What was your path to frontend development?
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My journey kicked-off while studying in high school, where I developed my very first website. Later, I completed the BSc programme of Informatics at the Kaunas University of Technology and joined Metasite in Vilnius. I’ve been successfully climbing my frontend & UI career here for 11 years now and counting!
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Why does frontend development tickle your fancy?
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Front-end development is very dynamic and always changing. I’ve got an opportunity to contribute to interesting projects, learn and improve myself continuously while working with the latest frameworks and tools, for example, we started using React Hooks in our newest projects just right after its release.

So, is it Angular or React?
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It all depends, really. I’ve got extensive experience with both frameworks, but it all usually drills down to your team, its experience and project requirements. React is the most popular library today and I highly recommend it. As it’s only the “view” in MVC, React gives you the flexibility to choose any libraries you want to work with. You can seamlessly use React for non-SPA websites as well (e.g. for complex and dynamic forms or wizards). Also, developers may spend more time writing JavaScript rather than worrying about the framework-specific code.
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What’s next on your “to learn” bucket list?
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As Javascript is everywhere today – on a client and backend side, when creating mobile applications, etc. – I’m planning to try out Node.js that allows boosting frontend application performance with server-side rendering amongst other benefits.

You’ve led the UI competence at Metasite for many years. What does this role entail?
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One of my duties is to always keep up to date with the latest trends, evaluate the changes among versions, choose the tools and libraries for frontend development. So, I’ve got an opportunity to make an impact on and influence bigger scale decisions. I’m also participating in meetups of UI engineers at Metasite, encouraging knowledge sharing among us and assisting the HR team during interviews with frontend developers.
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Who inspires you?
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Have you ever heard of Shai Reznik? He’s a developer, a blogger and a speaker. Shai always manages to provide with technical information in a new, interesting and fun way. Apparently, his ideas come from music, movies, theatre and improvisation shows. Check out a few of his talks on YouTube – I promise, you’ll get a good dose of humour 😉
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What music do you listen to while coding?
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Drum&Bass usually, because it helps me to keep a pulse while I’m working and concentrate on my tasks.

How does it feel to work in a diverse distributed team?

I’m currently working on a big scale project with an international team, spread throughout a few countries – Italians, developers from the Netherlands and Lithuanians who work with us from different locations. In my opinion, such a team enables knowledge sharing and helps us grow as individuals greatly, because we must align and agree on the code style (Prettier is a very useful tool here) as well as discuss the libraries and functionalities during daily stand-ups with the team.
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What does #metasitelife feel like for you?

It’s like a road trip with your friends – full of challenges and opportunities. You never know what’s waiting for you around the corner; new technology or a tool, a new project or a new colleague 😉

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