Hi there, it’s me Aish again. In this blog, I want to share about my experience in getting a full time job as a Software Developer. I’ll also share about my learnings and projects that helped me to land a job at Expedia Group.
First thing, I structured the order of courses in such a way that I get the skills early enough to try for internships. I took all basic courses like CS Fundamentals, Data structures, Algorithm and also took web development course to start with small projects and hosted them in Github. I learnt Express.js, Node.js and HTML in the web development course. But, in parallel, I also started researching about latest web technologies and enrolled myself in React.js offered by Udemy. At the end of the course, I had completed two portfolio projects:
- Burger Builder Web Application – React.js and Firebase Auth API, storage
- Static website for small restaurant – HTML, Node.js and Express.js
In order to prepare for internships and interviews, I took Introduction to Databases and Mobile & Cloud Software Development courses next. I gained my skills in SQL databases and worked on building two other portfolio project.
- Generic Toursim Website – MySQL DB, HTML, Node.js and Express.js
- Wastegram – Mobile App to track the wasted food from restaurants – Flutter
I wanted to update my skills in databases and wanted to expand my knowledge in AWS. This made me enroll in Cloud Developer course by Udacity. I learnt the basic services by AWS and put together everything I learned in the form of a project. I built a small version of photo album app, using React.js. I created a GraphQL API using AWS AppSync for accessing photos stored in S3 and let users upload and deleted photos. I also handled the user signup and authentication using AWS Cognito.
- Multi-User Photo Album Application – React.js, AWS, GraphQL
- Todo List – React.js, AWS Lambda, Serverless framework
- Udagram – Instagram on AWS – React.js, REST API, Travis CI, Docker, AWS EKS
These portfolio projects made my resume strong and helped me gain some interviews. I got summer internship at Expedia Group (EG), but COVID-19 had some other plans. Lol. I couldn’t join EG, but I landed as a full-stack intern at a startup called Heirloom, where I worked in building client facing components of the product using React.js. Reading the blog so far, you would have realized that I used React.js in almost all my projects. Yes, that’s my favorite 😀
I luckily got an opportunity to interview at EG again, but this time, for a full-time role. I successfully cleared the interviews and joined EG two months back. My job requires me to build tools for EG developers using open source platform called, Backstage.
Persistent effort and updating myself with latest technologies helped me to land this job. I look forward to grow in my field with specialization in backend.
Thanks for reading. Hope this was useful, if you’re hunting for a job in the field of CS 🙂
