Is it more fun to develop for mobile phones than for the web?

    Hello to the mobile developers of Habr. Tomorrow we will finish accepting applications for  AppsConf 2019  and it seems that it's time to tell who the people are who will prepare for you a mega-program of the most useful conference on mobile development.

    We have a large program committee, because we need a whole team of experts on iOS and Android, and because there is more than a total background and different points of view, it is better, less subjective hype and those that are widely known only in very narrow circles. I already talked about how we work with applications, and  introducedyou with some PC members. Today I will introduce you four more. The place of work, position and basewords of key interests, they only say that they are all developers with decent experience, but a short frivolous (in fact with important questions) interview, it seems to me, will better tell what conference these people will do.



    So, the questions are the same for everyone: iOS vs Android, mobile phones vs web; Mobile developer tools time travel thought experiments; technology leaders and industry news sources. And the answers are different, except that no one would want to go back in time and dissuade themselves from mobile development - but this is better for us.

    Spoiler: The most popular tool a mobile developer cannot do without is patience.

    And for the rest - please, under cat.


    Timur Akhmetgareev 7 years in Android development, 6 years in App in the Air (the last three years - a lead). Google Developer Expert, speaker, mentor at Google Launchpad.

    His hobby is flying, in 2018 he spent more than 185 hours on flights.


    - On what side would you advise your mother’s son’s son, who wants to become a cool mobile developer and rake money with a shovel, iOS or Android, to stand up?

    For both :) Development is developing rapidly, tools and platforms are born and die, so it is important not to focus on one thing , constantly develop a list of your competencies.

    Fullstack is everything.

    And recently, new opportunities for cross-platform development with a common code base have appeared, Kotlin Native or Flutter are interesting solutions with a high-quality output.

    In 2019, the threshold for entering Android development is still much lower, both in terms of quality materials for training available free of charge and in terms of ease of development of tools. It also does not require such large-scale investments as development for iOS.

    On the other hand, the next wave of customers from offline business comes to the vastness of our vast homeland, and it is easier to convince them that any level of iOS developer will cost more than the equivalent Android developer. Although, as far as I know, this is more stereotyping than a real fact.

    In general, money is not happiness, but in the creative component of our work.

    - Or if you returned to the past, would you dissuade yourself from mobile development?

    No, mobile development has been and remains one of the fastest growing environments. Where else you can (and sometimes also need) to pump not only technical skills, but also begin to understand design, hiring, team growth and solving related problems, and many other areas.

    - If you had a magic button that erases all traces of the presence of some technology in the world, what would it be?

    Ray Bradbury had such a story, Rust is called. There, the scientist invented a device that would destroy all weapon steel in a certain radius. The story is short, you can find the whole.

    If you try on IT, then, of course, a "digital portrait" of a person. Making tracking digital behavior history impossible is priceless . But it

    makes no sense - they will invent it again :) - Why is developing for mobile phones more fun than for the web?

    I believe that creating new is exciting in itself, no matter what and under what.

    - The main part of the day of an ordinary mobile developer?

    Wake up - Fabric - Play Console - Reviews - Get out of bed. But this, of course, is a single-product-company edition.

    - Three tools that a mobile developer cannot do without?

    A workstation at work and at home, a low-end and a flagship smartphone on the platform under development.

    “Hire a budding young man without a college degree?”

    Of course! In 2017, a graduate of the school took place in our summer practice, who in 10 days made the project several times cooler than 15 second-third year students in two weeks. He then continued to work with us, which we are extremely happy about.

    More than half of my colleagues came to work in the 3rd or 4th year. From experience, only a person can affect the professionalism and quality of a person’s work, and not the presence of a certain colored crust.

    By the way, we are looking for people with burning eyes who would like to join our team and make the best tool in the world for frequent flyers - write to  tim@appintheair.mobi , Android or iOS - it doesn’t matter :)

    - Which company is yours right now? look at the industry leaders? Who should the rest be technologically equal to?

    I sincerely believe that we should strive not for abstract "technological" leadership (how to measure it at all?), But  to do better than you did yesterday .

    Industry leadership is not a clear concept. If users like the result of your work, if you yourself began to make it more beautiful, faster, more flexible or simply in a new way for a certain period of time, that’s great, and that means you have succeeded. If the result has not changed in any way, then what difference does it make who is in the industry in what position - you stand still. Even if the others are sitting the same way - this is a defeat.

    If you want to understand how good your pace is, then again it is difficult to answer the question, you need to compare with similar companies, because The industry is vast: from custom-made studios to giant corporations.

    I would advise finding in the community several companies with similar characteristics and involving its developers in a tacit competition - there will be an occasion to share experience with each other and thus keep yourself in good shape.

    - What advise you to read, to whom to subscribe, to be in the subject? Where do you most often read industry news?

    I only regularly read @shitty_android in a telegram and https://android-developers.googleblog.com . I follow the release notes of key libraries: support and Play Services.

    For beginners, I recommend https://guides.codepath.com/android - a good hodgepodge of how to quickly and beautifully make beautiful, modern applications. Part of the guides, of course, is outdated, but not all.

    Companies of any size value people with developed soft skills. Therefore, read fiction - it will diversify your life experience, develop teamwork skills (communication and more).

    But the best way to be on the topic is to solve practical problems. Look at the application that you are doing as a user and write out 20 (or better 40) disparate controls / transitions between screens / anything else that you don’t like or could do better. And then start working on them. For the middle-level developer, this is the best way not only to pump technically, but also to begin to be responsible for the quality of the entire product as a whole, which means closer to the senior position.




    Daniil Popov began programming for Android in 2012. He currently leads the Instant Messengers Android development team at the Mail.ru Group. Prior to that, he worked at the IT Territory game studio on mobile games. He taught mobile development in the educational project Technopark from Mail.ru.

    In her free time she makes music: plays the guitar, writes songs.


    - On what side would you advise your mother’s son’s son, who wants to become a cool mobile developer and rake money with a shovel, iOS or Android, to stand up?

    About 5 years ago, I would definitely recommend iOS, but in today's realities it’s more likely Android.

    - Or if you returned to the past, would you dissuade yourself from mobile development?

    If I returned to the past, I would try to do my bestso that Android developers make it architecturally better , more convenient and more enjoyable for application development. Then mobile developers would not sometimes have to regret their choice.

    - If you had a magic button that erases all traces of the presence of some technology in the world, what would it be?

    iOS, <here comes an ominous laugh>! In fact, each technology has its own areas of applicability. It would be better if this magic button erased the desire to use one language or technology for all needs, with or without.

    - Why is developing for mobile phones more fun than for the web?

    It seems that the frontend has the same problems as the mobile phones. It is these problems that make our lives fascinating.What could be more interesting than circumventing firmware or browser bugs?

    - The main part of the day of an ordinary mobile developer?

    I hope that not scrum rallies, but the development of new functionality and the study of the platform.

    - Three tools that a mobile developer cannot do without?

    IDE, browser and terminal are a necessary and sufficient set for any developer.

    “Hire a budding young man without a college degree?”

    I try to ignore the presence of higher education in the candidate. For me, his absence is not a minus, but the presence is rather a plus.

    - Which company do you think is the leader in the industry? Who should the rest be technologically equal to?

    Everyone has their own priorities and their own ideas about the right technological processes and the technologies used in general. At conferences, blogs and social. Networks developers and team talk about how work is organized in their company. You can read, listen and decide for yourself where you really want to work.

    - What advise you to read, to whom to subscribe, to be in the subject? Where do you most often read industry news?

    These are mainly Medium blogs. Sort of:


    I also really like the technical blogs of Uber, Airbnb, Spotify, Medium Square.




    Ekaterina Petrova in IT since 2011, started with iOS: managed to develop both for iPhone 3GS and without ARC; to work both in outsourcing and in startups. I went beyond the framework of my platform more than once, sometimes picking up features on Android, then peeing a backend on RoR, and in the last startup I put on a hat CTO. Since 2019, he has been leading the platform front-end team at Avito. Podlodka leads the podcast and loves IT in all its manifestations.

    It can stand for 7 minutes in the bar.


    - On what side would you advise your mother’s son’s son, who wants to become a cool mobile developer and rake money with a shovel, iOS or Android, to stand up?

    All roads lead to leads anyway! (Actually not)

    - Or if you returned to the past, would you dissuade yourself from mobile development?

    Only Magic Mouse would dissuade me from buying: in 2012, I thought that it was a necessary attribute of a successful iOS developer.

    - If you had a magic button that erases all traces of the presence of some technology in the world, what would it be?

    React Native : in the courtyard of 2019, and reports on this topic are all trying to fill the program network of mobile conferences ...

    - Why is developing for mobile phones more fun than for the web?

    Because you have less room for error, because "and half of the users have an old version !! !! 111".

    - The main part of the day of an ordinary mobile developer?

    The one when he feels unusual.

    - Three tools that a mobile developer cannot do without?

    Patience: to wait while the code compiles.
    Memory: in order to remember a little all architectural patterns and win dinner disputes.
    The ability to google, what is there to be ashamed of?

    “Hire a budding young man without a college degree?”

    “We hire for hard skills, fire for software.” There are no ticks about higher education either there or there!

    - Which company do you think is the leader in the industry? Who should the rest be technologically equal to?

    “Do not make yourself an idol” - it’s not so important to follow someone specific, as a whole to be aware of what is happening in the industry. Attendance at conferences can also contribute a lot to this!

    - What advise you to read, to whom to subscribe, to be in the subject? Where do you most often read industry news?

    Telegram channels are convenient: the authors have already filtered out interesting articles for you, providing them with an informative description, and there are plenty of high-quality author's material. And most of all I love podcasts, especially during sports. P - productivity: swing the brain and body at the same time! Podlodka, by the way, has already released the 100th anniversary issue - don’t miss it!




    Artyom Olkov in development since 2011, since 2013 specializes in iOS. At the moment, Yandex.Disk is developing, before that he worked at Odnoklassniki, Acronis, even before that there were a lot of different things, from his startups to the studio’s tech support)

    In his free time he does crossfit and watches TV shows.


    - On what side would you advise your mother’s son’s son, who wants to become a cool mobile developer and rake money with a shovel, iOS or Android, to stand up?

    If we turn to statistics - iOS developer is rarer, as a result more expensive in the market. But do not forget that it is not from the platform that the main component of the salary is formed.

    - Or if you returned to the past, would you dissuade yourself from mobile development?

    I’ve tried various other areas during my career and no - I wouldn’t try to dissuade anyone from mobile development , especially myself. A very fascinating sphere with its powder of frenzy and gray hair that doesn’t come very quickly. But a number of acquaintances began to acquire microphones, which is a very strange flex, but approx.

    - If you had a magic button that erases all traces of the presence of some technology in the world, what would it be?

    Architecture von Neumann. In my opinion, at one time it was not very deservedly preferred to alternatives, but it is no longer possible to get off this needle.

    - Why is developing for mobile phones more fun than for the web?

    At least, because under the mobile phones you really develop)Under the web, you configure the webpack for weeks and joke about burning out on Twitter. And the modern development infrastructure for the web is more likely to cause a couple of demons in the middle of your open space than entertainment during development.

    - The main part of the day of an ordinary mobile developer?

    I was sure that the mobile developer of the view moves and paints the buttons. But the reports of the last year give the impression that all day long they either raise farms for fps regression or come up with new architectures.

    - Three tools that a mobile developer cannot do without?

    Oh, here is a serious answer now, for the first time in an interview.

    When I started in development, the best tools for any developer were - brain, perseverance, desire to learn.

    By the end of the first quarter of the 21st century, these qualities have shifted, according to my observations:

    1. Patience. A lot of patience. Today, development is more about the ability to talk with other people and agree, and without patience, your negotiations will end very quickly.

    2. Empathy as a reinforcement of the first paragraph. Because you need to understand what is leading and what is happening in the heads of other stakeholders. You need to understand all the positions and make an informed decision.

    If you don’t know how to listen, it will be difficult in mobile development.

    3. Ability to admit mistakes. None of us are god. None of us work for the glory of our ego. We pursue other values, we solve the problems of end users. They don’t care who is more right in the development team, they want to use applications to solve their daily tasks. The faster you learn to hear other people and admit that you made a mistake, the faster the user will be able to get a new solution to the problem.

    “Hire a budding young man without a college degree?”

    Hired it was a deal. I did not regret it.

    - Which company do you think is the leader in the industry? Who should the rest be technologically equal to?

    I will not give my subjective opinion, I suggest just looking at a collective opinionmobile developers, very timely assembled.

    - What advise you to read, to whom to subscribe, to be in the subject? Where do you most often read industry news?

    I recently discovered for myself that to receive news on the state of the industry, I come to meetings and communicate with people . And I want to advise the same to readers.

    Communicating with people alive is useful - that's for sure. And this is one of the motivations for us to do AppsConf. If you want to jump into the last car, then send an application here . In general, it is time to study the submitted applications and plan to participate in the conference on April 22 and 23 in Moscow. Here are a few reports already accepted:



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