ENGINEERING ROLES

FDE vs software developer

Quick answer

A developer builds to a specification handed down; an FDE helps write that specification with the customer and then builds and deploys it.

	SOFTWARE DEVELOPER	FORWARD DEPLOYED ENGINEER
MAIN OUTPUT	Features and applications to a spec	A working deployment inside one customer's systems
CLIENT TIME	Much lower than an FDE	High: discovery, demos and handover every week
WRITES PRODUCTION CODE	Yes	Yes
PAY	See FDE salary in India for bands by experience and city.

Learning how the customer's work really happens before building anything.

How systems talk to each other over HTTP.

Documentation that a customer team can run without you.