Web Developer vs Front End Developer

[miguelzuleta]

Hi everyone,

after long indecisive talks with coworkers about this topic, I figured I’d take this online to see your take on it.

What do you think is the difference between a web developer and a front end developer?

:)

[miguelzuleta]

Well so back end people deal with stuff like php, ruby, java, etc. The reason why I’m asking is because I feel that web developers and front end developers both focus on pretty much the same languages and frameworks like HTML, CSS, Sass, Javascript, jQuery, etc.

So are they the same thing? If not, where do you make the distinction?

[Ilan Firsov]

Web developer I feel is a generalized term for someone who works on websites.
Mainly you’d find 3 kinds of ‘web developers’: back end developer, front end and ‘full stack’
Usually the back end guy mainly focuses on the server side while the front end guy does pretty much everything with HTML, CSS and JS.
Full stack developer is a term for someone who is working both on the front end and on the back end.

So a back end developer is a web developer, but a web developer is not necessarily a back end developer.

[Senff]

I’d say it’s just the specifics. Analogy alert:

Web Developer == house builder
Front End Developer == painter
Back End Developer == bricklayer

In other words, a Web Developer is just a more general term than Front End Dev and Back End Dev, which are more specific.

Next up, discussing the meanings and differences between Front End Engineer, Web Programmer and Integrator. ;)

[miguelzuleta]

Awesome. Thanks for the reply y’all! :D

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