Why I'm excited to be getting back into web development

So for the last few years I've been concentrating on working with the Flash Platform, using mainly Flex now ever since Adobe decided to move away from Flash and Flex I've found that the Flash roles have also
dwindled.

When it came to me finding a new role, after my last full time Flex role ended I decided to start getting back into front-end web development. Before I started using Flex I was a ColdFusion developer using HTML/XHTML and ColdFusion. So I decided to get back into web development. The Flex roles are there, but now they are looking for Java/Flex developer, with strong computer science backgrounds, to work in finance. Flex seems to still have a strong presence in the financial sector.

Anyway after the last Flex role ended I went on a HTML5 training course, which was a great idea. It gave
me a good refresher on HTML and what's new in HTML5. With that I managed to get a web development contract working with HTML5/CSS and JavaScript, no Flex.

Coming back to web development I can see how much the community has grown, how much the web development stack has grown. When I was building websites with HTML and ColdFusion 4.0, all you has was a bit of HTML, some CSS and very little JavaScript. All the power of the web application you were building was in languages like ColdFusion and ASP/ASP.Net.

Now a front-end web developer has so much more that they can use in order to build powerful web applications, this is due mainly to the power of modern browsers (god love Google Chrome).

But this is also due to the many great open source projects out there, like HTML5Boilerplate, BackboneJS, RequireJS, and the many other projects started by web developers to make building great web applications easier.

So the reasons why I'm excited to be back as a web developer is I can start working with these great web projects and technologies that have sprung up over the last few years that I can now use that weren't available when I last developed web sites. Here's a list of the sites/projects I find exciting:

• HTML5Boilerplate
• BackboneJS
• RequireJS
• AngularJS
• NodeJS
• jQuery
• jQuerymobile
• Responsive Web Design
• Github (this makes it so easy now for a web developer to get their project/ideas out there and share
• with others) 
• Google Chrome