Sheppard Digital

@rbrtsmith Thanks again for your response. I had always assumed GraphQL was a replacement for relational databases, but since your post I've done some research and found it's actually more a replacement for REST, so I've learnt something new already, thanks. I'll certainly have a look into Javascript again. I guess the problem is, as a programmer you're always kind of taught that OOP is the way things are done, everything relating to system design that I've been taught revolves around OOP, hence why I guess Javascript 'feels' wrong. I will however take a look, and I'll also look at GraphQL, and NoSQL database in more detail to at least get a better understanding before I dismiss these technologies.

Thanks for the response, I've always thought I'd like to remain freelance, there's a number of reasons, I guess the first is I have a home office which I'm committed to for the next couple of years (home extension which needs paying for). I've always saw contracting as working for someone else, having a boss, I feel like freelancing provides freedom. I think if I found the right 'niche', I'd certainly consider contracting at home and away from home, I mean £1,000 per day, who wouldn't! It's just finding that niche, something that I know that if I put the effort into would eventually reap rewards. I've always been against functional languages, they feel 'wrong', don't ask me why, OOP languages feel 'right', although that's subjective. I've certainly never liked the idea of Node, the thought of working with Javascript server side is enough to make my nose bleed. However, I must confess, that other using PHP in the early days, I don't have a great deal of experience with functional languages, and maybe I should at least take a look. My biggest concern is spending time to learn another language from scratch, which I can't help think could be better spent giving me a more in-depth knowledge in the languages/area I already know.

I've been developing for the web for about 21 years, and a full-time freelancer for the past 12 years. I see myself mainly as a backend developer in PHP (Laravel) and Java (Spring). I'm a couple of years off 40 now, and I've started to think about the future more, and because I work on such a wide variety of projects, I feel like a jack of all trades and that I don't specialise in anything in particular. I think I'd like to narrow down my services, but I don't have a clue where to start. I try to avoid building websites, I just don't like it, and I've always stayed away from the likes of Wordpress. But, an existing client has requested that I build a number of websites for a really large client of theirs in Drupal. Because it's an existing client that I don't want to lose, I've agreed, but it means me getting a Drupal develop on-board and meand I'm going to be doing some HTML/CSS and Drupal work myself, which I don't particularly enjoy doing. I'm feeling like the new knowledge I'm learning, while it's earning me money, would have been time better spent improve my existing skills, but at the end of the day, bills need paying and sometimes you've just got to do what pays. Last year I started studying towards a Masters in Computing following a software engineering route, and in this we're coving topics including software design, requirement gathering, project management, data management, and other web development and software engineering topics. I started this because I felt that as I got older I may want to move away from being a developer and more into system design. However recently I've had advice that unless I'm working for a large organisation or contracting, I probably won't get to do that kind of job as a freelancer. So, I have two problems, I'm not sure how I would go about the process of turning work away that I don't want to do. Even then, I'm not sure what it is I want to specialise in. My clients are mainly agencies, some marketing, some mobile app developers, so I get to work on anything from static sites, bespoke sites, web applications and web services. One of my mobile app developer clients for a couple of years sent me a lot of work building web services for mobile apps. Straight away I clicked with this, it's almost completely backend work, there's very little (if any) HTML involved, it just feel like my thing. My current thinking is that I think I'd like to concentrate on building my existing knowledge of web services and REST, along with really nailing down two programming languages to work with. Potentially aiming to be a web service specialise, where I could utilise my uni knowledge and existing skills, by designing and building web services and related backend. The problem is, outside of my existing clients, I have no idea if there's a market for this, let alone enough to sustain me? My instincts tell me that web services/micro services are huge these days, but outside of really large organisations is there much of a need for them? Will I be able to find enough work to one, continue my existing level of pay, and two to build up more skills and experience. I'm posting here for some advice and pointers, and would appreciate any assistance.