5 Challenges Facing Modern Web Developers

In the modern fast paced digital world, being a web developer requires great proficiency in a wide range of skills, and problem solving always needs to be top of the list. The industry is constantly evolving, with new tools and libraries emerging on an almost constant basis, forcing modern developers to regularly refresh their skills to keep up with the ever changing challenges.

We’re taking a look at some of the biggest problems and challenges facing web developers today…

Keeping up with the pace

Not only does web development become more complex over-time, the industry is also evolving faster than ever – meaning any developers need to be constantly ready to improve their ever-increasing, and ever-changing skill sets.

Web developers have to strive to keep up with the latest industry standards, be ahead of the curve, and often they need to be able to predict what’s coming up next.

It’s a constant struggle for businesses as well, trying to find web developers who are completely up to date with the latest specifications, and modern skills. Developers have to distinguish themselves from one another with the latest intuitive knowledge of things like, security, integration, responsive design etc.

UX focused

Keeping the user experience or journey in mind during the development cycle, is absolutely essential for any modern web developer.

Oversaturation in the industry has led to a fierce rise in user expectations, with more and more web content becoming easily accessible, with simple to use applications. These expectations need to be satisfied, which means anything that’s being developed needs to be as accessible as possible, as well as being highly responsive on any new and existing platforms, especially mobile phone apps.

Web developers need to create an end product that does everything the target users demand, but also remains powerful – they also have to be able to rethink problems, such as when having certain features may compromise usability.

It’s certainly a huge challenge, because if applications fail to meet modern user’s high expectations, then they’ll quickly find an alternative option.

Security conscious

Application security is always changing rapidly, in order to be able to effectively combat the latest threats and ward off security breaches. Web developers need to ensure their system is secure at all levels, and be able to spot any potential vulnerabilities during the development cycle and beyond – which is all extremely difficult.

There are guides out there to help spot the most important and dangerous threats, but it’s still the developer’s responsibility to make sure they keep up to date with evolving application security risks.

Proficiency in security skills such as, patching frameworks regularly, monitoring network traffic, system logs for odd behaviour and much more, is essential for any web developer to be successful.

Need for speed

Performance optimisation is something web developers have to constantly keep in mind throughout any development cycle – as every action taken has the potential to impact the performance and speed of the end product.  

User’s attention spans consist of mere seconds these days, usually less than that of a goldfish – meaning they don’t have the patience to stick with slower applications, and will quickly leave a site if it takes more than a few extra seconds to load.

The demand for feature-rich applications and sites is high, but this can mean they typically run slower – meaning web developers have to strike the right balance between producing a product that performs exceptionally fast, whilst also meeting feature expectations.

Correct optimisation of performance, usability and design needs to be effectively executed for every single development project.

Imperative Integration

Another huge challenge for developers is integration – due to a high number of modern businesses becoming much more diversified than ever before.

This flexibility is useful but very challenging, as developers need to be skilled at tying everything together – for example when building a site or application, a developer may be required to effectively integrate it with cloud services to provide greater functionality.

This will require a strong understanding of everything, from coding and system analysis, to technical architecture and testing, along with many other aspects – integration needs to correctly connect all the components, activities and outputs that are essential to making a web development project successful.

At Ultimedia, we are Episerver (now Optimizely) web development specialists who don’t shy away from the complex – we face any challenges head on. And we’ll take all of these and more into consideration, when delivering the best digital solutions for our customers.

If you’re struggling with any of these challenges or other complications, then our highly experienced team is ready and waiting to work with you.

So please get in touch today on 0161 260 1500 or info@ultimedia.agency.