this post was submitted on 29 Oct 2025
49 points (98.0% liked)

Web Development

5000 readers
57 users here now

Welcome to the web development community! This is a place to post, discuss, get help about, etc. anything related to web development

What is web development?

Web development is the process of creating websites or web applications

Rules/Guidelines

Related Communities

Wormhole

Some webdev blogsNot sure what to post in here? Want some web development related things to read?

Heres a couple blogs that have web development related content

CreditsIcon base by Delapouite under CC BY 3.0 with modifications to add a gradient

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
snowe@programming.dev
erlingur@programming.dev
Ategon@programming.dev
49
As a backend developer, where do I even start with frontend? Feeling major choice paralysis (feddit.dk)
submitted 2 months ago by SorteKanin@feddit.dk to c/webdev@programming.dev
76 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

I'm an experienced backend developer. To me, the backend world seems super simple compared to the frontend world.

It seems like there are a million options and I don't have the experience to say what's good and what's not. I'm hit with major choice paralysis, basically.

I don't have any special requirements - I "just" want to build a pretty standard, responsive, modern-looking UI. Ideally without too much boilerplate, in a framework that "feels good", in a way that might at some point attract other contributors as well, if I get to the point of open sourcing.

Of course I could just reach for the most popular thing i.e. React, but that doesn't seem to be the "hip" thing to use nowadays (or maybe I'm wrong? What do I know, I'm a backend dev).

But even if I choose a framework, there's a million other libraries out there to choose as well. For instance, which UI library to choose? What about observability and state management and authentication and so on?

Sorry if this is a bit ranty. I am honestly just looking for an experienced frontend developer to point me in some direction (i.e. some set of frameworks/libraries; a "stack" if you will), so I can get out of this choice paralysis.

What would be your go-to stack for a new frontend project today?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] MisterNeon@lemmy.world 19 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (18 children)

First get the basics with HTML and CSS. Learn JavaScript then Typescript. Figure out if you want to learn SaSS, styled components (for JavaScript based applications), or a library like Tailwind. Do YouTube searches and research on React, Vue, and Angular. See which one gels with you.

I suggest Udemy for that and if you're interested I can suggest specific teachers.

If you or your company are hiring UI/UX developers then DM me, hopefully then I'll train you myself.

[–] SorteKanin@feddit.dk 7 points 2 months ago (11 children)

Sorry, I should've made myself clearer. I am an experienced backend developer but I know basic HTML, CSS and JS/TS. My problem is not with learning the basics of these foundational technologies, or learning anything actually. My problem is what should I even learn and what is a good stack-choice, taking into account not just my own enjoyment and what is popular/cool, but futureproofing and maintainability as well. I don't have time to go through all frontend frameworks. There are simply too many and it is not an exercise I find enjoyable.

[–] Kissaki@programming.dev 5 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

The most future proof web tech is not using frameworks and libraries at all.

Render native HTML controls.

I also assume it's lower barrier than any of the libs and frameworks you could use, which is always a subset of web tech with the addition of their own concepts.

load more comments (10 replies)
load more comments (16 replies)