Team Q&A: 7 Questions with our Senior Front-End Developer, Jon

About Jon

Jon is a senior front-end engineer at Coassemble and manages a small team of front-end developers. When not building Coassemble to be the best authoring and microlearning tool, Jon is all about coffee, baking and cooking, and spending time with his wife and son.

1. Let’s start with an easy one—tell me about your role at Coassemble?

I’m a front-end engineer, so I spend a lot of my time building Coassemble itself. My day is usually some mix of writing code that becomes features or fixes issues in the app, meeting with designers and product managers to talk about what is coming up and managing a team of other front-end engineers.

2. For those who do not know exactly what front-end development is, how would you describe it? How is this different from back-end development?

It’s kind of nuanced even for people within the field, but you can think of the front end as everything you see and interact with—everything from the appearance to the logic that drives the experience. In contrast, the back end is more concerned with the database, services, infrastructure, and things like that. We’ve chosen to split those concerns up so we can specialise and become really great at dealing with one side of that equation.

3. What is something you're working on right now? And what is happening behind the scene to achieve this?

At the moment we’re just starting to rebuild assignments in Coassemble. It’s very much a collaborative process between my team and the design team that kind of culminates in the handover of final designs for us to get started. We will build and test over the next few weeks so keep an eye out for some exciting assignment changes.

4. Are there any tools that you use as a developer that has changed the way you work or made you more productive?

I spend so long behind a screen that I’m a big fan of pen and paper so day-to-day my most used tool is probably a notepad and pen (a Lamy fountain pen—essential). You just can’t beat the immediacy of writing it down. Beyond that, most of the tools I use frequently are probably a bit nerdy for most people.

5. Which resources do you follow to stay current on industry news?

Newsletters and podcasts mostly.

For podcasts, I am listening to ShopTalk Show, Full Stack Radio, Syntax, and Intercom on Product.

For newsletters, I’m reading Bytes, Frontend Focus, JavaScript Weekly and Vue News.

6. If you could choose one type of food to eat every day for the rest of your life, what would it be and why?

My heart says something like pasta, but if I’m thinking practically, I’d say sandwiches. Does that count? I think it’s probably the most versatile food group that I’m least likely to get sick of.

7. If you could learn to do something really well, what would it be?

I feel like these days I have the resources to learn just about anything I would want to, so if I were really wanting to learn something, I don’t have any good excuses. I’m always wanting to be better at listening and empathy—I don’t think there is a Coassemble course for that one (yet).

Want to learn more about the team behind Coassemble? Check out our 7 Questions with... Q&A series!