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StackOverflow.com

Started by capn_midnight 10 replies 2.7k views
Original Post
capn_midnight
capn_midnight
Have any of you guys been following the development of StackOverflow.com? It is being marketed as a new type of programmer's website, a sort of compendium of articles, forums, and wikis, with the goal of creating a learning resource with quality content. It's mainly headed up by Joel Spolsky (of JoelOnSoftware.com) and Jeff Atwood (of CodingHorror.com). I'm not in on the beta, so I don't know what the site looks like yet. From listening to their podcasts, I'm... less than overwhelmed. They sound exactly like ever 15 year old kid we get in here wanting to make an MMORPG just as soon as he manages to figure out how to wrangle HTML+Variables. I haven't seen anything in their planning to show that it is going to be anything more than Slashdot+Wikipedia. Hell, they spend half their time talking about why they chose ASP.NET because people have been complaining about it not being PHP (before ever even seeing the site). Already, there are "religious wars" going on. I'm going to stop here, because I'm about to launch into a giant anti-Atwood rant. So anyway, anyone else following it?
Promit
Promit
Don't you rather dislike both Spolsky and Atwood? Or am I remembering that wrong? Just curious.

As for StackOverflow, nothing I've read on codinghorror suggested to me that I should actually care, so I didn't. It sounds like my gut instinct on that was not far off. Maybe they should've just made a programming superblog, with opinions reaching hurricane force levels.
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capn_midnight
capn_midnight
Quote:
Original post by Promit
Don't you rather dislike both Spolsky and Atwood? Or am I remembering that wrong? Just curious.
Spolsky is alright. He has very good ideas on project and company management, and an excellent ability to comb unrelated industries for management practices that could potentially be applied to software. His technical knowledge isn't as good as he seems to think, but that's okay, most managers are like that.

But you are correct, I can't stand Atwood. However, I hadn't learned of him until after I started following StackOverflow. It was along the lines of, "oh look, Joel is doing something new, and who is this Atwood guy?"

asp_
asp_
capn, Atwood hasn't claimed to really be an authority on much. He's just popular. Joel has achieved a bit more but there's a scent of hubris there as well.

As for StackOverflow, I didn't even know about it. Most of the stuff I read from Atwood and Spolsky comes to me via various social news sites. If the site is good I'll use it. There's so many sites launched daily that I'm inclined to wait before passing judgment, positive or negative. They're popular enough to gather some skilled people under the same roof.
curtmax_0
curtmax_0
Both have used ASP extensively in their companies, so it probably doesn't make sense for them to make the site with anything else. It's not a religious war, just common sense :P

But yeah, I'm not expecting much from stackoverflow. I thought it was a weird idea from the start. Jeff has some interesting tidbits from time-to-time, and Joel has some really interesting blog posts on management techniques and such. It's worth browsing through their stuff from time-to-time.
coldacid
coldacid
Quote:
Original post by AndreTheGiant
So you found a website on the internet that you are less than impressed with?

I don't get it, why does that need a thread?

QFT. If there was a thread for every website that at least one person wasn't impressed with, the web would implode.
bschneid
bschneid
Quote:
Original post by coldacid
Quote:
Original post by AndreTheGiant
So you found a website on the internet that you are less than impressed with?

I don't get it, why does that need a thread?

QFT. If there was a thread for every website that at least one person wasn't impressed with, the web would implode.

Yes, but with this being a programming site, and that site also being of the programming variety, I fail to see what is wrong with this thread.

That said, I've never heard of Atwood or Spolsky, but I Wikipedia'd them, and found this interesting tidbit about Spolsky: "He is the author of four books, including User Interface Design for Programmers and Smart and Gets Things Done; both of which he has dedicated to his boyfriend, Jared." :0
Driv3MeFar
Driv3MeFar
Quote:
Original post by bschneid
Quote:
Original post by coldacid
Quote:
Original post by AndreTheGiant
So you found a website on the internet that you are less than impressed with?

I don't get it, why does that need a thread?

QFT. If there was a thread for every website that at least one person wasn't impressed with, the web would implode.

Yes, but with this being a programming site, and that site also being of the programming variety, I fail to see what is wrong with this thread.


Agreed. StackOverflow is a programming specific (albeit non-game oriented) website being created by some fairly well known (though perhaps not well liked) programmers. Discussion of it is not unwarranted.
Colin Jeanne
Colin Jeanne
Quote:
Original post by bschneid
That said, I've never heard of Atwood or Spolsky, but I Wikipedia'd them, and found this interesting tidbit about Spolsky: "He is the author of four books, including User Interface Design for Programmers and Smart and Gets Things Done; both of which he has dedicated to his boyfriend, Jared." :0

I think more well known than his books are various entries from his blog such as the oft referenced The Absolute Minimum Every Software Engineer Should Know About Unicode and Character Sets (No Excuses!). In my opinion, he has some real gems that you should read.
Shannon Barber
Shannon Barber
I defy you all to conceive of something that exceeds the awe-not-in-a-good-way-inspiring boredom of podcast about programming.

Let me find my spoon.
The trade-off between price and quality does not exist in Japan. Rather, the idea that high quality brings on cost reduction is widely accepted.-- Tajima & Matsubara
Billr17
Billr17
Atwood quit his job to be a full time blogger and devote his time to StackOverflow.com.Choosing Your Own Adventure

Although I don't agree with every one of his posts, he does have a few interesting posts every once in a while.

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