Front End Developer Questions

Front 1

What did you learn yesterday / this week?

Back 1

Explain something you learned.

Front 2

What excites or interests you about coding?

Back 2

Explain why you love coding. BECAUSE IT'S AWESOME AND I GET TO BUILD COOL STUFF.

Front 3

What is a recent technical challenge you faced and how did you solve it?

Back 3

something something Google, stack overflow, reading documentation.

Front 4

What UI, Security, Performance, SEO, Maintainability or Technology considerations do you make while building a web application or site?

Back 4

UI: App should be friendly for people to use. Build that app so people want to use it. Don't make it difficult and don't make them think.

Security: App security is critical so it's important to stay abreast of current security trends, update the application and related gems to close security holes, and/or force users to use secure passwords/phrases.

Performance: Don't repeat code. If two pieces of code do the same thing but are different, run a benchmark test to see which one performs better. Or talk to someone who has experience and might know which one performs better but also doesn't negatively affect maintainability or scalability.

SEO: Since search engines are one of the biggest ways people find information make sure pages meta information are optimized, images and ALT tags are optimized, you're using the appropriate keywords, etc.

Maintainability: Just because your code works doesn't make it maintainable. Keep it DRY and organized so that you or other people have an easier time maintaining it. Same thing goes for tests.

Technology: Stay abreast of technology trends and use newer technology if it can improve performance or usability of your app without any significant tradeoffs (eg security holes, learning curve, etc.)

Front 5

What's your preferred development environment?

Back 5

Solo or paired, depending on the challenge. Working with others is important and definitely helps to increase learning, decrease bugs, and increase code maintainability. Solo coding can be fun sometimes because of the autonomy and it can force you to be more resourceful in solving problems, which may lead to new solutions or ideas.

Front 6

Which version control systems are you familiar with?

Back 6

Git version control, preferably using Git Flow.

Front 7

Describe your workflow when creating a web page.

Back 7

1) Determine the point of the page - what's the goal and who is going to be using it?

2) Determine the content to achieve the goal.

3) Create a quick protoype, and then continuously refactor.

Front 8

If you have 5 different stylesheets, how would you best integrate them into the site?

Back 8

I would compile them into one document if possible. It is easier for a client to load one file vs five. However, I would keep the precompiled files separate for better code maintainability and organization.

Front 9

Can you describe the difference between progressive enhancement and graceful degradation?

Back 9

Progressive enhancement is the practice of building basic web functionality that works in all browsers and gradually improving it over time and making it automatically available to users.

Graceful degradation is the practice of building web functionality so that it provides a certain level of UX in modern web browsers, but degrades gracefully to a lower level of UX in older browsers while still offering the core functionality.

Front 10

How would you optimize a website's assets/resources?

Back 10

Compress files, resize images, combine multiple files (eg stylesheets) into one file. Minify files. Use CSS sprites for icons.

Front 11

How many resources will a browser download from a given domain at a time?

Back 11

Generally 6, though this depends on the browser.

Front 12

Name 3 ways to decrease page load (perceived or actual load time).

Back 12

Combine files, minify files, optimize code (reduce code redundancy), resize images, use CSS sprites.

Front 13

If you jumped on a project and they used tabs and you used spaces, what would you do?

Back 13

Probably switch over to spaces for consistency. There are good arguments either way for tabs or spaces since the project is already using spaces, it makes more sense to use that for consistency instead of jumbling everything up.

Front 14

Describe how you would create a simple slideshow page.

Back 14

Bootstrap and a carousel plugin. Easy peasy.

Front 15

If you could master one technology this year, what would it be?

Back 15

Javascript. I have a good foundation in Ruby and Ruby on Rails, but JS is a ubiquitous language that is gaining more and more popularity and used to power huge chunks of the web. It's not going away anytime soon and I want to make sure I have a good grasp on it.

Front 16

Explain the importance of standards and standards bodies.

Back 16

Web standards are important because they allow developers to achieve a more stable web, reduced development and maintenace time, backwards compatiblity, increased search engine success, graceful degradation, and common knowledge for everyone. Web standards bodies, such as the W3C and ECMA are tasked with setting these standards, vs individual companies duking it out.

Front 17

What is Flash of Unstyled Content? How do you avoid FOUC?

Back 17

Flash of Unstyled content is an instance where a web page loads information with the browser's default styles prior to loading an external CSS style sheet. There are some methods of using JS to hide elements until everything is loaded, but One of the simplest ways to prevent the FOUC is by ensuring all stylesheet links are included at the very top of the header, so they are loaded by the browser first.

Front 18

Explain what ARIA and screenreaders are, and how to make a website accessible.

Back 18

ARIA is Accessible Rich Internet Applications, which defines ways to make Web content and web applications (especially those with AJAX and Javascript) more accessible to people with disabilities. ARIA includes things such as "navigation" and "menu" roles, allowing users to identify the site primary navigation and page menus. Screenreaders are used by people with disabilities to read the contents of web page, including text, images (alt tags), links, menu items, etc. Ways of making a website accessible included using high contrast on text areas, including ALT tags for images and media, using tables for tabular data, and using ARIA.

Front 19

Explain some of the pros and cons for CSS animations versus JavaScript animations.

Back 19

CSS animations are better for simpler one-shot transitions, like toggling UI element sates. JS animations are better for more complex animations such as bouncing, stop, pause, rewind, or slow down. JS offers more advanced control over animation. CSS requires browser prefixes for compatibility.