There are many people who join tech talent development companies like Revature to learn to code and explore the IT field. However, the tech domain involves numerous professionals, starting from software engineers and developers to web developers. While software engineers are the ones who focus more on designing programs for computers, web developers specialize in building applications and websites for the web. For people who want to get into the IT field, understanding what such varied job roles entail would be the first hurdle.
Revature discusses how software engineers differ from web developers
To know how software engineers differ from web developers, one firstly needs to gain an in-depth understanding of each of these job roles. In the simplest terms, software engineers are the ones who design, test, and create programs for networks, operating system, and hardware. They are more inclined to work closer to the hardware than web developers. The scope of the work of software engineers can extend to developing not just desktop programs, but also mobile and web apps. To get a job in this field one needs to learn basic software engineering languages like C++, Java, and Python. Many web developers also learn these programming languages owing to their broad functionality and applicability.
While the specific duties and responsibilities of a software engineer would depend on the company, team, and industry they are working in, these professionals typically have to:
- Build and test applications for user needs
- Analyze, diagnose, and adjust existing software
- Monitor overall system performance
- Design backend architecture
- Identify brand new technologies which can improve the existing software
People who are interested in software engineering can easily get trained in the latest software skills through companies like Revature.
Coming to web developers, much like its name suggests, such professionals largely work with websites, web apps, and APIs. It is also vital to acknowledge that at times the lines are quite blurred between web developers and software engineers. Depending on whether one works as a frontend or a backend developer, people may find themselves working on pretty similar tasks and projects. While front-end web developer majorly works with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, they are not limited to these languages. On the other hand, backend web developers usually focus on Python, Java, and C, as such languages are advantageous for working with databases and memory manipulation. On the whole responsibilities of web developers include the:
- Design, plan, and test new website features
- Monitor website traffic and overall systems health
- Stay up-to-date on the latest releases and tools
- Collaborate with UX/UI designers and product managers on planning a website or app redesign
- Diagnose and troubleshoot website issues such as page load speed
On the whole, the biggest differences between software engineers and web developers are not their training, or the programming languages they know, but the work they carry out and the approach they maintain while completing projects. While software engineers use their computer science background to create software products, web developers tend to solely focus on building websites and other web applications.
