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Working a corporate 9-5 as a dev might be cushy, but it can also put a damper on your personal development. You might not be able to stretch your creative wings or tinker with new libraries during work hours, but weekend side projects give you free rein. Want to deepen your understanding and grow faster as a professional? Here are the tools you’ll need to conceptualize, create, and successfully deploy your passion projects.
Prototyping Tools
Great side projects start with a spark of creativity you’ll need to shape into a tangible idea before you start writing code. Prototyping tools are a broad category that helps on multiple fronts.
For example, you could use a note-taking app to lay out the project’s basic feature set, pain points, etc., and later use it as the basis for a user guide or FAQ. More design-oriented tools in this category let you quickly slap together mockups of the overall layout and UI, potentially uncovering feasibility and usability issues before they become hard-coded.
Frameworks & Templates
Even if your idea is totally unique, you shouldn’t need to start working on it from scratch. Templates and frameworks provide the basic building blocks needed to get the project up and running so you can focus on the idea and its execution.
Included are essentials like folder structures, a build pipeline, rules for keeping your code style consistent, ready-made forms, buttons, and more.
A Repo
Side projects can quickly veer off the initial path you set for them. This hits home especially in the early stages when you’re still nailing ideas down or trying to figure out what approaches would resonate best with target users.
Repositories serve several essential functions. They make sure your project is available online, both as a backup measure and a means for possible collaboration. More importantly, they store several versions of the project. This lets you experiment with new features before adding them to the latest version or roll back to a previous, more stable one if things go awry.
Security Tools
A common mistake when developing side projects is focusing solely on the idea and feature implementation while outright neglecting or leaving security on the back burner. Well and good for a personal project you’ll never share, not so much when creating a web app with the potential to go viral, attracting thousands of users and their sensitive data.
Cybersecurity comes in various forms. On the one hand, you’ll want to make sure the code is error-free and not linked to compromised dependencies. User inputs need to be sanitized, and the site that hosts the project will need an SSL certificate to encrypt user data. On the other, you’ll want to use cybersecurity tools like a password manager for secure access and cloud storage for backup.
A Seeded Database
Whether your weekend project is an API, SaaS, or personal analytics tool, you’ll need data to iterate on and test it correctly. User account and payment information, comments, profile pictures, and datasets all qualify.
Databases provide a structured environment you can populate and reference to maintain access to such data. Since users will only start signing up once the project is actually presentable, seeded databases offer the kind of dummy data you’ll need for proper testing without having to go through the tedium of generating it yourself.
An Authentication System
Unless you’re creating simple tools or mini-games you’ll make available to everyone, your project will need a way to match data stored in your databases and the users associated with it. An authentication system provides the framework for easily creating and authenticating user profiles.
Even if you don’t expect users right away, setting the authenticator up ensures you can test account-related features and expand.
Error Tracking & Testing
Side projects naturally invite experimentation, which often means working with new frameworks or technologies you’re not familiar enough with yet to use in a production environment. Unsurprisingly, this leaves your code more prone to errors.
Error tracking tools ensure no major issue goes unchecked. They will alert you to syntax errors, misspellings, convention mismatches, and other shortcomings that reduce the code’s stability and security. Testing tools are an excellent supplement since they help verify that various components continue to function as new versions roll out.
An Identity Theft Protection Service
Identity theft protection services might not be the first thing on a dev’s checklist, but they belong there. Travel or late-night releases shouldn’t leave your accounts exposed while you’re away from your usual devices.
The best identity theft protection services monitor credit reports, bank accounts, and the dark web for suspicious activity and alert you quickly if your details surface. If something does happen, they provide step-by-step recovery help — fraud resolution specialists, paperwork support, and help restoring accounts and credit.
Conclusion
Launching a side project is a great way to sharpen your skills. You can explore new tech and build something that’s entirely your own. With the right mix of technical and security tools, you will surely move fast without cutting corners. Keep your setup smart, your data safe, and your momentum steady — the rest will follow.
Many of his resources are available on various design marketplaces and for free on Codepen.
Over the years, he's worked with a range of clients and contributed to design publications like Design Your Way, Designmodo, WebDesignerDepot, WPDean, and Speckyboy, andSlider Revolution among others.
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