to stick with Angular as I have few work projects going to come in coming months so it will help me to learn it .
2. I am unfamiliar with typescript . How much effort will it need to learn in order to code for this project. I am most familiar with Python only.

What are some of the best resources to learn front-end development?

I want to build a startup (SaaS).

None of my team mates have filed patents. Some Engineers working on ML, Computer Vision have filed lot of patents. I don't have experience in ML and its difficult to get into these teams as a beginner in ML. I am working in Insights team and building recommendation systems(Its in primitive stage, hardcoded rules). I have been trying to read lots of articles, what other companies are doing, recent ML work on recommendation systems but I am failing to come up with an idea that I can apply to our use case as I don't see similar use case outside. I don't have research engineers/scientists to talk to in my org. Filing a patent is not a requirement for my job role. I just want to do it out of interest. I am stuck. Could someone please provide insights on how I can move forward to think bigger?

I appreciate the value of side projects mentioned on Taro, and I'd like give one a shot. Whenever I've looked before, I got caught up in not finding ones relevant to my work. I work on the backend side, working in the machine learning infrastructure/ops space. That's literally the example used in the side projects video of one where it's hard to do on your own... so is it still worth doing a side project? Maybe one in a similar language (C++), even if it's not related?

I feel like I'm just not being creative enough here, but I'd rather not do a side project that's super unrelated to my area (e.g. learning a ton of frontend to build an app that has a small machine learning component) unless it's still valuable. Maybe to make this more general, how did those of you working on the backend get started with side projects?

I'm applying for jobs now and am concerned that I don't know enough languages. I have a few years of work experience as a Data Engineer, so my bread and butter is Python and SQL. I'd like to get an entry-level role as a software engineer, but am concerned that I don't have the right languages. From what I can see, Java and C/C++/C# are the main languages asked for in job apps. Do I need to do a side project using these languages so I can add them to my resume? Or should I only apply to Data Engineer roles?

Currently working full time as an Android Developer but also running a small consulting gig on the side. Main reason at the time was to have another income stream.

Now I am torn between keeping both jobs, quiting the full time and going all in on my company or dropping my company.

For me personally it is a difficult choice because I am driven to achieve what my mind sets out to do but lately I have not been enjoying work like I used to. In the end the decision is mine to make but I would love some guidance.

• I am looking for a Software Engineer role in big techs.
• They varied my experience in my previous company, i.e. I was part of three different projects, all of which used different tech stacks, and none of them was a development project.
• Now I am confused about adding projects to my profile because I do not have any projects related to development.
• I have experience in python that is related to Data Science.
• I would love some guidance on deciding on what to build and how to choose between web, front/back end, full stack, android, etc.

Lately, I have been finding myself with a lot of free time and am unable to shake this feeling that I am not "doing enough." After finishing my school work, I usually just go to the gym, hang out with friends, or play video games.

Is there anything else I can do to further improve myself as an engineer and set myself up for success later on? Perhaps some books or resources to read.

I've tried working on some side projects, but honestly find it hard to follow through with them due to lack of urgency with no deadlines and prior fatigue from working on school assignments.

My goal is to transition into a SWE role, but something I've struggled with is making the building of software projects more digestible. A lot of the time I'll look at some project I have to build, and I just don't know where to start or how to figure out what to do. Any tips on how to make this process less scary?

The applications our current team develop are targeted for individual users only and most of our projects are centered around building complex business logic rather than scale. So there is less scope to gain experience on concepts such as parallel processing, concurrency, caching or similar. What are my options to become really good at these skills if I am not working on these on a day-to-day basis?

For people who work on side projects: I was wondering what is your system when it comes to coding at work and then coding after work? How do you divide your time effectively between the two?

I'm a self-taught, aspiring Android engineer, looking to land my 1st full-time role. I have around 4 hours a day to learn software development, and I'm wondering how I can spend my time the most efficiently. Here are the 2 core things I want to understand how to balance my time between:

• DSA (data structures and algorithms)
• Building projects for portfolio

For context, I mainly work on the web-side, building customer-facing surfaces. I don't want side projects to be something like DSA where it's good for interviews and that's it.

The concept of side projects makes me think of Flappy Bird when it came out. It seems like it started off as a side project, so this is all interesting to me and would love to learn more about the benefits.

I was inspired by the gamification on Duolingo, which is a language learning app with a "daily streak" mechanic. The incentive to do something in the app every day has been very powerful for me - I have a streak of 200+ days!

I want to bring this idea over to an engineering context, creating an app called "Leetfriends". The purpose of the app is to have friends share with one another their Leetcode streaks, using social pressure to encourage consistency for everyone. I’m hoping that the app does well, so I could include it in my portfolio and boost my job prospects. How do I best go about this app?