Project Technical Lead
IT skills, frameworks and tools to take your Java career to the next level
In today’s fast-paced IT world, staying one step ahead is not only an advantage, it’s a necessity. The world of technology is like a fast-moving river, and to navigate it successfully, you need to continually hone your skills and dynamically adapt to changes in the current. This attitude is especially true for Java developers who want to take their careers to the next level.
Java, with its reliable, versatile and platform-independent nature, has remained a cornerstone of the IT industry for decades. However, the key to success in this highly competitive industry is not just mastering Java itself, but also developing a broader portfolio of IT skills that complement and extend your expertise. This article is your compass to guide you through new IT skills on the horizon that can take your Java career to the next level.
The value of continuous learning should not be underestimated. Every line of code you write, every bug you fix, and every new skill you learn is an investment in your professional growth. (Read our previous article Practical tips and tricks for programming). Remember that the IT industry is an area of unlimited possibilities, where innovation and customisation are the gateway to success. And it is success that gives us the strength to overcome all the pitfalls that prevent us from constantly improving and reaching that much desired new level.
In addition, there is an undeniable financial incentive to improve in the IT field that we all love so much. Companies around the world are constantly on the lookout for top professionals and are willing to offer premium salaries to those who have the skills that will make or keep them ahead of the technological curve. By learning new IT skills, you’ll not only increase your chances of getting a job, but you’ll also open the door to better-paying positions and career progression.
Although our blog is mainly dedicated to Java topics, we at msg life Slovakia are big fans of new IT technologies, a few of which we will try to introduce to you. If you get a job with us (see our latest job offers), you’ll be able to meet many of them in person.
It’s time to seize the opportunity, embrace new challenges and embark on the path to an information-packed and financially motivating career in Java with these new IT skills. Let’s get on with it!
Spring Framework
There is no doubt that Spring Framework is among employers’ highly preferred skills for Java developers. Spring Framework is a popular framework for developing applications in Java. It is characterized as a comprehensive, easily extensible and flexible tool that provides solutions for many aspects of software development. The framework facilitates the creation of reliable, powerful and easy-to-maintain applications and offers a wide range of features, including Inversion of Control, Dependency Injection, Transaction Management, aspect-oriented programming, Spring Data module and many more. The Spring Framework is often the building block of many modern Java applications and is known for its ability to simplify development and increase the efficiency of software projects. The current version is 6.0.
Git
It was first introduced in 2005 by Linus Torvalds during the development of the Linux kernel. Git is an open-source distributed system version control tool that easily handles everything from small to large projects. Most organizations and individuals want the functionality, performance, security, and flexibility that Git provides. It’s also a useful DevOps tool for distributed version control. GIT is the basis of many services we’re familiar with, such as Github and GitLab (Read our article Git vs. GitHub vs. GitLab). The best thing about Git is that you can use it every day without having to pay, thanks to the GPL licence. For its users, it provides a cloning feature that can be used to distribute an entire project to another computer if needed, making it easier for the development team to scale.
SQL
SQL stands for Structured Query Language. It is a database language that was introduced in the 1970s. years for database management. Through SQL, the user can manipulate and retrieve data stored in a relational database. SQL is used to insert, delete, modify or create any data. It should be emphasized that SQL is a query language, not a DB system. SQL is mainly used by professionals to process data in relational database management systems.
JUnit
JUnit is a comprehensive Java testing framework that is a key tool for developers to ensure the reliability, functionality and quality of their software. It is characterized as an automated testing tool that allows developers to create and run tests for different parts of their applications.
JUnit offers a simple, declarative way to define tests, allowing developers to verify that individual pieces of their code (units) are working correctly. This framework provides assert methods for evaluating expected results against actual ones, allowing errors and problems in development to be detected as early as possible.
JUnit is an important tool for practicing Test-Driven Development and ensuring that changes to code do not break existing functionality. It is an essential tool for developers who want to achieve a high level of quality and stability in their Java applications through systematic and automated testing.
Hibernate
Hibernate is a powerful framework for mapping objects to relational databases in Java. Its main goal is to simplify the interaction between the application and the database, allowing developers to work with Java objects instead of working directly with SQL queries.
It is characterized as an object-relational mapping(ORM) tool that offers a convenient and abstract way of working with data in a database. Hibernate allows you to define mapping relationships between objects and tables in the database, which simplifies data manipulation and eliminates the need to manually write SQL queries.
This framework also offers features such as transaction management, data caching, fault tolerance, and optimizations for efficient data access. It is widely used in application projects, where it is necessary to work efficiently and reliably with the database. Hibernate is thus an important tool in the Java ecosystem for developers who want to increase productivity and reduce complexity when working with data in relational databases.
SOA
SOA, also known as Service Orientation Architecture, can be defined as an approach of reusing software components through service interfaces. These interfaces use common communication protocols that allow them to quickly integrate into new applications without requiring extensive integration each time. Service interfaces can be called without knowing how the integration works. Standard network protocols, such as Simple Object Access Protocol ( SOAP ), are used to deliver read or change requests to services. Services are released in a form that makes it easy for developers to identify and reuse them in new applications. With the help of SOA, the complexity of the project can be easily managed.
Microservices
Java microservices are a collection of small software applications implemented in the Java programming language that work together to create a larger solution. Its architecture is similar to a factory assembly line, with each microservice serving as a station along the line. Microservices are increasingly common in the software development world as developers strive to create larger, more efficient software that can be better built and managed as a set of smaller services that work together to provide a richer set of capabilities for the entire application. The best thing about microservices is that you can easily build a comprehensive application with these small individual programs – microservices.
Apache Kafka
Apache Kafka is a highly scalable and distributed message processing system that has become a key player in event and message processing within modern IT solutions. It is characterized as a reliable and robust data flow tool that enables efficient real-time processing of large volumes of events.
Kafka is known for its ability to move data between applications and systems within a large organization or even across the Internet. This is achieved through message queuing and publish-subscribe, which enables fast, reliable and distributed data exchange between different software components.
This tool is often used to solve problems related to real-time event analysis, traffic monitoring, log analysis, and many other applications. Its features such as fault tolerance, horizontal scalability and efficient management make it an essential tool for modern software development and data analytics in complex and large-scale IT ecosystems.
Cloud Computing
The term cloud is commonly used to refer to software or services that are accessed over the Internet. And in a similar context, cloud computing is (virtual) computing that provides shared processing resources and data to computers and other devices on demand. When you check your emails or search the web as a regular user, you’re taking advantage of several cloud options. In these situations, the processing technology happens in remote locations and is not visible to users. There are many examples, such as Dropbox, Google Drive – all enabled by the cloud.
Elasticsearch
Elasticsearch is a powerful and highly scalable analytics and search tool that is characterized by fast and flexible processing of large volumes of data. It is characterized as a distributed system for the management and retrieval of structured and unstructured data, which is the basis for a variety of applications, including search, analysis, monitoring and more.
Elasticsearch uses indexing and leverages full-text search to efficiently and quickly find data in huge files. This tool is known for its ability to automatically scale and distribute data to multiple servers, ensuring high performance and availability for large application projects.
With its rich data analytics capabilities, Elasticsearch is often used to solve problems related to infrastructure monitoring, logs, website search, and user data analysis. It is an essential tool in big data processing that helps organizations extract value from their information sources and improve decision-making through fast and efficient search and analysis.
Docker
Docker is a revolutionary containerization tool that enables developers and IT professionals to package, distribute, and run applications in isolated environments called containers. It is characterized as an easy-to-use and scalable tool that simplifies the development, deployment and management of applications.
With Docker, you can create containers that contain all the necessary dependencies and components for your application, ensuring consistency between development, test and production environments. This tool enables fast and reliable deployment of applications to different platforms, all without incompatibilities or conflicts between packages.
Docker is an essential tool for modern software development and automated deployment. It helps reduce the time it takes to build and run applications, increasing developer efficiency and ensuring that applications are easily portable and scalable. With Docker, you can respond quickly to changing demands and simplify infrastructure management, increasing productivity and reliability of IT projects.
