A Developer’s Tale

Marco Vezzani is a Web Developer based in Grangemouth. He kindly takes time to share his thoughts on how web development appealed to him even from an early age.

What prompted you to be a Web Developer?

Well that’s a hard question to answer seeing as when I was growing up and at school the internet wasn’t quite what we have today. I arrived late to the whole web design/ development concept as only universities and libraries tended to have web access, so I wasn’t really exposed to it in the way that people are now.

From an early age I had always been into computers and watched my father program some games for our home computer by copying code from magazines to create very simplistic one screen games. The idea of creating something from nothing more than a few lines of code blew me away and got me trying to learn computer programming.

My computer history started with an Acorn Electron followed by a Commodore 64, then an Amiga 500 and finally a PC running the ‘brand new’ Windows 3.11. With each computer I had various levels of success at programming using the likes of Basic and Amos. I always found it difficult to relate what I was programming to the end result, as you couldn’t see what you were doing until you compiled the code, which meant I spent a lot of time looking at error screens when things inevitably went wrong. This prompted further practice and overall I did produce a few programmed games. During this time teachers at school encouraged and convinced me to stretch my creative side in other ways by writing short stories, poems and plays which weren’t too bad (so I was told). Although I was being creative and enjoying it, I still wanted to be creative whilst programming so kept trying to learn more.

After leaving school, I got the Internet at home through my trusty 56k dial up modem. This is when I started to take more of an interest in web design/ development. I bought a book and a couple of days later I had learned enough to start building some rudimentary websites, soon after I began to play around with flash once again with varying degrees of success. I spent a few months learning more about flash and programmed some flash games, websites and animations; putting my new knowledge to good use.

Not being the greatest artist and still having a desire to code I started to look into scripting languages like JavaScript, PHP and ActionScript. It was at this point I really felt I was doing something I enjoyed. I loved the ability to come up with a concept put something together and see it working so quickly. This was all still a hobby, something to do when I was bored or when I had spare time, but these formed my reasoning for wanting to do it as a job- if it was at all possible.

To make that happen I looked into learning more and settled on going to my local college to do an HND. After my HND and with some coercing from college lecturers I applied to Glasgow Caledonian University and completed my Honours degree two years later.

Throughout all of this one thing has remained the same, the joy I get from coming up with an idea, ironing it out, putting some code together and seeing it working. Watching something take shape from a basic idea to a final working piece gives me so much satisfaction. I enjoy the whole process and get a huge kick out of working on a project from beginning to end and knowing that something I created is useful.

Tell us a bit about your first job.

My First IT based Job, came about 7 months after I had graduated from University in 2006 for a company called INRS Training Solutions. They’d built their own online learning management system (LMS), designed to cater for the needs of the oil and gas industry.

I was the sole developer in the company so any issues, bug fixes or new functionality for the LMS had to be designed and built by myself, quite a daunting task when it’s your first job but a challenge I relished.

During my time at INRS I also took charge of the company website, which I completely re-designed and worked on some re-branding for the company to compliment the new site. This new design is still being used as their current website, although since my departure someone took it upon themselves to change some layout aspects of the site and unfortunately re-built the design using tables and removing some of the JavaScript interactivity I had incorporated.

What has been a highlight of your experiences so far?

It’s hard to pick a single highlight out of all my experiences in developing so far, but two do come to mind. The first coming during my first job when I was asked to plan and design the new iteration of the current system we had developed in house. I had only been out of university for 15 months and had been working for INRS for 6 of those. The designs, plans, blueprints and coding were used even after I left and a new developer with more experience was taken on board.

Another highlight came only a few months ago in December 2009, when I found out that one of the clients websites I worked on whilst in-house at Mine Digital won an award at the inaugural HeraldScotland.com Digital Business Awards. Normally this would be praise enough to have worked on an award winning website. But to find out that a lot of the aspects citied as helping to win the award, I had worked on solely was a fantastic feeling and a great highlight.

Any tips on jobs to avoid?

This may not be helpful to most people but, is any job a bad job, especially when you first start out as a developer?

It’s all experience at the end of the day and experience is key when looking for a job be it your first or tenth. With the coveted commercial experience being the necessity of many jobs these days, it’s hard to say what jobs to avoid. Web development covers so many areas and niches that I don’t think you can afford at first to rule out any jobs.

I thought I’d end up working for a media agency, working on different websites but found my first job working on an in-house system offered me a higher learning curve that set me up fantastically for future jobs as well as pushing me to learn more that I thought I would in my first job.

I’d say be open to the different types of job opportunities out there, especially when first starting out and use these to help decide which development path best suites you. Play to your strengths and follow the path you enjoy the most. I have worked with people who thought they would dislike certain jobs but ended up loving them and also know people who finally get that job they always wanted only to realise it wasn’t quite what they thought it was.

What advice could you give to those starting-out?

The best advice I could give anyone starting out in web development is be flexible, open to learning and always plan with the future in mind. The web is a big place and moves at an incredible pace including standards and technologies. Never think that because you know a few web technologies that you are good to go, as you should always be learning and developing new skills no matter how long you have been working in the industry.

I would also say it’s critical to get as much experience as possible by working on projects for other people even just for friends and family. These projects will help you pick up skills you will need in the professional world.

Try and get some work experience before you graduate, but don’t rely on your college or university to set this up for you. It seems almost all employers these days want you to have at least some commercial experience before they will look at your CV. So get started early and set up your own work experience for local companies even if it’s unpaid. This commercial experience will pay dividends when it comes to getting that first job.

A word of advice for anyone undertaking freelance work, get everything in writing and stick to your project contract. Agree with your client in writing what it is they want, expect and what functionality their project is to have. This will stop your client adding in extra work and functionality to their project.

What are you currently working on?

My day job at BuildStore keeps me busy, dealing with internal projects, web functionality, email campaigns, SEO and new web content. Once again I’m the sole developer for all these areas so I have to manage time along with generating monthly and weekly reports for different areas and aspects of the business.

When not at my day job you can find me freelancing, over at ojfreedom.co.uk or working with friend Chris Walker to develop a concept for a review site. Keep your eye out for www.spilleditwrong.com launching soon.

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Find out more about Marco Vezzani and follow him on twitter.