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Developer vs applications developer

The differences between developers and applications developers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 2-4 years to become both a developer and an applications developer. Additionally, a developer has an average salary of $100,076, which is higher than the $89,205 average annual salary of an applications developer.

The top three skills for a developer include javascript, python and java. The most important skills for an applications developer are java, javascript, and C++.

Developer vs applications developer overview

DeveloperApplications Developer
Yearly salary$100,076$89,205
Hourly rate$48.11$42.89
Growth rate21%21%
Number of jobs262,570279,877
Job satisfaction5-
Most common degreeBachelor's Degree, 71%Bachelor's Degree, 71%
Average age3939
Years of experience44

What does a developer do?

Developers are usually system or application developers in a company who work on specific projects related to networks or applications from conception to implementation. They attend planning sessions to ensure that the program is feasible. They are responsible for designing the system through coding and basic user interface design. They also work on troubleshooting any challenges that may be met at the testing stage of the program's development. They solve challenges and ensure that minimal problems will arise upon publishing the system or application. They also manage the evaluation to ensure that the program's goals are accomplished and that the end-users are satisfied with the results.

What does an applications developer do?

An application developer is responsible for creating program applications for devices based on clients' specifications and business needs. Application developers must have excellent knowledge of computer systems, as well as a strong command of programming languages to develop customized programs. Duties of an application developer also include running diagnostic tests to ensure the application's performance and stability, providing instruction manuals for reference, performing troubleshooting for any inconsistencies, upgrading design codes for optimization, and launching the application following the client's timetable.

Developer vs applications developer salary

Developers and applications developers have different pay scales, as shown below.

DeveloperApplications Developer
Average salary$100,076$89,205
Salary rangeBetween $76,000 And $131,000Between $67,000 And $118,000
Highest paying City-San Francisco, CA
Highest paying stateWashingtonWashington
Best paying company-Meta
Best paying industryFinanceFinance

Differences between developer and applications developer education

There are a few differences between a developer and an applications developer in terms of educational background:

DeveloperApplications Developer
Most common degreeBachelor's Degree, 71%Bachelor's Degree, 71%
Most common majorComputer ScienceComputer Science
Most common collegeMassachusetts Institute of TechnologyMassachusetts Institute of Technology

Developer vs applications developer demographics

Here are the differences between developers' and applications developers' demographics:

DeveloperApplications Developer
Average age3939
Gender ratioMale, 74.9% Female, 25.1%Male, 77.0% Female, 23.0%
Race ratioBlack or African American, 4.6% Unknown, 4.9% Hispanic or Latino, 8.4% Asian, 29.8% White, 52.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2%Black or African American, 4.4% Unknown, 4.8% Hispanic or Latino, 8.2% Asian, 29.9% White, 52.5% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2%
LGBT Percentage8%8%

Differences between developer and applications developer duties and responsibilities

Developer example responsibilities.

  • Manage continuous integration, configure the servers using Jenkins.
  • Analyze and manage the project throughout SDLC, written/review specification documents.
  • Configure and manage JGroup multicasting communication for apache tomcat web servers.
  • Upgrade internal loan and prospect tracking system to be more responsive and utilizing the latest in CSS & HTML.
  • Implement this application, using object-orient Perl to dynamically generate HTML with embed JavaScript, interacting with back-end databases via DBI/DBD.
  • Integrate content feeds via JSON, XML, and RSS from both internal and external sources into web content management components.
  • Show more

Applications developer example responsibilities.

  • Used to update issue tracker and manage code using version control system git.
  • Create UNIX shell scripts to automate the FTP process, handling of data discards, data errors, compliance errors etc.
  • Manage complete SDLC for development projects including gathering and determining business requirements.
  • Used AngularJS HTTP request to read data from web services and process JSON data to render in the UI.
  • Develop interfaces using JavaScript, HTML technologies for several web applications to fetch and graphically present require data from database.
  • Core service uses the main database and the other Microservices use their individual databases to access and store data.
  • Show more

Developer vs applications developer skills

Common developer skills
  • JavaScript, 7%
  • Python, 6%
  • Java, 6%
  • C++, 5%
  • API, 4%
  • CSS, 4%
Common applications developer skills
  • Java, 11%
  • JavaScript, 7%
  • C++, 6%
  • QA, 4%
  • Database, 4%
  • HTML, 4%

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