Which web framework for someone who wants a job?

Question

I want to learn a framework that promotes good programming practices and is respected by the programming community.

However, I also want a framework that I can use for a day job.

Which one would you recommend?

This question comes from my experience of learning the basics of Django because it was highly acclaimed by developers on Stack Overflow and Hacker News. However.. there's hardly any jobs in my area (NYC) that are asking for Django developers.

Stoltz

sadly, "good programming practices" and "day job" don't overlap anywhere near as much as we'd like. – Rufe

Answer 1

As a long-time ASP.NET guy, I've recently gone through a similar decision process to figure out what other web frameworks I should try. Here's what I learned so far which may apply to your case too:

• framework/platofrm choices (and hence job opportunities) are highly regional-- the Bay Area job market differs alot from what you'll find in NYC, Chicago, Montreal, or London. Look at local job listings (craigslist and indeed are good places to start) to get a good sense at what's in demand.
• similarly, usage varies alot based on the size and type of company. if you want to get a job in a large company, Spring MVC and ASP.NET MVC may be your best bets. In small companies, DJango and (especially) Rails seem to be on the rise.
• usage also sometimes varies by industry. for example, many HR apps seem be to .NET based, while financial/banking apps seem to favor Java. if you want to work in a particular industry, check out what up-and-coming companies in that industry are using.
• when investing your scarce time in learning something new, favor technologies which are on the upswing of the adoption curve (e.g. Rails) rather than frameworks with wider adoption which may not be growing as fast. Also be wary of very early or niche frameworks which may not ever gain wide adoption.
• the one common thread between most (or almost all) frameworks gaining in popularity is that they're MVC frameworks and rely heavily on a solid understanding of REST. Learning those concepts in depth is a good idea.
• before deciding to invest a lot of time in one framework, gain a basic understanding of several of them, so you can get a reasonable sense of what you like and don't about each-- and so if you end up applying for a job using a framework you haven't learned, at least you'll be able to talk intelligently about it.
• If you focus on what you enjoy, you'll be more motivated to learn it. For example, personally I found Rails (regarless of employment opportunities) more interesting than Spring or Django, so I decided to focus on Rails first. Others may have different impressions-- follow your programmer instincts. That said, there are often few jobs using technologies you find fascinating, so try to strike the right balance: technology you like that many companies are actually hiring people to use!
• once you answer the basic "what framework" question, there are many more questions lurking, including picking a javascript framework, validation framework, an ORM, etc. Don't worry too much about those choices yet-- when starting, just pick the default implementation for your framework. But as you get more advanced, the same argument about frameworks also hold for those other things-- e.g. it's useful to know a few ORMs.

Personally, I decided on this approach:

• continue building stuff in what I knew best (ASP.NET) but transition all work to ASP.NET MVC, where I can better understand MVC and REST concepts which apply cross-platform
• learn JQuery (again, platform neutral)
• blow off the ORM choice alltogether for now-- too many other things to worry about
• build a few projects in Rails, which is the framework I see used most in the newer SF-Bay-Area startups I've been looking at
• learn the basics (e.g. read a book or two, try a few samples) about Python/Django, Java/Spring, and Groovy/Grails.

Insufferable

Answer 2

i'd probably say ASP.NET MVC. I always see lots of .NET jobs around and this seems to be a solid framework which i think in fact powers all the stackoverflow family. As a PHP developer i must also make a mention of Zend Framework which is used by a number of big sites including bbc.co.uk and is now frequently mentioned in advertisements for PHP jobs.

Kriemhild

There are a lot of .NET jobs around but they are not using the MVC framework. Developers tend to run away from the old school .NET, at least from the ones I have talked to. They have jumped ship to Django or Rails, there seems to be something scary in the old stuffs. – Merrick

Answer 3

I've encountered real projects at cool, small companies using Django, Ruby on Rails and (eiuw!) even Zope. .NET is for teletubbies - I've only ever heard of it being used by big corporations that don't know better.

Beverage

I agree that .NET usage is relatively unusual in small startups near where I live (although it varies by industry). That said, exceptions are common. For example, I heard recently about a local startup running a popular website on .NET where developers can ask coding questions and get quick answers. Now if I could only remember which site that was.... anyone know? :-) – Insufferable

Answer 4

I would say that knowing two or three is better than knowing one that is widely used because you will gain a better understanding of how it works as a concept. For instance if you've only used Java, there is something probably missing in your understanding of OOP, because you're pigeon-holed into thinking about it in one way. If you already know Django though you Spring would probably be a good compliment to that.

Saddlebow

Answer 5

I want to learn a framework that promotes good programming practices and is respected by the programming community. However, I also want a framework that I can use for a day job.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news here, but those two desires tend to conflict. IMHO most business managers tend to go for (ugly) rapid development on top of CRMs or other higher-level 3rd party codebases. Building elegant websites from the ground up mostly happens in startups, or true web companies where the website is the sole product. There are not that many of those companies; and many of those that seem to fit are actually a mess on the inside, i.e. due to time pressure, messy legacy code and many other reasons you often don't get to write according to "good programming practices" anyway.

I agree with Kaleb Brasee that Java and .NET are the two main platforms when job availability is a priority.

Every job market is unique, so look at job openings in your area, or call a handful of recruiters and ask what they see a need for / could easily place you in a junior position for. What I'm seeing is that Microsoft Sharepoint is in demand, and a few other regional CMS'es are in demand (in Denmark I see Sitecore regularly).

I think ASP.NET MVC 2.0 together with MVC Areas and ASP.NET Dynamic Data will have a good story, a good solution, for many of those bosses who want rapid development. And I think the resulting code could be quite okay, or at least not bad compared to many of the "CMS beaten into something else" sites that exist. But this is a brand new thing for the .NET platform, and it will need to be sold to the decision makers first...

Bottom line: If you want job security first and foremost, then look at large CMS's like Sharepoint, and work on other technologies in your spare time. Optionally you could take a job at a startup / a web company later; but look before you leap.

Glarus

Answer 6

Have you tried Spring MVC? Many companies do use Java for web-apps (or .NET) and web service based applications.

Palestra

Answer 7

Since you mentioned Ruby on Rails, you might want to learn Ruby on Rails. It has got some good programming practices in it and a very well thought architecture. The Ruby community itself have also (in my personal opinion) created very innovative frameworks and highly favor testing and quality. You can see this by the innovative testing framework like Cucumber, webrat, shoulda, coulda, rspec, test/spec. Many startups also uses Rails as their platform, so it should be easier for you to get a job. You can start looking at Working With Rails and 37signals job board. So there is a good ecosystem inside Rails and Ruby community.

But the downside of Rails compare to Django is mainly there are too much magic (less explicit) and the docs is not as good as Django. If you want to get a Django job, try looking at several news site because Django grew up from a newspaper site so it is adopted alot in news based sites.

Agler

Answer 8

I would recommend ASP.NET MVC, Ruby on Rails, or Python/Django, they all seem to be popular and successful, and based on the MVC paradigm which is definitely the right tool for the job when it comes to the web.

Lothario

Answer 9

.NET and Java are by far the 2 largest platforms used by employers, and hence the most in-demand when searching for a job. Java has a few popular frameworks, with JSF, Spring MVC and Struts all seeming to be about equal in demand. I don't use .NET, but from what I've seen, ASP.NET and ASP.NET MVC are the major ones.

Songster

Answer 10

I would say that most of the frameworks mentioned here promotes good practices. But that doesn't neccesarily mean that the companies using those frameworks are actually following those good practices! In fact most probably aren't. So don't expect too much.

You see, places like Stack Overflow, Hacker News etc. are a great way to connect with people who really care about their craft. Sadly this is a minority. There are millions of programmers in the world. Most of them suck. The code they write sucks. They don't care. They are not interested in improving their skills. They just want to learn the bare minimum required to collect their paycheck, go home, feed the dog, spend some time with the family, watch some TV, go too bed and do it all over again the next day.

Okay that was a bit harsh :) What I'm getting at is that you are probably better off asking this question to some of the managers at the companies where you would like to work. My guess is that most of them will answer .NET or Java. If you are up for a laugh ask them why they chose that particular technology over something else, and see how many buzzwords they throw at you ;)

Tangram