Boot.dev Blog
The Two Classes of Software Engineer
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
"Software engineer" has become a ubiquitous term for people who write, deploy, architect, or sometimes even simply test code. In reality, I think there are two classes of "software engineers"; those who understand computer science well enough to do challenging, innovative work, and those who just get by because they're familiar with a few high-level tools. The laziness with which the tech industry has adopted the term "software engineer" has made it harder for us to distinguish between the two.
Top 8 Benefits of Functional Programming
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
Functional programming is a way to write code where programs are created strictly through functions. Functional programming has gained quite a bit of traction in recent years among the development community, mostly because of the benefits it provides.
Top 8 Tricks to Learn Coding Fast
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
The journey to becoming a gainfully employed software engineer can feel long. The good news is, you can learn smarter not harder. Apply these eight tricks and you'll be learning to program a lot faster than the average bear.
Is There a Case for Programmers to Unionize?
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
I've seen a lot of buzz recently about software developers wanting to form unions. I'm particularly interested in this topic while I'm #indiehacking boot.dev, where my goal is to provide a free-to-audit university-quality CS education. I also want to point out that at the time of writing I'm a full-time software developer working for a separate company (not boot.dev). I'm not a manager and boot.dev is just a side-project. As of right now, I'm pretty sure I'm a member of the proletariat.
View Git Tags with Semver Ordering
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
If you're like me, you wish all Git tags adhered to the Semantic Versioning standard. Unfortunately, Semver is just a convention, so Git tags can basically be any string of text. By default when you use the git tag command, your output will be in alphabetical order. Being a gopher, almost all the projects I work on are tagged according to Semver standards, which means the default output is fairly useless.
Why should you learn Golang? [2026]
by Meghan Reichenbach
Golang has skyrocketed in popularity year over year, making it one of the best choices for career-conscious developers to learn. As an example, StackOverflow's Developer survey saw it climb in popularity among developers from 10th in 2019 all the way to 5th in 2020. Additionally, a full 32% of developers surveyed in Insights Dice want to learn it. Go developers are paid well - globally, the StackOverflow survey found that Perl, Scala, and Go programmers have the highest salaries.
What Is Dry Code, and Is It Always A Good Thing?
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
"Don't repeat yourself", or "DRY" for short, is a somewhat controversial principle of software development. It aims to make code cleaner, which is to say less buggy and easier to work with. DRY purports to accomplish this by reducing repetition in your codebase and replacing that duplicate code with abstractions like functions, classes, and methods.
The Benefits of Gamified Learning
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
Why was that adjustment to college classes so hard? Sitting through hours of lectures and PowerPoints can be challenging for even the most dedicated students.
NLP is Hard Because Even Humans Don't Agree
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
In my full-time role at Nuvi, I've been lucky enough to work on a team where we're able to push the boundaries in the natural language processing field. We built out several different "facets" that we score text on, including sentiment, emotion, vulgarity, tense, and currently, we're working on promotion detection.
The 8 Crucial Mistakes Holding You Back From a Programming Job
by Zulie Rane - Data analysis and computer science techincal author
If you're reading this article, you're well aware of the great benefits that come with a programming job - high salaries for programmers, an expanding job market, exciting opportunities.
Writing a Binary Search Tree in Python with Examples
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
A binary search tree, or BST for short, is a tree where each node is a value greater than all of its left child nodes and less than all of its right child nodes. Read on for an implementation of a binary search tree in Python from scratch! Also, if you're interested in really learning this stuff, you should check out three of my courses:
Building a Linked List in Python with Examples
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
A linked list is a linear data structure where elements are not stored next to each other in memory. Unlike and array, elements in a linked list use pointers or references to each other to keep the list intact.
The Best Ways To Get a Programming Job with No Experience
by Winston Wagner - Technical author at Boot.dev
It sounds like a pipe dream. A well-paid programming job, with no experience? Get out of town. Well, as it turns out, it's both just about as difficult as you believe, but probably easier than you think. As with most things, the main obstacle standing in the way of you getting a programming job with no experience is yourself.
The 8 Most Popular Coding Languages of 2026
by Zulie Rane - Data analysis and computer science techincal author
How can you decide what the most popular coding language is? It's like trying to pick the most popular ice cream flavor - everyone has a favorite. The truth is that different coders prefer different coding languages for different reasons, and just when you think you can say a single coding language reigns supreme, a new one crops up, or an older one becomes relevant for a new application.
Boot.dev's Refer a Friend Program
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
We think learning is better with friends! For every person you invite to join, you'll both earn some free gems. As soon as your friend signs up, we'll credit each of your accounts with, at the time of writing, 150 gems.
Converting an Array to a JSON Object in JavaScript
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
JSON, or "JavaScript Object Notation", is a highly popular data exchange format that's widely used in web development. In this post, we'll explore several simple methods for converting a JavaScript array into JSON data. Plus, we'll discuss the benefits of using JSON and how it can help improve your web development projects.
Should you Learn Computer Science or Software Engineering?
by Winston Wagner - Technical author at Boot.dev
The most important thing to understand about these two fields of study is that, ultimately, they are similar. At the end of the day, Software Engineering and Computer Science will both help to make you a better programmer and developer, and the only difference between the two is how they are applied. Software Engineering tends to be more practical, and Computer Science tends to be more theoretical. In a way, Software Engineering is just applied Computer Science, and using that as a starting point, we can examine the differences between the two.
Guide to Getting a Certificate in Computer Science
by Zulie Rane - Data analysis and computer science techincal author
There are so many reasons to want to get a certificate in computer science in 2021, especially when you compare it to alternatives like getting a degree or attending a coding bootcamp.
6 Computer Science Resume Examples
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
It's really hard to get your foot in the door for engineering interviews, especially if you have no experience and are looking for an entry-level position. Often times, more experienced candidates looking to find a higher-paying job can also have trouble. As an employer myself, I can tell you that one of the biggest mistakes I see in 75% of resumes is using a visually boring template. When I'm sifting through forty or fifty applicants, it's really easy for my eyes to glaze over. Think of your resume as your website landing page. You need to catch your employer's attention by calling out your biggest accomplishments and selling points at a glance.
The Highest-Paying Computer Science Jobs
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
There are many jobs within the software industry, and most of them are easier to land or are higher-paying once you land them, if you have a solid grasp of computer science fundamentals. You don't need a degree from an accredited university in 90% of cases, but you do need to learn the material, whether it be online, on the job, or in a formal setting. Let's explore the most common computer science job titles and their associated compensation, details, and duties.
Computer Information Systems vs Computer Science
by Winston Wagner - Technical author at Boot.dev
As technology continues to advance, the need for professionals who are capable of utilizing and understanding computers continues to grow. This demand creates a strong job market, with excellent pay and exclusive opportunities. However, there are two fields of study when it comes to working with this technology: Computer Information Systems and Computer Science. Both are useful areas of study with in-demand skills, but what are the benefits of each, in comparison to each other? We explore that below.
The History of Computer Science - A Timeline
by Winston Wagner - Technical author at Boot.dev
The Antikthyera Mechanism
Certificates vs Diplomas in Computer Science
by Zulie Rane - Data analysis and computer science techincal author
When I was looking into getting my first job related to programming, I had no idea what the difference between a certificate and a diploma was. I was terrified that I'd have to go back to school and spend 2-4 years getting a degree in computer science before an employer would even blink in my direction. Unfortunately for me, two degrees in conservation biology aren't enough to attract any serious coding employers. Then I learned about boot camps, which eased my concerns some, but I didn't have the time or money to spend on a 15-week program.
Examples of Heuristics in Computer Science
by Winston Wagner - Technical author at Boot.dev
Heuristics in computer science and artificial intelligence are "rules of thumb" used in algorithms to assist in finding approximate solutions to complex problems. Often, there's simply too much data to sift through to come to a solution promptly, so a heuristic algorithm is used to trade exactness for speed. However, because heuristics are based on individual rules unique to the problem they are solving, the specifics of the heuristics vary from problem to problem.
How to Create a Custom Checkbox Form in Vue
by Lane Wagner - Boot.dev co-founder and backend engineer
You have a problem. The browser's default checkbox form is ugly and outdated, but importing an entire library just to change the styling seems like overkill. Instead, let's build a custom checkbox form component from scratch. It will take 15 minutes to type up, or just 3 if you just copy and paste my boilerplate code.
