Being a Backend Developer Today Feels Harder Than 20 Years Ago

Comparing the backend development landscape of today with that of the late '90s reveals a significant shift. Despite the fact that the barriers of entry to software development as a career have become lower, the role is now more complex, with developers facing a broader range of challenges and expectations.

Engineers today grapple with building larger and more intricate systems and an overwhelming amount of choice across all aspects of software development. From which language, tool, platform, framework, etc. to use, to which solution, architectural style, design pattern, etc. to implement.

The demand for designing robust, scalable, and secure distributed systems capable of supporting thousands of concurrent users, often with near-perfect availability, and compliance with stringent data-handling and security regulations, adds to the complexity.

This article delves into the ways backend development has evolved over the past 20 years, shedding light on the aspects that contribute to its perceived increase in difficulty.

Higher User Expectations

Today's computers boast exponentially greater memory and processing power, along with other previously unimaginable capabilities. These technological leaps enable the development of far more complex and powerful software.

As software capabilities have increased, so too have user expectations.

Modern users demand software that is not only globally accessible but also offers a seamless cross-platform experience, responsive design, and real-time updates and collaborative features. They expect exceptional performance, high availability, and continual updates to meet their evolving needs with new features and enhancements.

This shift challenges developers to leverage an array of technologies to meet these expectations, making backend development even more challenging.

Increased Scale and System Complexity

The complexity of software problems we tackle today far surpasses those from 20 years ago. We are now orchestrating networks of computers, processing thousands of transactions per second, and scaling systems to accommodate millions of users.

Developers now need to know how to handle massive, polyglot codebases, implement distributed systems, and navigate the complexities of multithreading and multiprocessing. Additionally, the necessity for effective abstraction and dependency management further complicates the development process.

With complex distributed systems, abstractions are essential to allow developers to reduce complexity, hide the unnecessary details and focus on higher-level functionality.

The downside of the widespread use of abstractions is that debugging is much more difficult and having a comprehensive understanding of a system much more challenging, especially due to the limitations of traditional system visualization tools.

Furthermore, the proliferation of APIs necessitates meticulous dependency management to prevent the creation of systems that are convoluted, fragile, or opaque, making them challenging to understand, maintain, or expand.

Although many developers still resort to whiteboards or non-interactive diagramming tools to map their systems, recently, more dynamic and automated tools have emerged, offering real-time insights into system architecture.

These changes, along with many others (e.g. heightened security requirements, the introduction of caching, increased expectations for test coverage, exception handling, compiler optimization, etc.), underscore the increased complexity of modern backend development.

The era when a single programmer could oversee an entire system is long gone, replaced by the need for large, distributed teams and extensive collaboration, documentation, and organizational skills.

Overwhelming Choice

With the rapid pace that technology is evolving, developers now have to navigate a vast and ever-growing ecosystem of programming languages, frameworks, libraries, tools, and platforms.

This can lead to decision paralysis, exemplifying the paradox of choice: it is a mistake to assume that if we give developers more choice, they will be happier and more productive. Unlimited choice is more attractive in theory than in practice.

The plethora of choices in the tech landscape is documented in the latest CNCF report - which shows hundreds of options!

While a degree of autonomy in choosing the best technology or tool for a solution is important, too much choice can lead to overload and ultimately overwhelm people or cause procrastination or inaction.

The solution is to strike a balance between providing developers with the freedom to make meaningful choices and curating the options to prevent choice overload. By offering well-vetted, purpose-driven recommendations and fostering a culture of knowledge-sharing and best practices, we empower developers to navigate the expansive tech landscape with confidence and efficiency.

Different Set of Skills

The advent of cloud computing has introduced additional complexities for backend developers, requiring them to be proficient in deploying and managing applications in cloud environments, understanding containerization, and selecting appropriate orchestration tools.

Besides technical knowledge, skills in modern backend developers that are particularly valued are:

• Managing legacy software and reducing architectural technical debt. The majority of projects developers work on these days are “brown field”. Knowing how to adapt and evolve architectures to accommodate unforeseen use cases, all the while managing — and possibly reducing — architectural technical debt is a prized skill.
• Assembling software by choosing the right technologies. With the explosion of software-as-a-service (SaaS) and open-source software, software development has shifted to an assembly-like approach, where backend engineers need to meticulously select and combine components, libraries, and frameworks to create a complete system where each piece fits seamlessly.
• Designing a scalable, performant, and secure system architecture. Backend software engineers are designers too and they must possess a deep understanding of software design principles to create scalable and maintainable applications.
• Cross-team communication. Distributed systems are built by large teams that comprise many different stakeholders. A sign of a great engineer is the ability to communicate effectively, fostering a shared understanding and efficient decision-making across all stakeholders.

Conclusion

In reflecting on the evolution of backend development over the past two decades, it becomes evident that the role has transformed from a relatively straightforward task of server-side programming to a multifaceted discipline requiring a broad spectrum of skills.

The challenges of meeting higher user expectations, managing the scale and complexity of systems, navigating an overwhelming array of choices, and acquiring a diverse set of skills highlights the complexity of modern backend development.

While it has never been easier to enter the field of software development, excelling as a backend developer today requires navigating a more complex and rapidly evolving technological environment. Possessing expertise in system architecture, cloud services, containerization, and orchestration tools, alongside the soft skills necessary for effective cross-team communication, will remain pivotal for success in this dynamic domain.