Tuesday, 28 February, 2017 UTC


Summary

Do you have more than two years' development experience? Are your advanced CSS skills aided with Sass and Autoprefixer? Is your JavaScript knowledge reasonable and you're happy using Gulp, npm, and jQuery? If so, you're a typical developer, according to Ashley Nolan's Front-End Tooling Survey.
Lies, Damn Lies, Statistics and Surveys
Surveys such as this are useful to discover new tools and highlight obvious gaps in your knowledge. At the time of writing, the survey has received 5,254 responses which is a significantly better sample than most opinion polls. However, be wary about taking them as the gospel truth…

Worldwide results

The survey was offered worldwide, but will be heavily biased toward English-speaking countries. A popular tool developed or used elsewhere may be omitted.

Developer knowledge

The survey appealed to knowledgeable developers who understood the questions, were aware of its existence, and had the time and inclination to complete it.
83% of respondents had two or more years' front-end technology experience, with just 5% admitting to less than one year:
Image courtesy of Ashley Nolan
Developers with minimal front-end skills were less likely to complete the survey, so the results may be skewed accordingly.

Opinions and biases

Respondents were asked to judge their own experiences. Some may be modest and suffer imposter syndrome. Others may over-estimate their technical abilities because they're the sole front-end developer on a large team of novice programmers. Self-opinionated biases may average out, but there's no way to prove it.

Past activities don't indicate future trends

The results highlight what developers have been using. It does not follow that the tools were useful, saved time or will be used in future projects.
Continue reading %Front-End Tooling Trends for 2017%