
Don’t Call Yourself a Developer If You Don’t Code - ingve
http://devwp.eu/dont-call-yourself-a-developer-if-you-dont-code/
======
quaunaut
I find it fascinating how obsessed people are with titles.

Edit: I code, but I honestly couldn't care less what someone else calls
themselves. If I'm interviewing them, they'd have to prove their abilities in
the relevant code right then.

If we're just having a conversation, most disciplines are different enough
that you have to explain many things from the bottom up anyway.

Backend developers lead entirely different lives from frontend developers, and
both lead entirely different lives from low level developers. Game developers
or data science devs similarly work nothing like anyone else. So why does it
matter that someone calls themselves a Wordpress Developer?

~~~
volaski
Since it sounds like "Wordpress developer" is a title used to refer to people
who add wordpress plugins, I wonder what you would call actual developers
working on Wordpress core engine.

~~~
yongjik
Well, that somehow reminds me of one hilarious subtitle:

    
    
        Tim Berners-Lee
        Web Developer

~~~
timrichard
I remember seeing that subtitle somewhere... :)

Tim Berners-Lee, Web Developer

David Shing, AOL Digital Prophet

[https://mobile.twitter.com/ElSatanico/status/514340801468706...](https://mobile.twitter.com/ElSatanico/status/514340801468706816/photo/1)

------
yesimahuman
If someone is able to build with a tool something that a developer would build
with code, they are practically a developer (especially if the market starts
to identify them as such). Your hiring needs and classic dictionary
definitions notwithstanding. Could it be that programming is being
commoditized and we don't want to accept it?

~~~
sixdimensional
The OP's sentiment runs the risk of alienating people who would potentially be
interested in pursuing a more "traditional" software engineering or
development career. I am not sure that is ultimately a good thing.

I guess as a technical community, there are at least two forces at work here:
1) The community wants to be as inclusive as possible - get as many people to
code as possible, because it is good for everyone to be able to contribute,
even if it is using a higher-level tool/abstraction that does much of what we
would do writing code by hand manually; and/or 2) The community wants to
distinguish itself clearly based on skill-level at some level of core
competency or abstraction.

~~~
sixdimensional
One more thought - I am not sure we want to go down this route, but organizing
into professional trade organizations (I hesitate to call it a union) could
provide for "licensed/certified" software engineers/etc. to help distinguish.

I know we have plenty of professional certifications, but I don't know of one
as general as this which exists yet and has any true merit. I think the IEEE
was working on something like this.

~~~
6stringmerc
I really appreciate your train of thought on this subject, because I can tell
you've got a pragmatic, inclusive desire in mind. Hopefully my little bit on
guitarists/guitar players in this thread kind of aligns. I just wanted to
respond because in guitar, there are top 1% players. Chet Atkins was one of
the undisputed greats, and he used to bestow upon people the term "Certified
Guitar Player" to convey his approval and admiration. If you'd like to see
what he meant, feel free to check out some live work by Tommy Emmanuel, a CGP
according to Chet. Since Chet has passed away, I don't think anybody feels
it's their role to take his place giving people the term, but it remains a
very highly regarded professional distinction!

~~~
sixdimensional
I think what you said both here and in your post are very valuable additions
indeed.

To me what it feels like you're saying is - when you are truly an "expert", it
is more likely that you can identify/recognize other "experts" \- or even
people with that potential.

When I look at my own skills, I try to rate myself honestly on the following
scale with regards to some particular skill: expert, professional or amateur.

Expert is a guru-level understanding. If I say that I am an expert, I am
saying I think I am as good as the top x% (where x is maybe 1-10) in a
particular skill. For me, I pretty much never rate myself as this in any
skill!

Professional is practiced, practical, hands-on real world skill. You've honed
this skill, you've been formally trained, you've employed this skill
successfully in a repeated, demonstrated way.

Amateur is a hobby, done it a few times, do it for fun or would like to do
it/get better at it level of experience.

I observed that in traditional skilled tradesmanship, we have the apprentice,
who progresses to the journeyman, who progresses to the master craftsman.
These are the same levels of what I mean by amateur, professional and expert.

I don't know why our industry seems to reject some of these concepts from
skilled trades in terms of organizing into better/stronger professional trade
organizations and certifications.

Actually, the way we often talk about coding as a "craft", it's almost like we
would feel a lot better with a formal organization and such a career
progression/structure in place.

We have our 1%'ers in the software community, our gurus/experts/master
craftsman. I often think of these as the core contributing past and current
"fathers" and "mothers" of our industry, people ranging anywhere from Ada
Lovelace to Vint Cerf. Reality is, those core thinkers are probably where many
of us learn from anyway - that and "hacking/tinkering" which is what many of
us do and can still lead to progress too.

To me it's all connected, but something about our community always holds us
back... maybe there it is the element of not wanting to be forced into
structure either. After all, the "hacker" ethos is also a source of our
strength, and part of the art.

------
arnvald
"Don't call yourself developer if you don't know C"

"Don't call yourself developer if you know only one programming language"

"Don't call yourself developer if you don't know (put any algorithm here)"

"Don't call yourself developer if you don't (have this one particualr skill
that I have)"

Nothing changed.

~~~
JonFish85
"Don't call yourself an engineer (e.g. software engineer) if you got a CS
degree."

~~~
kl4m
In Canada, it's actually illegal to do so.

~~~
YZF
I don't think this is actually true, e.g.:
[http://www30.rhdcc.gc.ca/CNP/English/NOC/2006/Profile.aspx?v...](http://www30.rhdcc.gc.ca/CNP/English/NOC/2006/Profile.aspx?val=0&val1=2173)

You can't call yourself a "professional engineer" unless you are one but if
you have a CS degree you can actually become a "professional software
engineer" if you go through the process, pass all the tests and meet all the
requirements.

------
6stringmerc
Oh I feel bad for laughing at this post, because yeah, the term "developer"
genuinely infers a distinction worth pointing out. Words do matter, and using
terms improperly cheapen the meaning. This is important in the realm of
commerce.

Why do I laugh? Welcome to the world of "guitarists." Sure, some people have
spent 1-3 years learning the instrument, as a general concept, and they can
play the open chords, the barre chords, and maybe even know 10+ cover songs.
Great! They can play guitar, but are they a guitarist?

Not really, because these same people don't really know how things work "under
the hood" when it comes to the instrument. There's a laundry list of
techniques, genres, ancillary skills and more which in layman's terms equates
to a genuine "guitarist." It's a very broad label that can be used
appropriately, or, like the article says, be employed by over-confident
amateurs.

There's nothing wrong with being a "guitar player" and having fun with the
instrument, and if those guys and gals want to join a cover band or do Open
Mic night performances to improve their craft, awesome. Enjoy it. In my
experience though, "guitar player" folks quickly check their ego when a tried
and true "guitarist" starts playing in front of a crowd. There's usually a
communal appreciation, in that a guitarist won't talk down to guitar players
because there's a shared love of the instrument, of the purpose, and an
appreciation for a mutual desire to make music...and every once and a while,
there's a heckler or arrogant ass who can't stand the ego check.

That's why in guitar-land we have "head cutting" \- the one vs. one, get up on
stage, "put up or shut up" mentality for bragging rights. Some people who
inappropriately call themselves developers should be easy to call out in this
fashion. Those who deserve the term will treat it with respect, and act
accordingly.

YMMV!

------
Raed667
I can relate to this. A few years ago, as a young student that have invested
time to learn PHP, MySQL and the inner workings of WordPress Themes and
Plugins I found that people who didn't even know HTML where filling the local
freelance market with prices I can't beat.

I ended-up offering higher prices for custom solutions (that took me more and
more time) finally it reached the point where the highest price I could ask
for (as a 20y/o student) wasn't worth the time invested in each project, and I
quit freelancing.

~~~
jakejake
I have a few reasonably popular Wordpress plugin, maybe around 500k installs.
I get offers all the time from people wanting me to build them something for
$25.

If you use Wordpress to find clients, it's tough to find good paying work. But
if you find clients elsewhere, then you can use Wordpress as a part of your
overall solution and save time.

~~~
Raed667
These "WordPress admins" are just giving the rest of us a bad name. Last time
I tried to convince a client that a WordPress would suit their needs just fine
with a custom theme that I'll write, they first disagreed and wanted some
framework then tried to cut the budget in half (just for mentioning WordPress)

~~~
nofearinc
most _capable_ people selling WordPress nowadays don't sell WordPress itself,
but a solution, purely because of the bad rap and the "WordPress developers"
out there. I personally don't feel comfortable being "ashamed" of what I work
because of the fact that 9 out of 10 people out on the street sell WordPress
websites and claim that they are developers.

And I don't see a reason to switch to a more elitist community just to avoid
the ones who've intruded or don't know better due to the lack of educational
resources and standards.

------
rtl49
I don't think the titles we use are irrelevant like some have said, but why
draw the line at the manual editing of text that is ultimately translated into
machine language? Do programmers working at a lower level of abstraction have
a stronger claim to the title of "developer"?

I've never used WordPress, but to my knowledge this is just a tool that
reduces the amount of manual coding involved in creating a website. To me this
seems similar to the way Python reduces the amount of C you have to write,
which reduces the amount of assembly you have to write, and so on to the
machine code. Perhaps WordPress "development" is considered easier, but even
if you equate the terms "developer" and "software developer," it doesn't seem
like an unambiguously inaccurate or misleading description of the activity.

~~~
walod
With WP I think it's a problem when people sell others pre-existing plugins
and themes as their own work. I think a self proclaimed WP developer should at
least know all there is to know about Theme development. That means they need
to know all the wordpress internals as it relates to themes, hooks, filters,
theme templates, custom post types, basic php logic, html, css, standards
etc... They don't need to know plugin development, as plugins can contain so
much and be basically anything, but by the time they know most of the theme
aspects, they would be able to make basic plugins anyways. The problem is a
lot of people don't even know those things, since pre-made plugins and themes
make it easier to set up

~~~
rtl49
Incorporating themes and plugins strikes me as basically equivalent to using a
framework written by a third party in your software product, which few would
say disqualifies you as a "developer," even if you couldn't write framework
components yourself. I'm not making claims about the amount of expertise
required to be a WordPress developer, only whether the title could be
appropriate for a person who cannot "write code."

~~~
nofearinc
I believe that what walod refers to is the astounding number of people calling
themselves "developers" while installing vanilla WordPress with a few plugins
and a theme, and changing a few admin options. There's certainly nothing wrong
in using WordPress as a framework (which many of us do to cut down time wasted
on building CRUD and ACL and DB layers etc), it's just that now everyone is
suddenly a WordPress developer once they know how to install WordPress from
the web host's admin panel.

~~~
rtl49
Yes, I understand. My main message is that it seems a software developer need
not be a programmer in the sense of writing code as we currently conceptualize
it. It isn't hard to imagine a future where ordinary people can create their
own software using primarily visual tools, as I presume WordPress developers
do.

I'm also obliquely objecting to the lionization of software developers in
general, as much software development is glorified plumbing, while some of it
is among the most intellectually challenging work available. If one is going
to take pride in one's job, I tend to think it should result from the work
itself, rather than the job title.

~~~
nofearinc
I don't mind the job being done by people building products with visual tools.
I just believe that the "developer" title has a unified and consistent meaning
across different platforms, languages, communities and what not, and new types
of services (like composing elements with visual builders) need a new title to
avoid ambiguity - say, site builders, webmasters, implementers, super admins
or so forth.

That would be more than sufficient - creating a new job group for people with
similar skills and service offerings, allowing SMB clients to reach out to
those and large businesses connecting with developers.

------
gregimba
Reminds me of the hackathons where "BizDev's" show up and expect to find
someone to create their app.

~~~
nathancahill
Yeah, exactly. "It just needs implementation. I'm an idea man."

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkGMY63FF3Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkGMY63FF3Q)

~~~
wellyWellyWell
[http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/S/SMOP.html](http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/S/SMOP.html)

------
nvader
I'd like to more about why 'WordPress Developers' are such a magnet for the
author's ire.

The last paragraph was pretty weak. The bald assertion that "Installing a
website itself is of no service to most clients who can accomplish the same in
a couple of hours with a cheap host providing a detailed guide on their
website", must be false. At least two hours of technically knowledgeable work
is definitely a worthwhile service, and deserves adequate remuneration. The
next sentence, about "providing real value" doesn't stand up, then, because
such WordPress Devs _are_ providing real value.

There's no reason why success should require taking on custom projects for
larger businesses, when there is an ample market of small businesses and new
businesses that are well-served with just WordPress and plugins.

------
ryanpetrich
Those who title-inflate do so at their own peril; doing so selects for
employers that have poor ability to hire competent people.

------
alricb
But how am I going to convey the fact that I'm an evil person planning on
destroying your community to replace it with McMansions and Big Box stores?

~~~
askafriend
So this is what Steve Ballmer meant all along

------
codingdave
To people who are not involved with web development in any way, they just
don't care whether someone writes code for a living, or admins a site via a
CMS like Wordpress. To most of the world, both types of people "make web
sites".

Trying to claim a specific title for yourself, while telling other people that
they have no right to claim that same title, is purely an exercise in your own
ego.

~~~
guntars
And the author mentioned how it has negative consequences when there is in
fact an actual difference that the clients are not able to distinguish
between. Some self-policing on the part of the people who can would help a lot
with that.

~~~
codingdave
Are you referring to that bulleted list of problems that he claims impact the
"entire industry"?

Because that list sounded more like negative consequences to the author's
business, not an entire industry. If he were truly succeeding as a services
company focused on the Wordpress niche, those would be pain points toward
which he would focus his own marketing, and they would be business
opportunities, not global problems with people's titles.

~~~
nofearinc
Other than the bulleted list I linked a few articles as well, including the
problem with having to educate the customers. While education is always
required, most of the "developers" underprice the market, sell unstable
solutions and so on. A lot of enterprise customers avoid WordPress as being
unreliable and hard to find a reliable team for, which leads to other
problems.

We do have a decent business strategy that seems to be working and have some
high-end clients (including banks, automotive manufacturers, SaaS providers),
but our growth is somewhat constrained due to the limited opportunities thanks
to the bad rap of the platform, hiring is incredibly challenging, selling to
enterprises has an added overhead and so on. And yes, we can switch to another
platform, but I do believe that a few actionable steps (like settings
standards and simply separating site builders from developers) can solve many
of those problems.

------
gotchange
Another episode of the title wars.

"You can't call yourself an engineer when you don't have a degree from an
engineering school", "You are not an architect if you didn't study
architecture in college" blah blah blah

Can we please put these debates to rest? it's tiring already. Yeah,
recruitment is frustrating since everyone likes to over inflate or lie
outright about the accomplishments and qualifications on their CV but it's
been established a long time ago that this is part of the process and the onus
is on the interviewer or recruiter to screen the applicants and tell who's the
real deal and who's not, it's part of their job after all.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
Title inflation lowers the perceived value of professional development work.
It goes from "I don't understand what you're doing, but it looks hard" to "My
ten year old nephew set up a WordPress site, so why should I pay you $150k a
year to build the CRUD backend for my brilliant startup idea?"

All professions that don't have gatekeepers, certification, and strong
professional associations suffer from declining salaries.

The difference between good and bad web dev is the difference between a site
that scales, is maintainable, secure, and reliable, and looks nice, as opposed
to a WP site that does none of the above. (But looks nice - maybe.)

I've talked to "designers" who say things like "I don't know if we can do that
- I leave all those details to my technical people."

It turns out all the "designer" did was pick a font and a colour scheme and
draw a few wireframes. And they got the job because they knew someone on the
board.

Meanwhile the "technical people" have done all the real work - and could
probably make a site look just as good if they'd been asked to.

~~~
nofearinc
Agreed with all of the above. I'm even surprised that more of the "hardcore
devs" didn't get annoyed by WordPress crossing the 25% web market share a week
ago. I can see how more and more large businesses turn to WordPress to cut
license costs, decrease salaries, reduce development time and invest more in
marketing/advertisement instead.

That comment is also for everyone who mentioned that the post reflects only to
the state of a single business instead of an entire community, ecosystem and
the business of web development as a whole.

------
Ianvdl
I'm surprised how many commenters here argue that those who care about the
meaning associated with the word developer are somehow obsessed with titles.
Titles are useful (especially fairly generic titles like software developer)
and serve to convey meaning among the multitude of disciplines we have in the
industry.

If you've never written code, why call yourself a developer? I know language
changes over time, but that's just being purposefully misleading.

~~~
nofearinc
Precisely. I wouldn't care if it was 0.01% of the "developers" in WordPress.
But when it's the vast majority, actual developers become a limited and hardly
visible minority.

------
allendoerfer
Actually, calling yourself "Wordpress developer" already tells me, that you
cannot implement software beyond a certain level (aka real software), so I am
okay with that. There are already so many _PHP developers_ , who cannot do
that and _Wordpress developer_ seems to be one step beneath that.

Just to clearify: There are totally legit developers who use Wordpress and/or
PHP, but they usually would not put that in their title.

------
golergka
This is a good article.

However, I'm having trouble understanding on what's it doing on top of HN. Are
there actually a lot of people who have regular encounters with WP developers,
or WP at all, aside from may be people from the WP company itself, that read
or comment here? I had such a good impression of a crowd here that I assumed
that working with WP requires far less programming skills that people here
usually have.

------
ckaygusu
This is a context thing. As OP depicts, in this context developer means
someone who codes. A WordPress "developer" may call herself a "developer" just
fine in the right context, but when used in places where the OP is coming
from, the word does not contain the expected information.

~~~
walshemj
It does seem that Europeans outwith the UK seem to be much more hierarchical
and hung up on titles.

------
Amorymeltzer
>Mario Peshev is a CEO and WordPress Architect at DevriX, a technical
WordPress development agency building scalable projects for successful
businesses.

Don't call yourself an architect if you don't plan, design, and construct
buildings.

That would be absurd of me to expect, clearly the meaning of the word
"architect" has different meaning in different contexts, to different people,
and in different fields of work. "Engineer" is another good example. If you
have specific definitions, use them in your job postings so people know what
you mean, but don't cry foul when people use a term in an accepted but
different manner than you prefer.

~~~
nofearinc
I get your point and I'd genuinely apologize to every architect graduate (in
the construction space) who feels insulted by that.

Even if my day-to-day follows the "software architect" definition, I would
gladly replace it with something closer to the technical field if it wasn't
polluted by the majority of people mislabeling themselves. Which is more or
less the point of the post.

------
VLM
On the bright side, calling themselves "engineers" only creates even more
drama, so given that extremely likely alternative, "developer" is the less
evil.

Some of it comes from various state / federal labor law and relates to
compensation. Someone who, lets face it, is the online equivalent of a sign
spinner, has certain legal obligations WRT overtime compensation that isn't an
issue for a "professional engineer" or "software developer"... A lot of
overtime pay is saved by calling data entry clerks "developers".

------
danellis
The author would have a point if these people were calling themselves
"software developers". Using the definition of a "software developer" to
object to people calling themselves "wordpress developers" shows a narrow
understanding of the word 'developer'. A developer, in fact, is someone who
develops something.

------
JustSomeNobody
I'm a senior something developer something something.

That's what most people hear when I try and use my title.

I simply tell people I program computers. Why? Because its what I do.

Does it matter to me that I'm not telling them that I design/architect and
develop solutions? Nope. I don't care. Because, to me, that all boils down to
"I program computers".

------
grhmc
My neighbor is a person who develops property. He's a property developer. A
developer doesn't have to write code, they have to "grow or cause to grow and
become more mature, advanced, or elaborate". I think a wordpress developer
does just that.

~~~
mikeash
Yeah, it's really bizarre to get hung up on such a vague term. Don't
appropriate a generic word, give it a specific meaning, then complain when
other people don't comply.

If you want a word for people who write computer programs, there's a word that
means specifically that: "programmer."

------
bikamonki
I tell my clients: would you use an 18 wheeler to move one small box from A to
B?

Not only WP devs are not devs, they do not truly understand/care about real
client needs. In than sense, the are not solution architects/designer either.

------
ommunist
title is only important if recognized by a client. Clients have no clue of
underlying technology for the website or application they need, in most cases.
But they often know 'WordPress' or 'Drupal'. You want a client? You have to
call yourself 'WordPress Developer'. Never seen a client for website or
application, who wanted to be aware of C++ or assembly skills of potential
contractor.

~~~
learc83
> Never seen a client for website or application, who wanted to be aware of
> C++ or assembly skills of potential contractor

No, but I would expect a Word Press Developer to know PHP, HTML and CSS.

------
kmac_
Don’t Call Yourself an Architect If You Don’t Code

------
xnx
I'm proud to call myself a nogrammer. I'd much rather use/modify existing code
than write from scratch.

------
intrasight
Simple filter rule. If the resume doesn't have the work "hacker" then throw it
away.

------
sklogic
Property developers would be puzzled by this suggestion.

------
gaius
First comment on that post is from a PHP "developer".

