TITLE: Advice for a Prospective Web Developer
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: July 30, 2009  6:12 AM
DESC: 
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BODY:
For the last couple of days, I've been speaking
with a prospective non-traditional student who
is seeking advice about what to study for a
second bachelor's degree.  His indecision about
careers and school is worthy of its own post;
I've seen it in so many other 20- and 30-somethings
who are unhappy with their first careers and
not sure of where to go next.

He wants to get into web development.  What
should he study?  Well, he thinks he wants to
get into web development, but he isn't sure
exactly what it is.  This is a common issue for
prospective CS majors coming out of high school;
they rarely know just what computer science is.
It is apparently also an issue with the more
visible discipline of web development.  People
see the products, but they are not sure at all
how they are created.  Is this a problem for
budding electrical engineers or civil engineers?

This young man asked me for precise definitions
of the terms "web design" and "web development",
especially clear distinctions between the two,
and a map from the terms onto specific undergrad
majors.  I explained that these are fuzzy terms,
like so many of our best words and phrases.
That didn't satisfy him much, because the
fuzziness won't easily wipe away his indecision.

He is asking the head of the Computer Science
department for advice, so I tell him what I
think about web development, as fairly as I
can, but with an unmistakeable fondness for
my discipline.  On the one hand, there is
<EM>presentation</EM>, the web pages themselves
and how they appear to users within a browser.
On the other, there is the <EM>technology</EM>
that underlies the web, the code and data that
make it all work.  To be versatile in the web
game, and ultimately great, a person should
learn both.

We do not offer a program in web development
at my university, so a student must go to
departments that teach the ideas and tools
behind these facets of the web.  I suggested
graphic design with a little psychology for
the presentation side, and computer science
for the technology side.  We have a
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2007-04.html#e2007-04-05T20_57_33.htm">
   excellent graphic design program</A>
here, and our CS program introduces students
to programming and to the ideas of data
structures, databases, algorithms, and
information storage and retrieval that drive
the web.  We even teach an undergrad course
in user interface design, which is the closest
our major courses gets to presentation.

A freshman coming out of high school would do
well to double-major in CS and graphic design.
We have at least one such double-major now --
a dynamite student -- and a few others are
thinking about taking this route.  Majoring
in both is a challenge, because it requires
skills that are, on the surface, so unlike
one another.  I think the styles of thinking
at the heart of these two disciplines are
not so different after all.  Besides, these
majors don't just require skills; they help
to develop them.  It is a great double major.

However, most nontraditional students coming
back to school are not interested in re-living
the four- or five-year undergrad experience.
They have lives to support, and often families,
so they are usually focused on making a career
change and getting on with it.  As a result,
one of these majors will have to do.

It seems to me that if you want to make a dent
in the web world, you really want to know the
technology and the ideas that make them work.
Philip Greenspun teaches a
<A HREF="http://philip.greenspun.com/seia/">
   software engineering course</A>
at MIT with web programming as its centerpiece,
based in large part on the premise that this
particular technology is so central to the
experience of current CS grads when they get
out in the world.

(I wonder what it would be like if I tried to
teach Greenspun's course as
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2009-07.html#e2009-07-03T08_31_32.htm">
   my SE course</A>?!
My guess is that a lot of students would love
it, a few would hate it, and the respective
ratios for the faculty would be swapped.)

Not all students want to do the technology.
I would rather students make this decision
from a position of power -- knowing something
about the technology -- than from a position
of ignorance, but that's not always how the
world works.  Fine.  Then the student can
study graphic design and psychology and apply
that knowledge to learning how to make web
sites whose appearances sizzle.  There is a
shortage of great web sites out there, which
tells me there may be a shortage of great web
designers.  Go for it.

I had to be honest.  You can learn a lot about
how to make websites at the tool level
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2009-06.html#e2009-06-11T20_24_02.htm">
   without giving any university a lot of money</A>.
With a high school degree and a few books on
HTML, CSS, Javascript (three topics we teach
in a
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/courses.php#017">
   course for non-majors</A>),
and maybe Flash (which we currently teach in
an
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/courses.php#088">
   experimental course</A>,
also for non-majors), any reasonably intelligent
person can become a competent web developer.
This student already has a college degree, so
with discipline and perseverance he could
probably make this career shift on his own.
There may be practical limitations on the career
potential for some people who choose this path,
but it's viable.

In at least two of my exchanges with this young
man, I ran into a concern that I expected to
encounter.  It is the fear that rises to the
top of almost every neophyte's mind whenever
he or she is confronted with the words
"computer science":  <EM>Will I have to do much
programming</EM>?  I think he was asking as
much about the jobs he would get in web
development as about the CS courses he would
have to take to get a major here.

My part of these conversations can be summed
up in a mantra I now keep close to my heart:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
You don't <B>have</B> to program; you <B>get</B>
to program.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

We need to do something to change the default
expectation young people have about programming.
Seriously.

This particular student is a reasonable young
man.  He is college-educated and earnest about
finding a good career.  He is also a little
afraid.  In my recent experience, I have
encountered many like him, and I'd like to
help them as best I can.  So, let's get back
to the original question, "What should a
person study in college if she wants to get
into web development?"  Faithful readers:
What should I tell them?  What am I missing?
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