How to write websites today?

Question

Web development

Hello everyone,

I'll try to be brief, since the question is somewhat stupid, but it doesn't matter.
I am a relatively young adventurer)), I decided to do full-cycle web development. To do this on my own, I have neither the knowledge nor the strength, so I want to assemble a small team. I do not yet have a complete higher education, I am studying in Germany, majoring in Business Informatics. I have the vision, understanding and even practice in running small projects as a team leader. I clearly understand all the tasks and principles of Front- and Backend-and work, I can program the most important things in JS and PHP, there are no problems with the database. I am also gradually starting to understand SPA development (for the future) and practice React.

I made a plan for myself that I am looking for people who will also light up this idea like me. The market, as for me, is big, but if you try, you can always find a place for yourself there. Personally, I plan to act as a project manager, as well as participate directly in programming the client and server parts of projects. I see the team in this way:

UI-/UX-Designer (in principle, there is already a candidate)
Frontend-Developer (he will also be a layout designer at the beginning) Backend
-Developer

There are already candidates for programmers, but now let's move on to the most important issue. Today, more and more, all sorts of constructors like Wix are being advertised. Why they are needed, except for creating some simple blogs, I don’t understand, but I’m not interested in this in principle.

About 90 percent of the studios (from those that I googled) that are engaged in development use WordPress (hereinafter WP), one of the most popular CMS today. And in principle, wherever I go, these CMS appear everywhere. Someone says that CMS development is more convenient, cheaper and better. Someone writes that this is a marketing ploy, and sites on ready-made CMS are heavy due to various modules, they are poorly optimized for browser search, and they are inconvenient in terms of hosting when transferring a site. I do not understand where they write the truth, and where lies.

And here are two sides of the coin... Either the client receives the site on a CMS (for example, WP), and does not depend on the developers when it comes to changing the content of the site. Or, with each amendment, the client will need to seek help from the developers. And obviously, the first option would be preferable.

There will not be enough resources (experience and knowledge) to create your own bike (write your own CMS). And honestly, I don't know which direction to go in? Here are a few questions that I would like to get an answer to, although I will not refuse a detailed and general answer))

1. Is it possible to do without CMS in today's realities, and if so, what does site development look like?
   
2. If I write a site for example on WP, then how are things going with the layout, what can front-end developers program, and what can back-end developers? It’s just that a lot of places write that on WP, you can create a site yourself without knowing much programming, where can programmers appear?
   
3. Can I, for example, write a site roughly speaking in a notepad, and then transfer it to WP?
   

Of course, I apologize for the stupid wording of the questions, I could have asked one general one, but my head is already a mess, and I don’t know what to do next. I want to find understanding people in the team, but I can't understand how web development works today.
I would be grateful to anyone who can at least somehow explain what's what))

Answer 1

TL;DR: on vp you can cut sites yourself, sometimes using the services of freelancers, it will come out more efficiently and cheaper.

Is it possible to do without CMS in today's realities, and if so, what does website development look like?

Strongly depends. There are sooo many approaches, from "Uncle Kolya, why are you walking like a fool without a website, let me quickly make a site for you in Joomla for 50 bucks, gee ...", to the level of serious studios where they write serious projects on modern frameworks and with well-thought-out architecture, and the price tag starts from tens of thousands of killed raccoons, but for this money they will do everything for you: technical specifications, design, corporate identity, project documentation, technical requirements, selection of server architecture, etc... As you yourself said, the market is vast and , I will add, is very heterogeneous.

If I write a site for example on WP, then how are things going with the layout, what can front-end developers program, and what can back-end developers? It’s just that a lot of places write that on WP, you can create a site yourself without knowing much programming, where can programmers appear?

A typical site without special design and functionality can really be lifted in one snout in just a day. If you get confused with the design, you can either take / buy ready-made themes, of which today there are mulion and 2 on top, or order a designer for a price tag of about x2 of the finished design, well, it also depends on the requirements of course. A programmer is needed in cases when you really need something that you rarely see or some specific task for the needs of the customer, all typical "Wishlist" is usually solved by ready-made plugins. Naturally, all these charms have a serious flaw in the form of shitty performance and a nightmarish code, which you don’t want to climb into even in a full chemical protection suit.

Can I, for example, write a site roughly speaking in a notepad, and then transfer it to WP?

Strange question... probably not, as your code won't fit into the vp engine. And they usually do the opposite - they take the VP and make changes and additions based on its functions.

Answer 2

A normal question, remember yourself in your youth: what were Napoleon's plans to take over the world? Everyone had them (and some even still have them). But I will not write something on the topic "the author is a schoolboy, gyyy", but I will take it and answer. Because I've been in the subject since 2001 and I think I understand what the question is about.
The vast majority of businesses today do not need a website. Instagram and Facebook are great at selling physical goods and services. More than half of the entrepreneurs, those for whom I made a website 5-6 years ago, are now successfully selling on VK, Instagram or FB and don’t want to hear anything about “your own website”.
Most of the rest do not need complex multi-page sites. In fact, there are statistics that simple one-page sites sell 2-5-10 times better than multi-page sites. The user simply has nowhere to go - there is the most important information about the product and the "order" button. He read and ordered. If the user starts to surf the site, he gets tired, his brain is "clogged" and he decides to put off the purchase "for later". These entrepreneurs are successfully shut down by Vicks, Lpgenerator, Tilda and numerous other "website builders". Even a schoolboy can make a "website" on these platforms (and they do). This is definitely not a job for a professional website development studio.
What if people need to sell more than one product? Another demanding category is potential owners of online stores. Previously, there was a powerful layer of development - this is just the same development of an online store. And this layer, as you probably guessed, is almost closed by services.
And here, in principle, you can go. Not all requirements have been met yet. You can make modules for OpenCart, add Woocommerce stores, there is such a convenient SaaS service Shopify, which also has an API and supports third-party modules - there is room to frolic.
But again, this is not development from scratch.
Many studios concentrate on developing a unique website design. The topic is interesting and at one time was quite profitable. But today there are a lot of ready-made templates on the Internet, of which 98% of businesses choose their own design and, after a little tweaking, get a unique website. You can try to go here, but it will take quite a long time to find a good client.
But where you can really go is the development of large software products. There are few such orders, much less than the owners of micro-businesses. This is a SaaS development mainly. Development of marketplaces, services and everything else that will not be closed by designers for a long time. And you can use Symphony for this, even WP and CodeIgniter. If you have the power and knowledge, you can try using Nodejs or even Go.
Again, I will say again that there are not very many orders in this topic, but they are all worthwhile. And often you have to do not on what you are used to, but on what the service itself requires. This usually includes a lot of different technologies - a face on React, Vue, Angular, a main backend on Nodejs or Go (no CMS!), as a rule, they order a mobile application right away - so be prepared to do it. At first, you can go to PhoneGap, but often this solution is not suitable, customers are smart, they know how to google.
In general, go ahead. And most importantly, what I would like to say is that if you rely on a lot of simple orders, you will not succeed, with a high probability. Because every student can do simple orders, and he has more free time and does not have to pay wages to contractors, so he will beat you.
We need to go where schoolchildren cannot cope alone - where a lot of modern technologies are needed at the same time. This is where the gold mine is for IT companies.
Good luck!

Answer 3

From the outside, your question looks like this:
"I have neither the knowledge nor the strength, I'm looking for a team to make a web studio, but do I need cms or not
? to you customers, how do you like the idea of ​​​​gentlemen? "
This is a million dollar startup (sarcasm), in fact, the question is for you, how are you different from others?

Answer 4

The more idiotic the question, the more active the local gurus are writing multi-kilometer texts, inserting pictures with architecture and talking about the website building industry.
And the question is asked by yesterday's schoolboy.
Programmers simply don't have critical thinking.

Answer 5

Is it possible to do without CMS in today's realities, and if so, what does site development look like?

go to my blog, the "website" tab and everything is detailed there point by point and there is even a top-level architecture diagram: Web site: Basic Architectural Model and Internal Device (Scheme)

Answer 6

First of all, you need to study the information in the tags
Organization-work
web development
Here the work of a young studio
is discussed Look in the search for a toaster for the query "web studio"

Answer 7

Oh, I saw something like this in about 2007.
There was also a studio there, it consisted of 11 people, everyone worked for a percentage, everyone had an equal share. I was offered to give my portfolio to them on a site that did not exist yet, and in return to get rich with interest from non-existent projects.
He refused then, but now he would have become a billionaire.

Answer 8

I would start much easier, by testing the idea.
If I understand the basic questions correctly, they boil down to:

• Self-employment, hobby or company
  
• Make a product or a project business (there are options like outstaff)
  
• Choosing the technologies you want to work with
  

In these questions and ideas, the most important thing is where the money is, right?
If you just want to assemble a team and practice writing code without money, then open source is for you.
If it’s about self-employment, then take projects on the same freelance to start with for yourself (what you already know how) and try to do it. You will learn to scale later.
If you want a product - make mvp yourself, look for a team and investments for mvp. You will get little money on bad terms, but you will get a great experience.
If you want to play in the project business, then find orders and sell. Then look for performers under them (it is desirable that you have competencies to block). When you close in plus, you will draw conclusions.