Early Start, Continuous Learning. The Artisan of the Day Is Diana Scharf.
Diana Scharf, better known as "Di" in the Laravel community, started her coding journey at just 11 years old with PHP4. Today, she's a full-stack developer at Beyond Code, working on tools like Laravel Herd, Tinkerwell, and other products that thousands of developers rely on daily.
Diana calls herself the "Fullstack-Witch" and is the founder of the open source team 5amco.de, with a mission "to transform the dev space into a more welcoming, open-minded place for everyone."
From PHP4 to AI Integration
"I started PHP when I was 11 years old. So very, very early. Laravel didn’t exist then," Diana explains. Her professional Laravel journey began at her first job after university at a small agency, where she learned the framework while working on various projects.
In 2021, she joined Beyond Code, where she now works on exciting AI integrations and other developer tools. "With all the AI stuff coming into the scene, extending Herd and Tinkerwell to match developers' workflow with AI is very exciting to see," she says. She's particularly enthusiastic about Laravel Boost: "I just started playing around with it and I am especially excited about the guidelines: they improve Laravel development a lot."
A Tech Stack for Modern Laravel Development
Diana's current tech stack reflects the latest Laravel ecosystem trends. She's "a big fan of Inertia" with Vue 3, having adopted TypeScript two years ago. "I really like the integration, it feels so intuitive," she notes. For styling, she combines Tailwind with ShadCN: "I still like Tailwind UI a lot, but whenever I want a bit of a different look, I go with shadcn."
Community Champion
Diana also shares her knowledge as a frequent speaker at conferences around the world and mentors women in tech. She's attended around 10 Laravel events, with Laracon EU in Lisbon being her favorite: "It had such a great vibe. You get away from cold and dark Germany in January to sunny Portugal."
Diana's passion for the Laravel community runs deep, particularly around inclusivity. "I think the Laravel community is very unique because everyone is welcoming and open and curious about whatever else everyone does. Especially as a woman, I still belong to a minority and it’s great that the Laravel team is so keen on making Larabelles a bigger thing in the community."
She appreciates the balance of technical excellence and human connection at conferences: "We connect on more than just technology here. We also have deep talks about life. But of course, we’re developers, so we are always curious about technology and moving things forward, making a developing experience that's better for everyone."
Practical Dev Advice: Just Ship
Diana's advice to new developers comes from experience: "I think it's important to get a good foundation, but I know that it's kind of a trap sometimes that you learn and learn and learn, and just don’t start building things. You follow all the tutorials and videos, but in reality, you learn how to use something when you just build something with it."
Her philosophy on mistakes reflects her growth mindset: "I still make plenty of mistakes each day, but it's such an empowering feeling to learn from your mistake and to know that you learned something, you've made something better, and this won't happen again. So my advice is: just start building things and don't be afraid to make mistakes."
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