Real work takes time

A new idea pops in mind, we open the IDE, start coding and a couple of hours later Boom! It is done. It works. Now everything you do today requires a website to market it. So you throw in a little UI with bootstrap and poor wording and your work is published.

It's a common thing to hear programmers say, "I threw this thing together over the weekend". I find myself saying it all too often, even right here on my blog:

With this [blog], on march 26 at 12am I had some ideas I wanted to share but had no medium to do it. So I opened my IDE and started coding. One hour later I had a simple CRUD/blog ready to be deployed.

And I even documented one of my quick little projects in the same spirit. I don't know about everyone else but when I say it, it is to boast. The smart developer that created a facebook/twitter clone in just a couple days. The guy that single handedly created a website that shook all the online dating industry (plentyoffish.com). These are stories we all like to hear and we want to be that guy or gal. Unfortunately, the title is the only thing that is compelling in these stories (if you don't want to put much effort in your work). If you dig a little deeper, you will see that any serious project requires a lot of work.

I threw this weather app together over the weekend. Sometimes it is actually accurare... only sometimes.

Background image from hdwallpapers.in

Twitter bootstrap is great, but not so much the bootstrap mentality. Bootstrap is a resourceful tool with exemplar coding practice. Just reading the source code made me a better developer. But I think using it for every single website is missing the point. Just like the name suggest, use it to get that initial push you need to get your project running.

When you see a website using all the default bootstrap styles, it just looks lazy. Use it to get your project up and running, but if you have a project in its dying phase and you still have the default bootstrap styles on it, maybe you are to blame.

This is not suggest that projects that were completed in a very short time should be neglected. You have to spend more time on it to move it from prototype to product. Real work takes time. If you want results you will have to put the microwave mentality away.