What Different Kinds of Programmers Do

In the world of programming, there are many different career options. At Codecademy, we offer a couple of distinct paths you can take as you begin to explore your next career. We categorize these into two segments: Software Engineering and Data Science.

In this article, we will look at the two different career paths and explore videos to see what’s involved in different coding career journeys. Let’s get started!

Software Engineering

Software Engineering, also known as Software Development, is a career path that enables you to design and create software that solves real-world problems!

Check out the following video to learn a bit more about what a software engineer does:

There are multiple kinds of software engineers that focus on different parts of software. Below, we will cover three different types:

• Full-Stack Developers
• Front-End Developers
• Back-end Developers

What Does a Full-Stack Developer Do?

Take our Full-Stack Software Engineer Career Path to get job-ready at a fraction of the cost of a coding bootcamp.

What Does a Front-End Developer Do?

Pursue our Front-End Software Engineer Career Path to acquire what it takes to do this job yourself.

What Does a Back-End Developer Do?

Check out our Back-End Software Engineer Career Path to get started learning the key skills for a back-end career.

What Is It Like to Be a Software Engineer?

Now that you have a good grasp of the different types of software engineering paths, take a look at what it would be like to be in the shoes of a software engineer:

Data Science

Data Science is a broad field that encompasses many disciplines. Think of data science as a mashup of probability and statistics, software engineering, and domain knowledge. A data scientist’s super-power is taking large amounts of information and turning it into something actionable and interpretable.

Check out the following video to learn a bit more about what a data scientist does:

Explore the different career specializations in Data Science to see what it’d take to go from zero to job in this field, or take the Data Science foundations path to learn core skills that are used across all data science roles. Then decide which path is right for you!

What Is It Like to Be a Data Scientist?

Now that you have a good grasp of what data science is, step into the shoes of a data scientist and learn about a day in their lives:

Next Steps

Congratulations on taking the first step of choosing a new career! One of the best ways to pick a new career path to commit to is to try a little of them yourself and then settle on one that excites you the most. Another way to make an informed choice would be to complete this free course, with its other overviews and samples.