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Professional coding
Launched: Software Development
I realise that there is already a site which has a stunning amount of material, it would be difficult for anyone to seriously compete with that site. However I (and quite a few others) have decided we don't want to post or answer on that site for reasons I think everyone understands.
This has put me in a bit of a difficult position as I would like to contribute somewhere. Theres no serious competitor (imo) to the other site, and from a workflow perspective not being able to post anywhere at all isn't great for me (even if no one answers a question its still worth writing).
I would like to propose that we add a coding site and see what happens.
I don't think we would be canonical in the same way as the other site, but that doesn't mean there wouldn't be a community.
1 answer
(Moving this here from another proposal; I forgot about this one and it fits better here.)
Discussion here and elsewhere led me to ask How should we approach a programming site or sites?. It currently has 21 upvotes and several answers, which I'll take as interest.
There's a lot of discussion there of one site versus several. Here is what I wrote in a recent answer there (click through for the full answer):
Create a single Software Development site, planning from the start for spinoffs. Here's how I see that working:
First, I said "software development", not "programming", because we're not an SO clone and don't need to do exactly what they did (as pointed out here). I'm proposing a broad scope -- code questions, software design, architecture, process, tools, the works. In time that will get large and subcommunities with more-specific interests (like web development or C++ or machine learning) might feel lost in the larger community. That's an issue at SO, and "afterthought" specialized sites face challenges because their topics are also still on-topic on SO. We need a better strategy for subcommunities that want to get a place of their own. But it doesn't seem like there's a lot of interest in creating a bunch of small, specialized sites from the beginning and running the risk of falling below critical mass.
[... mechanics of how we could plan for spinoffs from the start ...]
This approach lets us start with one general site while supporting specialized communities as they emerge. I don't think any of us can accurately say what specialized programming communities will exist in a year, so let's focus on a framework that lets them develop naturally while also having a home for the many other questions that aren't specific to a tech stack or language.
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