Beyond Code: Insights on Community, Frameworks, and Growth with Scott Spence of OES Technology
Aug 31, 2023
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Scott Spence, a Developer Advocate Consultant at OES Technology, shares insights on web development, the Svelte framework, working with other developers, and the benefits of using Storyblok.
Scott gained real-world experience by working with other developers on a community project, which boosted his confidence and helped him land his first front-end developer role.
Storyblock allows developers to create flexible CMS schemas with reusable blocks, improving the efficiency of both development and content management teams.
Deep dives
Scott Spence's journey into web development
Scott Spence transitioned from being a VBA analyst developer to a web developer in 2018. He started by automating tasks and realized his interest in web development. He explored JavaScript and discovered Free Code Camp, which provided a great learning curriculum. Later, he joined Chingu Collabs, a community project that allowed him to gain real-world experience by working with other developers on a project. This experience boosted his confidence and helped him land his first front-end developer role.
Scott's introduction to Svelte
Scott initially worked with Gatsby but was looking for a faster alternative. He discovered Svelte, a component framework that caught his interest. When Svelte announced its V1 release, Scott decided to give it a try. He found the code in Svelte to be more readable and succinct compared to other frameworks. Scott became an expert in Svelte and started creating educational content on it while working at GraphCMS. He highlighted the benefits of Svelte, such as its lean code and close alignment with browser APIs.
Scott's experience with Storyblock
At his current position with Storyblock, Scott works with a headless CMS that utilizes atomic design principles. He appreciates how Storyblock allows developers to create flexible CMS schemas with reusable blocks. The CMS schema is assembled into a JSON blob and delivered to the client, where the SDKs use the data to build components. Scott enjoys demonstrating the flexibility of Storyblock to content editors who can easily make changes without developer involvement, improving the efficiency of both development and content management teams.
Scott's approach to workshops and teaching
Scott conducts workshops where he focuses on guiding participants through building projects step-by-step. He emphasizes getting data from remote sources and displaying it on a page using concepts like REST APIs and GraphQL. He provides attendees with comprehensive documentation, offering code samples and steps to follow. Scott values immediate feedback and interaction during workshops, finding it helpful to gauge participants' understanding and provide clarifications. He enjoys sharing his knowledge and finds the teaching aspect of his work highly fulfilling.
In this episode of The State of Developer Education, Jon is joined by Scott Spence, Developer Advocate Consultant at OES Technology.
They discuss Scott's journey into web development and his experience with the Svelte framework. Scott shares valuable insights on working with other developers, his involvement in the Svelte community, and the benefits of using Storyblok.