What I Learned in 90 Days as a Front‑End Intern at Alibaba

Preface

Today marks my 90th day as an intern at Alibaba. Inspired by senior articles, especially those by @于江水, I reflect on my growth and share insights from the perspective of a fresh graduate entering the workforce.

Origin

In 2020, the pandemic made the year unusual and pushed me to seek an internship during my junior year. I dreamed of working at a top tech company in a city I love. Due to pandemic policies, my previous employer halted office work in February, giving me time to review fundamentals and prepare for campus recruitment.

Through a community on 牛客, I connected with peers also preparing for interviews. I discovered a recruitment post for 淘系 and, with a senior's help, submitted my résumé.

After an initial screening, I interviewed with a friendly senior who asked both technical and personal questions, reinforcing my determination to join 淘系, the "strongest front‑end team in the Eastern Hemisphere".

Gathering

Subsequent interview rounds, including a cross‑team interview, focused on both technical depth and broader perspectives. Interviewers explored my understanding of front‑end trends, performance optimizations, and future plans, making the process feel like a learning exchange rather than a pure evaluation.

Although the company initially scheduled us to start in early April, policy changes forced a ticket refund. After a period of waiting, I briefly interned at 腾讯 before finally receiving Alibaba's offer.

Arriving in Hangzhou during the pandemic, I worked remotely from a hotel, later joining the bustling campus environment and meeting my mentors and teammates.

Growth

Interpersonal Skills

Integrating into a large team required proactive communication. I learned to seize opportunities to express myself during weekly meetings and team‑building activities, gradually becoming more confident in sharing ideas.

Technical Skills

淘系's ToC business primarily uses the cross‑platform framework Rax, which shares syntax with React. While the learning curve was gentle, I needed to master multiple internal development platforms, which was time‑consuming.

Debugging, consulting documentation, and seeking help from senior engineers helped resolve most issues. I also encountered challenges with legacy Weex pages, which require web‑first development before native adaptation.

Recently, Rax's mini‑program runtime was released, allowing direct Rax development for mini‑programs. Implementing this in a business project exposed many pitfalls, prompting me to seek guidance from teammates.

The scaffolding configuration of Rax is opaque, limiting customizations to exposed options. When encountering bugs, I often had to read source code of components or repositories, which was difficult due to limited experience.

Through this process I developed a systematic approach to debugging, documented recurring issues for teammates, and focused on writing low‑coupling, readable, and extensible code. I revisited design patterns, such as the Strategy pattern, to refactor unnecessary branching.

I also explored front‑end automated testing, Electron desktop app development, and the Rax/Weex architecture, broadening my technical horizon.

Business Skills

Understanding product and business requirements became essential. I realized that technical solutions must address real‑world pain points; otherwise, they add unnecessary overhead.

Reading @于江水's "Three Years of Front‑End at 淘系" reinforced the importance of business acumen for developers. I also discovered the ahooks library, which originated from business needs and proved highly useful.

By engaging with product teams, I learned to evaluate the necessity of features, estimate development timelines more accurately, and communicate technical trade‑offs effectively.

Other Aspects

My communication abilities improved, allowing me to articulate problems clearly and express opinions confidently. I also became better at estimating task durations based on complexity and potential obstacles.

Conclusion

These 90 days flew by, filled with team meals, activities, and valuable mentorship. I am grateful to my seniors for their guidance, which boosted my confidence in handling projects and estimating timelines.

Despite some anxieties about conversion and upcoming recruitment cycles, I remain hopeful and encourage fellow interns and job seekers to persevere and aim for their desired offers.