Page 1 of 1
PHP as a career
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 12:11 am
by typeblu
Hi, im jsut posting hopeing to hear what you all do for a living as developers and maybe to give me some input as to what i should be doing also.
I have an associates in what my school called multimedia/web design. learned stuff like html, flash, javascript. been teaching myself php. ive been out of school and not pursuing my career for 2 years now. i did some interviews when i got out and didnt get in anywhere as a web/graphic designer. Right now im reworking my stuff but, my favorite thing to do is code, much more than designing side of it. im thinkin i have to go back to school more towards computer science? to learn stuff like php,asp,xml, and other more useful stuff. when i look at jobs they want these harder languages like c++ and vb, xml. im jsut curious of my options and directions i can take. at the moment it seems its either try to get some freelance sights up and do and internship or do something like go back to school.
as much feedback as possible will be very much appreciated. im 22 and i feel really lost.
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 1:28 am
by kettle_drum
Well first of all where are you from? Each country will be in a different situation as to what kind of skilled workers they want. I dont see any reason why you cant break into the web design/development business if you know html/flash/php i would just say start off slower and get a portfolio together. I assume that you havent been hired for a full time position as they think you are not good enough or dont have the right amount of experience. The only way to get past that problem is to get experience by doing as many jobs and projects you can find.
I woudl suggest that freelance would be the way to go to begin with, go to some freelance auction sites and see if you can get any jobs, anything big or small will be good. See if you can develop a site for any friends or family, even if its not paid work it will still give you experience and something to show to future employers. Maybe see if you can join an open source project and do some development on that.
I think that you will find once you have done a few projects and got some experience that you can show the employers that you will do fine. There is plenty of jobs out there, you just need to keep your head up and go for what comes along and you will be successful.
You might also find posting on forums and helping people will help you make contacts and you can pick up some work from that.
Good luck!
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 1:42 am
by andre_c
My experience reflects exactly what kettle_drum is saying.
I dropped out of college while studying web design, and I started doing a website for a friend's company, did a couple more websites for other companies charging very little, while i studied php on my own.
After having a few websites that i could show i was able to get a job as a developer.
Right now I work as a programmer in a different company.
That's just my experience,
Good Luck
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 2:06 am
by typeblu
you are all a great help. im in the los angeles, california area. it should be fairly easy i think, it jsut seems so hard. i think your right though. maybe i need to get some more sites done. all i really have had in my portfolio is my portfolio itself and one other personal site i made. along with some graphic design material i made in college.
what are these freelance auction things? and where is a good place to look to get into an open source project?
i need to build my site building confidence up. i guess making some sites will do the trick.
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 2:30 am
by kettle_drum
http://www.sourceforge.org for open source projects. Just find something that you like and then ask the developers if there is anything that you can do or help out with.
For the freelance stuff there are places like:
http://www.freelanceauction.com/
http://www.elance.com
People basically just post jobs they want doing and then freelancers bid on the job, and then the person decides which bid to go for and then they get the work.
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 8:32 am
by patrikG
Btw. just to confirm that PHP is being taken seriously by business these days - there are jobs out there like this (although this one is really more the towards the "cream of the crop" end of things):
MySQL PHP Developer- CONTRACT ROLE- £550 PER DAY FOR 6 MONTHS
>>BASED IN LONDON
My client is currently rapidly expanding and needs developers on a six month
contract to help take the company to the next level. Application
development experience is essential and the successful candidates will be
self-motivated developers to work with network consultants to develop tools
and apps. Your development experience must be extensive and outstanding and
ideally you will have worked for reputable companies.
Your programming background MUST include:
PHP 4 years
MySQL 4 years
JavaScript 4 years
Apache 4 years
It is preferable to have:
Linux
HTML
XML
XSL
Personal Skills:
Excellent Communications Skills
A Confident and Professional Attitude
Client Facing Skills
Determination and Efficiency
Summary Details:
£550 per Day
Contract Role
6 Month Duration
Based in London
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 9:42 am
by xisle
I have both a career as a php developer and a home business
doing contract work in php. I too started in web design about six years ago.
Here are a couple of hints from my perspective:
Code: Select all
==>Start small with basic web design and sites for people you meet.
==>Clients want a dynamic site generally, the dont care if it is php, asp, jsp unless their site already exists.
==>If you have success with a client, build a close relationship, I just sent holiday gifts to my best ones.
==>Once you land a job updating or building sites, spend your spare time at work learning more. (or helping others here)
==>To present yourself as a PHP programmer is not the best initial approach, unless you have years of experience. Show your portfolio and present yourself as a web designer until you can write decent apps.
good luck!
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 12:09 pm
by Joe
I have to disagree with one of xisle's hints which was:
==>Clients want a dynamic site generally, the dont care if it is php, asp, jsp unless their site already exists.
Most of my clients are language specific and alot of which are PHP based which is good :O)
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 1:09 pm
by typeblu
thanks a lot guys. im gonna start putting my all into my portfolio, i think im going to start with my dad's business, and other family members have some businesses going. so ill be posting my portfolio soon hopefully.
my first portfolio was done in flash, im thinkin that was a bad move, any thoughts on that?
Posted: Fri Dec 17, 2004 3:02 pm
by magicrobotmonkey
if you do go back to school or take classes or anything, I think you will be most helped take more theory-oriented classes then language oriented classes. It is, in my opinion, a lot easier to learn an new language then to learn a new theory - i.e. I went to school for comuter science and our curriculum was java-based, but was mostly theory (a lot of pretty advanced OO stuff). We had a pair of classes just on how programming languages work. All of these things make it very easy to pick up a new language. So if I get a request for something done in a language I don't know, I'll generally take it and learn the language as I go, something I can do easily with my theory background.
Posted: Tue Dec 21, 2004 5:09 pm
by onion2k
My experience of writing PHP for a living is that its actually much the same as writing sites in any other language. I started out writing PERL for a year, then did a year of ASP stuff, and finally I ended up in my current role writing PHP a little over 3 years back. The actual coding is a laugh no matter what you're using.. the main difficulty in writing this sort of thing for living is the lack of a decent specification and clients who don't really know what they want.
Unfortunately that plagues every coding business there is and its inescapable.
Whatever you do at college or University, just don't expect the real world to be much like it.
Posted: Tue Dec 21, 2004 6:21 pm
by timvw
I must agree that in my working experience i haven't seen much clients that knew exactly what they wanted. Implementation details were entirely up to me. Interviewing the clients to find out what they really need takes more than half of the total project time. Once you've got the requirements rights, the implementation (usually) doesn't take that much time.
I'm becoming 25 in a few months.. and i'm still in school, so if you are 22, don't feel like you're the only "old" guy out there

(have already spend a couple of years at the university, then worked for a few years, now going back to school)
If you are studying you give yourself the time to learn some concepts about OOP, design patterns, math, editors, ... you would never look at when you are working... Or you can take on some freelance projects to make a little money
While in school or university you will also meet a lot of people that are interested in the same, and are learning at the same speed... It's an ideal time to build up a social network. That will help you getting a job afterwards
