Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

StackOverflow For Any Topic

Posted by kdawson on from the let-a-thousand-faqs-bloom dept.

RobinH writes "StackOverflow, the successful question-and-answer website for programmers, is now over a year old and its top user has just passed 100,000 reputation points. Now one of the creators of StackOverflow, Joel Spolsky, and his company Fog Creek, are developing a software-as-a-service form of the StackOverflow engine called StackExchange to support any topic you want. The software is currently in private beta, but the first few beta sites have surfaced. Topics include business travel, the home, parenthood, the environment, finance, and iPhone game development."

149 of 191 comments (clear)

  1. Joel, uhg.. by RingDev · · Score: 5, Insightful

    While I wholey appreciate the community and efforts of people involved in StackOverflow, I believe that Joel is subject to entirely too much fanfair and hero worship. I'd line him up right next to Dvorak in the grouping of "Right about as often as the sun shines on my dog's ass."

    -Rick

    --
    "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    1. Re:Joel, uhg.. by schon · · Score: 2, Funny

      "Right about as often as the sun shines on my dog's ass."

      So... at least twice a day then? Or is your dog toilet trained? Normal people don't force their dogs to wear pants in public, or indeed at all.

      Maybe he's from England... in which case his dog could be outside 24/7 and it would still be only once or twice a year. :)

    2. Re:Joel, uhg.. by Achromatic1978 · · Score: 2, Informative
      Personally, what I got the biggest laugh at is that, just like Fog Creek's other software, they're wanting ridiculous amounts of money for this code. Hosted? On a shared server? 10 million page views a month (Random page on Stack Overflow, 20KB, so in other words, about 200GB)? How much would you pay? For this forum / QA software?

      With Stack Exchange? A THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH.

      Wow. Just wow. Really, Joel? You think your software is worth that much?

      Or hey, you could use it on your own server. If you're willing to pay TWO AND A HALF THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH...

    3. Re:Joel, uhg.. by Timothy+Brownawell · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Personally, what I got the biggest laugh at is that, just like Fog Creek's other software, they're wanting ridiculous amounts of money for this code. Hosted? On a shared server? 10 million page views a month (Random page on Stack Overflow, 20KB, so in other words, about 200GB)? How much would you pay? For this forum / QA software?

      With Stack Exchange? A THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH.

      Wow. Just wow. Really, Joel? You think your software is worth that much?

      Or hey, you could use it on your own server. If you're willing to pay TWO AND A HALF THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH...

      Wow, that is rediculous. Why, it's almost as much as a single MSDN subscription or an Oracle license (assuming I actually read that mess properly).

    4. Re:Joel, uhg.. by Achromatic1978 · · Score: 1

      Wow, that is rediculous. Why, it's almost as much as a single MSDN subscription or an Oracle license (assuming I actually read that mess properly).

      Leaving aside the odd choice of comparisons, "No. It ain't." A single MSDN subscription is $1,199 for the first YEAR, $799 for every YEAR after that. Running a site on StackExchange can be a thousand dollars a MONTH.

      Basic math, you fail it.

    5. Re:Joel, uhg.. by lysergic.acid · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Clearly you're not very familiar with "enterprice" software. Magento, which is a solid open source e-commerce solution but nothing more, costs $8900+ a year ($11,125 for the average deployment) just to license—no hosting. That's the whole idea of free market capitalism. What something is worth doesn't necessarily correlate to how much effort was put into creating it, its material/resource costs, its usefulness, or any other inherent value it has; instead, it is simply how much you can get others to pay you for it.

      The cost of natural diamonds versus synthetic diamonds, for example, has nothing to do with any intrinsic value, nor can it be justified by its artificial scarcity (as used diamonds sell for far under market prices, but are purchased back from consumers by diamond distributors like De Beers, who turn around and repackage/resell it at market prices once again).

      I mean, isn't the objective of every good businessman to buy for as low as possible and sell for as high as possible?

    6. Re:Joel, uhg.. by Jurily · · Score: 2, Insightful

      A single MSDN subscription is $1,199 for the first YEAR, $799 for every YEAR after that. Running a site on StackExchange can be a thousand dollars a MONTH.

      That said, a StackExchange site likely serves more than one person.

    7. Re:Joel, uhg.. by Stiletto · · Score: 1

      Didn't he just have another Slashdot appearance a few days ago, telling us all how great "Duct Tape" programmers (or "sloppy programmers" as I call them) are and how those stupid disciplined software designers and architects were wasting their time?

      Meh... I think I'll take my software advice from someone else, thank you.

    8. Re:Joel, uhg.. by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      But this website is just like an Iphone (see above), and it's far more expensive than even the costly Iphone! You'd be much better off just getting an Iphone than this website.

    9. Re:Joel, uhg.. by ergo98 · · Score: 1

      Or hey, you could use it on your own server. If you're willing to pay TWO AND A HALF THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH...

      Joel talked about this strategy once before. The idea was something like "we aren't ready to support that model, however let's post a ridiculous price just in case someone is really motivated". Not only does it add credibility to the "StackOverflow is super valuable" idea, but maybe one day someone will send in a yearly check for $30,000 and they can pay an intern to make the install packages and documentation, etc.

  2. They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Anyone remember the short lived Ask Slashdot section on sex? No one had any answers, so they had to shut it down.

    1. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Anyone remember the short lived Ask Slashdot section on sex? No one had any answers, so they had to shut it down.

      Hell, I don't think anyone here had enough information on the subject to even come up with a specific question!

    2. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Anyone remember the short lived Ask Slashdot section on sex? No one had any answers, so they had to shut it down.

      Hell, I don't think anyone here had enough information on the subject to even come up with a specific question!

      Except: "where do babies come from?"

    3. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by T-Bone-T · · Score: 1

      Even then, the question wasn't asked that well. I believe it went something like:

      "How is babby formed?"

    4. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      What is girl? Correct Slashdot joke: "What is a female port connector named for?"

    5. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by Plunky · · Score: 1

      what are babies anyway?

    6. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by Philip_the_physicist · · Score: 1

      Babies are those one step on the intelligence scale above lusers.

    7. Re:They tried this with Ask Slashdot... by AniVisual · · Score: 1

      Ew. Tasteless.

  3. Good job, too by shmert · · Score: 3, Informative

    StackOverflow is really impressive, and useful. I find myself adding "site:stackoverflow.com" to google queries when I'm troubleshooting some code problem. If there's an answer on there, it's almost always better than the answers on other sites. With none of the horrible multi-page answers, scribd paper, navigation hell that plagues other sites.

    Great idea to branch this into other areas, but I wonder how many dedicated users you'll see like jon skeet when it comes to a parenthood advice website.

    --
    You drank my drink, you drunk!
    1. Re:Good job, too by larry+bagina · · Score: 1

      skeet and parenthood? LOL

      For those who don't know, "skeet" is the "pull and shoot" method of birth control, if you get my drift,

      --
      Do you even lift?

      These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

    2. Re:Good job, too by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Great idea to branch this into other areas, but I wonder how many dedicated users you'll see like jon skeet when it comes to a parenthood advice website.

      If parenting websites are any indication: a lot. There are many people in knowledge domains that are as dedicated to their chosen pursuit as hard core programmers are to theirs. It's just easy for us to forget that machines can be used for other things despite our jobs being about making them do other things.

    3. Re:Good job, too by Darkness404 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      However, the difference is programmers usually know how to -ask- questions that make sense to other programmers. Look at http://answers.yahoo.com/ for a moment, most of the questions there are either A) Obvious "do my homework for me" questions, B) badly worded questions or C) Simply stupid questions. Also, most programming questions are easy, either it works or it doesn't, on the other hand how exactly do you define "how hard it is to open a liquor store in Texas"? Its easy to answer programming questions because its very easy to figure out if it works, but parenting advice? You won't see the results of that for years down the line (if even that) and its impossible to determine what exactly went wrong/right.

      --
      Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
    4. Re:Good job, too by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      It should be interesting to see how well or how badly such a system will handle questions on topics such as parenting. It seems to me that parenting advice is less like programming, where there's often clear right and wrong answers, and more like religion where the right answer competes against everybody else's right answer. It seems like the perfect environment in which to observe that the wisdom of crowds also has its antithesis: the stupidity of crowds.

    5. Re:Good job, too by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      In many disciplines people don't ask questions to find the direct answer of how to do something. Especially in parenthood, people ask questions to find out their options and to get other people's opinions. Then they'll consider what they've heard and come up with their own result.

      Actually, with regards to programming, I find the more interesting questions on the net to not be, 'how do I do X' but rather, 'which is a better way of doing X, Y or Z (or N)' as they seem to spark more debate and thought.

    6. Re:Good job, too by Darkness404 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      We like to think that way, but look at Yahoo Answers or WikiAnswers, they don't really work that way. Most people don't want a thought out answer unfortunately. They want to ask for X and hear X.

      --
      Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
    7. Re:Good job, too by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 1

      I just wish it didn't rely on OpenID. A technology I loathe. LOATHE!

      --
      Comment of the year
    8. Re:Good job, too by Frankenshteen · · Score: 1

      At a glance the site is a little crowded. Something more akin to visual thesaurus.

      --
      "It's a doughnut stuffed with M&M's. That way when you finish the doughnut, you don't have to eat any M&M's."
    9. Re:Good job, too by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1

      However, the difference is programmers usually know how to -ask- questions that make sense to other programmers.

      You must be new on StackOverflow... ~

      Seriously, though, for about 50% of SO questions, I have to post a comment that specifically lists clarifications needed before the question can be answered - a very typical example is when people post 2 pages of (ususally incomplete) code with a comment "this doesn't work, please help!" - and no explanation of what the code is actually supposed to do, what implementation they're using (for C/C++ and the likes, where it actually matters), etc.

      Ironically, sometimes it is still possible to answer such questions by guessing (also known as "using my psychic powers", the term I believe introduced by Raymond Chen on his blog), simply because they're those of a kind that's being repeatedly asked roughly twice a week, and the problem is always the same.

    10. Re:Good job, too by simoncpu+was+here · · Score: 1

      How is babby formed?

      They need to do way instain mother> who kill thier babbys. becuse these babby cant frigth back it was on the news this mroing a mother in ar who had kill her three kids . they are taking the three babby back to new york too lady to rest my pary are with the father who lost his chrilden ; i am truley sorry for your lots

      Yeah, StackOverflow for any topic might be a good idea.

    11. Re:Good job, too by slim · · Score: 1

      However, the difference is programmers usually know how to -ask- questions that make sense to other programmers.

      Fairly often on SO, you get badly constructed questions. Sometimes the questions go unanswered. But often something like this happens:

        - users comment on the question (rather than leave an answer) asking for clarification
        - the original questioner fixes up his question, based on the queries
        - OR a 'senior' user (anyone who's gained enough rep points) fixes up the question
        - With the question clarified, the answering can begin.

    12. Re:Good job, too by Skapare · · Score: 1

      500 passwords in my encrypted password file, with an automated program that picks the right one for the site I go to and logs me in, after having entered my encryption passphrase once each time the password daemon restarts, is very easy to handle. Now, 5000000000 passwords, that might be a bit taxing on the resources. But even so, that's just a Berkeley DB file, with the records decrypted when needed.

      OpenID isn't the only solution around. It's just the one being promoted because businesses like sticking their hands in things. Had a company like Microsoft made this, it would certainly not have a way to run your own OpenID server. At least we can do that for those that don't want some company to see what other sites we log in to. But if we had the above tied directly into the browser, then we wouldn't have the issues we have with either a massive number of separate logins or OpenID's dependence on servers.

      --
      now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
    13. Re:Good job, too by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      So don't use it then...

    14. Re:Good job, too by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      Tell me, do you have a separate email account for every person you want to email, to avoid a "single point of failure"?

      That's how it could have been, if email servers worked like websites, in that if you were on one server, and someone else was on another, you'd need to sign up for a new account on the other server.

      OpenID is simply to make using webforums comparable to email and Jabber. It's like Jabber for IM, but for webforums instead. You don't hear people saying "But Jabber is a single point of failure, if they access my Jabber password, they can talk to all of my friends instead of just some of them!"

    15. Re:Good job, too by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      The main advantage of OpenID is not remembering passwords, in my opinion, but the faff of signing up for an account in the first place. If I'm just passing and want to leave a comment on a forum, blog, news article, it's annoying if I have to sign up for an account just to leave one comment - most likely I don't bother.

      For people who want to use more extensive features of a site, the intention is still that people get a proper account (e.g., consider LiveJournal, which invented OpenID: OpenID users can post comments and be given access to friends-only posts, but they can't write their own journal). Given that it's not even intended for things like having a journal, it should be obvious that it wasn't intended for bank accounts (the usual straw man argument that people make against it).

      It's just the one being promoted because businesses like sticking their hands in things. Had a company like Microsoft made this, it would certainly not have a way to run your own OpenID server.

      Well yes, this is why OpenID is comparable to something like Jabber, as opposed to Passport or MSN. I don't get why OpenID is so misunderstood here, when people seem to support things like Jabber and indeed email, which have the same "single point of failure" issue. I don't see why "But someone could post using your Slashdot and your LiveJournal" is anymore of a flaw than "But someone could gain email/IM access to all your friends, no matter what server they use".

    16. Re:Good job, too by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 1

      The problem is as follows:

      Let's say I sign up to StackOverflow using a OpenID from LiveJournal, since you used that example. I post to StackOverflow faithfully for years, I build up an impressive back-log of comments, and I have tons of reputation points, and all the other stuff StackOverflow will save for me attached to that LiveJournal OpenID.

      Now three years pass. LiveJournal takes a look at their infrastructure and says to themselves, "hm. We're spending a lot of money on these OpenID servers, and it gives us no benefit." They discontinue the service, LiveJournal is no longer an OpenID provider. I can open a new OpenID account, but there's no way to "merge" the data from the two accounts into a single one. (Like you can with, for example, Microsoft's Passport.)

      What happens to my StackOverflow account? It's completely inaccessible! I can't log in anymore! My only option is to create a new account. But I can't even use the same name as the old account because it's still in-use by my old account!

      My StackOverflow data can be made useless by a party other than me or StackOverflow!

      In short, I'd much rather trust my StackOverflow data with StackOverflow, than trusting it to a completely unrelated third party like LiveJournal, or Yahoo, or some other OpenID provider. I don't see why StackOverflow can't just offer a normal username/password, and also allow OpenIDs as an option-- you know like every single other site on the web that uses OpenID.

      --
      Comment of the year
    17. Re:Good job, too by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 1

      I don't.

      But I'd like to use the site, not being able to use the site because of the *log in* technology is fucking stupid. Why can't they just offer a username/password like every other site on the web? (Even those that also allow OpenID?)

      --
      Comment of the year
    18. Re:Good job, too by GameboyRMH · · Score: 1

      You win five Internets, sir!

      http://www.somethingawful.com/flash/shmorky/babby.swf

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    19. Re:Good job, too by logixoul · · Score: 1

      not being able to use the site

      Er, how are you "not able to use" the site?

      Damn. I'm feeding a troll...

  4. A compelling need? by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 1

    Joel Spolsky, and his company Fog Creek, are developing a software-as-a-service form of the StackOverflow engine called StackExchange to support any topic you want.

    There are already many BB and wiki systems available. By the way, a little obvious on the Slashvert.

    --
    If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
    1. Re:A compelling need? by MBCook · · Score: 4, Informative

      Have you used Stack Overflow? It's quite different from a Wiki, and is much more focused than a bulliten board. The ability to rate questions and answers makes it much easier to find good responses than generic phpBB sites.

      --
      Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
    2. Re:A compelling need? by belmolis · · Score: 1

      So, how does it differ from Ask Slashdot?

    3. Re:A compelling need? by jjohnson · · Score: 5, Funny

      The posters at Stack Overflow know what they're talking about.

      --
      Anyone who loves or hates any language, platform, or manufacturer, doesn't know what they're talking about.
    4. Re:A compelling need? by seifried · · Score: 4, Informative

      You get useful answers that actually help.

    5. Re:A compelling need? by Sancho · · Score: 1

      You can edit your replies, and people don't complain that you're asking them how to do your job.

    6. Re:A compelling need? by easyTree · · Score: 1

      Obviously anyone who likes cake is being paid to like cake.

      --
      Requiem for the American Dream
    7. Re:A compelling need? by noundi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The mods at Stack Overflow know what they're talking about.

      Fixed it for ya.

      --
      I am the lawn!
    8. Re:A compelling need? by i.of.the.storm · · Score: 1

      Yeah, the mods here are really WTFing me right now. The three posts in this thread talking about why SO is better than Ask /. are all modded funny. But also, it's much easier to navigate SO looking for answers than /..

      --
      All your base are belong to Wii.
    9. Re:A compelling need? by harlows_monkeys · · Score: 1

      Are you auditioning for a "Bing" commercial?

    10. Re:A compelling need? by slim · · Score: 3, Informative

      So, how does it differ from Ask Slashdot?

      Mostly, it's the economy of reputation points and badges (sort of like Xbox Live achievements).

      People get the warm and fuzzies just from having a score, and SO uses that instinct in all sorts of ways, to promote good questions, good answers, the refinement of good answers, and the sorting of good answers to the top.

      It also helps that it's very useable. For example, the post markup language is pretty much perfect for the purpose (making it very easy to include code snippets with syntax highlighting)

    11. Re:A compelling need? by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      We have mods? I thought they'd now been replaced with a random number generator...

  5. How very random. by stevey · · Score: 5, Funny

    It is good to know that the parenting forum is asking the most important questions.

    1. Re:How very random. by sayfawa · · Score: 1

      I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not. But yes, it is good to know that parents are trying to do the right thing.

      Although, I can't help but to feel a little scorn for them for not knowing the answer in the first place :)

      --
      Free the Quark 3 from asymptotic confinement! Bring your charm! Don't get down! All colours and flavours welcome!
    2. Re:How very random. by noundi · · Score: 1

      It is good to know that the parenting forum is asking the most important questions.

      What's even more funny is that there is no single answer that isn't a serious one. If it was slashdot however... let's just say the first answer would involve a man whos rectum is severly dialated.

      --
      I am the lawn!
  6. 100,000 reputation points? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    over a year old and its top user has just passed 100,000 reputation points.

    That can't be right. I've been posting on 4chan for years and I don't have 1 reputation point, let alone 100,000.

  7. I don't get it by Dr.+Evil · · Score: 1, Insightful

    First, I never heard of the site before. Is it really popular? Am I just out of the loop? It's not come up in my daily searches for technical info.

    I mean, it looks good, like somebody finally created a replacement for the community in usenet and what Expertsexchange was before they turned into a nag-site. It's not original, just re-creating stuff which was destroyed in the past by spammers and misguided business models

    But looking closer, it seems to be a showcase for their business selling the software to run the site. Could it really be any different?

    This is the most obvious Slashvertisement I've ever seen.

    1. Re:I don't get it by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 1

      Never seen it come up in a google search.. maybe it's got its niche..

      Usenet beats any of these sites anyway - there's decades of experience on that.

    2. Re:I don't get it by Blackeagle_Falcon · · Score: 1

      But looking closer, it seems to be a showcase for their business selling the software to run the site.

      StackOverflow has been running for over a year, long before Jeff and Joel thought about selling hosted version. StackExchange is basically a way to shut up everyone who kept asking for a "Stack Overflow on Topic X".

    3. Re:I don't get it by D+Ninja · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Never seen it come up in a google search.. maybe it's got its niche..

      Usenet beats any of these sites anyway - there's decades of experience on that.

      No, it doesn't always come up in Google search (try searching with site:stackoverflow.com in your programming searches, though), because that is Google's algorithm. As far as a programming/technical site, though, Stackoverflow (and its sister sites; serverfault.com (for admin/IT questions) and superuser.com (for general computer use questions)) is a *wonderful* resource. Don't knock it until you try it.

      As for your comment about Usenet, I do agree that there is a myriad of experience on there. Nowhere else are you going to see the beginnings of Linux and quite a bit of discussion on other technologies. BUT - Stackoverflow is current, its well moderated (by a user-community) and has some extremely knowledgeable and thoughtful people on its site to help out.

      I disagree with the GP post that is simply a Slashvertisement. I wish someone had told me about the site sooner.

    4. Re:I don't get it by bigbird · · Score: 1

      Yes, it's popular, and yes, you must be out of the loop.

      Post any technical question and you'll normally get a number of very useful replies within 24 hours.

      --
      Great Windows SFTP Server!
    5. Re:I don't get it by Timothy+Brownawell · · Score: 2, Informative

      Slightly offtopic, but does anyone else read expertsexchange as Expert Sex Change?

      Yes, that's why they hyphenated the name. They did that was a while ago, I think slightly after Pen Island sprang up.

    6. Re:I don't get it by Scrameustache · · Score: 1

      First, I never heard of the site before. Is it really popular? Am I just out of the loop?

      Well, it made slashdot, I can't decide if that's popular or unpopular.

      How many nerds does it take to make something popular? It's got to be a few orders of magnitude more than how many hot babes... toughy. If only there was a place where I could ask that question.

      --

      You can't take the sky from me...

    7. Re:I don't get it by MartinSchou · · Score: 1

      TherapistFinder decided to use CamelCase on their name ... I do have to wonder how many inquiries they get from stupid police offiers hoping it's TheRapistFinder.com

    8. Re:I don't get it by gbjbaanb · · Score: 1

      This is the most obvious Slashvertisement I've ever seen.

      So much so that my company's 'Smartfilter' spam filter has it listed as spam already!

      "You cannot access the following Web address:
      http://www.stackexchange.com/

      The site you requested is blocked under the following categories: Spam URLs"

    9. Re:I don't get it by denzel · · Score: 1

      http://expert-sex-change.com/

  8. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by SilverHatHacker · · Score: 1

    Yeah, but just picture being able to put "100,000 StackOverflow points" on your resume!

    --
    Funny may not give karma, but +5 Informative never made anyone snort coffee out their nose.
  9. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    You would have a point, except StackOverflow provides dumps of their databases in XML format and under a public license.

  10. yahoo answers by RiotingPacifist · · Score: 1

    I thought yahoo answers was where you could ask any question and get a well thought out informative response?

    --
    IranAir Flight 655 never forget!
  11. Yahoo! Answers by phantomcircuit · · Score: 1

    WOW WHAT A GREAT IDEA!

    THAT WONT BE OVERRUN BY COMPLETE MORONS!1!!!

    </sarcasm> morons... do they seriously think this is going to be more effective thank yahoo answers?

    1. Re:Yahoo! Answers by seifried · · Score: 4, Informative

      Yes, because until you interact with the community and earn points it's hard to make an asshat of yourself. I recommend you watch "Learning from StackOverflow": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWHfY_lvKIQ

    2. Re:Yahoo! Answers by magsol · · Score: 1

      It already has been more effective. Take a few minutes to browse and you'll find that, by and large, the site does what it says it does: the vast majority of users are either posting good questions or looking for good answers and will vote up those that qualify, while the rest either dissolve in forgotten oblivion, or are closed entirely by the crowd that Jon Skeet hangs out with.

      Most likely, its success has partially to do with the fact that it is a very focused site; that is, compared to Yahoo! Answers, questions posted must be none-too-subtly related to programming. Yahoo! Answers, on the other hand, can be about anything a moron's mind can conjure.

      --
      "I'd just like to emphasise that taking a million years isn't a metaphor here..." -Rich Bradshaw
    3. Re:Yahoo! Answers by phantomcircuit · · Score: 1

      way to read the summary moron, the new site is generic not specific.

    4. Re:Yahoo! Answers by D+Ninja · · Score: 1

      Actually, I think it is you who missed the summary. No need for the name calling.

      The new site is not a single site - it's the core of what makes up Stackoverflow and other, similar, sites. Think of it as an API for the site. Joel and crew are offering to sell this core (which they are calling "StackExchange") so that others can create whatever site they want - whether it is about programming, parenting, movies, or...whatever. StackExhange is just the core and provides hosting to that core (or can host onsite for the most expensive pricing plan).

    5. Re:Yahoo! Answers by moranar · · Score: 1

      way to read the article, moron, the new site is a service you rent to create a specific q&a site around your own interest.

      --
      "I think it would be a good idea!"
      Gandhi, about Internet Security
  12. Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by pathological+liar · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Seriously, what mouth-breather decided you should only be able to search tags instead of a full-text search?

    It's also likely that the apparent (I've only skimmed the site) quality of the questions and answers there are because of the subject matter. What works for programming questions probably won't work for a lot of other domains -- just look at the dreck that is wiki.answers.com, yahoo answers etc.

    1. Re:Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 4, Interesting

      That'll be why it never comes up on searches.

      90% of the time if I have to hit google for answers it's because something is giving a stupid error message (google for the message text) or error code (google for the number.. that can be fun..). Keywords won't cut it, because they assume I know what the problem is already (and if I knew that I'd hit the documentation and work it out myself).

    2. Re:Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by magsol · · Score: 1

      Granted, the lack of a full-text search is annoying. But I fail to see how that equates to "StackOverflow sucks".

      Then again, if you've only "skimmed the site", you might want to spend a little more time there (somewhere comfortably in between your virtually-zero and Jon Skeet's 100,000-karma) before you blithely condemn it. It does indeed far surpass Yahoo! Answers in quality, for more reasons than simply its content (though that does indeed help).

      --
      "I'd just like to emphasise that taking a million years isn't a metaphor here..." -Rich Bradshaw
    3. Re:Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by pathological+liar · · Score: 1

      The site is ugly and the usability is poor. I'll grant you that beauty is subjective, but a bad interface is not.

      Now is where you tell me why it's good for reasons beyond the relative post quality (which we agree on.)

    4. Re:Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by maxume · · Score: 1

      Whoever made the decision, I bet they never heard of Google, or thought qualifying a Google search with site:stackoverflow.com.

      --
      Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
    5. Re:Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by Trogre · · Score: 1

      One with a blocked nose, I would suspect.

      --
      "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
    6. Re:Too bad StackOverflow sucks. by slim · · Score: 2, Insightful

      beauty is subjective, but a bad interface is not

      Hence how we all agree about vi vs Emacs, right?

      I like SO's interface. What do you find wrong with it? Especially, the markup language is terrific.

  13. Kick the baby? by maxume · · Score: 1

    Don't kick the baby.

    There are plenty of questions with obvious answers.

    --
    Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
  14. Web Karma by retech · · Score: 2, Insightful

    /.'s karma system and stack's rep. points both have real web uses. It would be cool to see a standardization of this idea and have it follow you across the net. Granted it could be abused, gamed, misused and just worthless to some. But no system is 100% useful. I could easily see where a standardized web karma could be very useful.

    I'm still trying to figure out if this would be make for a utopian or dystopian internet.

    1. Re:Web Karma by Anpheus · · Score: 1

      If OpenID allowed each site to assign users a reputation, and had an opt in to advertise that reputation, and sites could opt in (after receiving requests, etc) to use reputation from other sites, two sites would be allowed to peer with each other (shared rep), and there would need to be some sort of exponential scaling to adding and removing site opt-ins, and random delays on how long it would take effect (1-24 hours.)

      That would prevent these abuses:
      * A user would not be forced to have site's that abused their reputation permanently marring their account.
      * A site would not be forced to allow other site's reputation affect the "other user's reputation" pool, and the opt-in prevents spam reputation providers, there would also be a facility for scaling reputation for each site.
      * Being only able to see the user's total "internal" and "external" rep prevents a site from naively determining the reputation a user has on another site for unknown reasons
      * Random delays on the time it takes to have a site opt in to use another site's user reputations would mean a site can't opt in, query all of their users, opt out, and use those scores for nefarious purposes. They are, essentially, "stuck with it."

      Presumably OpenID would however allow a service such as querying the mean, standard deviation, minimum and maximum or other metrics for what another site's reputation is, that would help prevent gaming, and of course there would have to be some sort of system whereby a site can have a minimum / maximum effect on a user's reputation, in addition to the scaling factor.

    2. Re:Web Karma by maxume · · Score: 1

      As I understand it, OpenID does not require consumers to keep identifiers private (sorry for the jargon), so it doesn't really have to allow anything for a reputation exchange to come about (consumers just have to choose to use such a service).

      That individuals may or may not be able to influence the publishing of their reputation information (or rather, the reputation information associated with a particular identifier) in such an exchange has good aspects and bad aspects.

      --
      Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
    3. Re:Web Karma by Anpheus · · Score: 1

      Obviously this system would require a revision to the OpenID system, whereby the authentication provider maintains the database, and the site is allowed to query it based on an identifier, assuming the user has allowed the site to do so.

    4. Re:Web Karma by maxume · · Score: 1

      My point is exactly that it would not require such a revision. As far as I can tell sites are free to do what they please with identifiers; it might be more popular to use a system that was explicitly under the control of users, but I don't see anything in the specification that says that a site has to keep the identifier and associated information private.

      --
      Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
    5. Re:Web Karma by Anpheus · · Score: 1

      The reason you would keep it private is to avoid one site from being overly abusive to that information. For the same reason we worry about facebook having too much data on their users, or google having this massive profile...

      That is why the associated data would be opt-in for user -> site, and site -> site. It allows the potential benefactor of that information to make the decision. Whether they make it well or not, we cannot decide in advance.

      None of this, by the way, is in the specification. As far as I know, the OpenID spec only outlines authentication, not storage of user data. Building the ability to store data across sites and providers into the specification, rather than creating a third party service, will increase adoption and therefore utility.

      Basic network effect stuff. If a service is only available to 1% of users, and it doesn't grow well, then no one uses it even though it may have enormous utility when the service is 80% available.

  15. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by Blackeagle_Falcon · · Score: 5, Informative

    But, hey! What happens when StackOverflow folds (which it will, eventually)?

    Then, suddenly, all the knowledge contracts and contracts to a single point until it goes "POOF!" - nada, zero.

    Actually, all the content on StackOverflow is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-Wiki license. They make monthly dumps of the entire question and answer database available. If SO ever folds, it would be quite easy to use the data dump to put up a new site with all the accumulated knowledge

  16. So is it like the Yahoo Answers of programming? by Hurricane78 · · Score: 1

    Or will it become like Yahoo Answers?

    --
    Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
    1. Re:So is it like the Yahoo Answers of programming? by slim · · Score: 1

      It's a reaction to Yahoo Answers and Experts Exchange - with the difference that it doesn't suck.

      http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/09/15.html ... is Joel's introduction to the site, which explains their motivation.

  17. Face it, stack* is *good* by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's very well designed. Compared to anything else in the same category, it's like the iPhone to a generic WinMo phone. It's easy to use, it's intuitive, it's powerful, it's fast, it's obvious and yet nobody comes close.

    I've heard many people make fun of Joel, and I would have been a bit skeptical but stackoverflow is an undeniable success.

    1. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by RingDev · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I would agree entirely. But one success does not a savior make. I don't even think that much of the unique features of StackOverflow is what makes it great. I think it is the combination of community and marketing that have made it what it is.

      If Joel had come up with a completely different design for the site with different functionality, yet still managed the same community activity, that project would have been just as successful.

      -Rick

      --
      "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    2. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by asc99c · · Score: 1

      Well of course a lot of the stuff Joel promotes in his articles are about building a community and marketing - and generally, pointing out that good engineering isn't all that is required to make successful software. Although of course, good engineering is required for all the other stuff to work.

      The thing I like about Joel is he just has a lot of opinions. His writing style isn't telling you what to do or think - it's just saying his own beliefs. A lot of stuff I agree with, a lot I think doesn't apply to my situation (custom software rather than boxed software).

      I remember when I was first introduced to the Joel On Software blog, I wasn't really a fan - by chance the first few articles I read made me think he was rabidly anti-UNIX, and pro-Microsoft. But he isn't really - I think he believes Windows is just the better choice for his products, and I think he's right if he believes that. I've been reading it for a few years now and although its made me a bit sad that I don't get my own private office with a nice view where I work, there is a lot I have learned.

    3. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by gbjbaanb · · Score: 1

      Well, they can still make fun of Joel, the software was written and implemented by Jeff Atwood (who is also dead wrong on his blog, but usually has the grace to accept when his readers put him right).

      Jeff Atwood's blog is http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/

      I believe Joel was involved more in the marketing and design stages, but its interesting how everyone has assumed stackoverflow is all down to him. Like how lots of people think Bill Gates wrote all that Microsoft software.

    4. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      Compared to anything else in the same category, it's like any other phone to a generic WinMo phone. It's easy to use, it's intuitive, it's powerful, it's fast, it's obvious and yet nobody comes close.

      Fixed that for you. Because there are other phones than just the Iphone, believe it or not. Not only does the Iphone get mentioned at every opportunity, but we now have bizarre analogies between a website to a phone, just so you can push your personal POV that your phone is the best, or get in an off-topic jab against Windows?

      What next? "This website is like a Sony Television that I just bought", "This website is like an Intel CPU" or for the obligitary car analogy "This website is like a Ford Escort, nothing comes close". I'm sure you like your new purchase very much, but it's off-topic for this article, and it tells us nothing about what the website is actually like. I think most people here are capable of discussing the technical points, without bizarre meaningless analogies to your Iphone, my CPU or Libraries of Congress...

    5. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by ergo98 · · Score: 1

      Well, they can still make fun of Joel, the software was written and implemented by Jeff Atwood

      Purportedly there is a team of developers, since the inception. Given Jeff Atwood's very limited claim to SO, I suspect that his contribution was lower. At the time that Jeff and Joel grouped up, Joel's blog was on a steep decline of importance and readership, while Jeff was getting front-paged on a number of sites daily, so I also suspect that Jeff is a "front man", herding his readership to SO.

      Because if Jeff actually developed StackOverflow, I doubt it would have ever worked.

    6. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by Taevin · · Score: 1

      I know it's hip to hate on Apple and Apple products on Slashdot, but if you honestly think the iPhone hasn't significantly changed the smartphone market, you're living in a dream.

      The iPhone brought the smartphone concept to the masses. Sure, powerusers have had access to Blackberries for a long time and it's probably true that many of the features of the iPhone are not particularly revolutionary and have been available in some form or another in other phones for years. However, the average person had no knowledge of such things and would compare their understanding of a smartphone to their understanding of a computer (i.e. none at all). Now I hear people rave about their iPhone all the time (even from people who were afraid to text message before) and how they can access the Internet from anywhere, even from clients that I still try to get to understand accessing their email on their desktop.

      For confirmation, one need only observe the major companies in the market. How often does AT&T complain about the heavy burden iPhone usage is placing on their network? I hate to break it to you, but there were no complaints about EDGE and 3G usage before the iPhone because it was only business users accessing their email. How many commercials do you see now for the Blackberry et al. emulating the iPhone commercials by touting the applications and access to the Internet from anywhere?

      Sorry to burst your bubble, but you're missing the point made by Nicolas MONNET. He's not pushing some Apple agenda, just pointing out that the iPhone brings a usability to the smartphone device that was simply not available before and still has yet to be matched though competitors continue to try. So while I agree that "I think most people here are capable of discussing the technical points," I think that most people are also capable of understanding a simple analogy.

      The iPhone brought usability to smartphones. StackOverflow brought usability to the community help-site. Get it?

    7. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by CastrTroy · · Score: 1

      The question is, would the community activity have been there had the site had a worse design. The amount of community activity is in direct relation to how well the site works. I mean, had they screwed it up as bad a experts exchange, requiring people to pay to see content, or scroll for hours, would the community be willing to spend any time on the site. The fact that there is so much community involvement is because the site is such a nice design.

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    8. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by gbjbaanb · · Score: 1

      could be, they don't let out much about it - except how wonderful ASP.NET is of course. I remember reading a bit on Jeff's blog about sql indexes, particularly making a SQL server not lock for read queries which made me think he was doing something coding-wise to it. He could have just been installing the DB come to think of it though.

      They did a good site, apparently a lot of it is a .NET open source library they use, as they have bragged about paying for features. I don't think they've ever said which one.

    9. Re:Face it, stack* is *good* by ckaminski · · Score: 1

      Wait. I was once a rabid experts-exchange contributor, but then they started the paywall - first simply being registered simply to read the answers, now needing to be a paying customer (broken javascript tricks aside).

      There's hope stackoverflow can be better, but the trolls and free-range mods have already taken hold and there's some of that "just because I've got 10,000 points, I can close whatever I feel is stupid" going on.

      I don't question the value of the site as a source of knowledge. But using it is a pain. I don't want to see Ruby or C# or iPhone questions, and on the front page I maybe get 1 question I'm interested in answering, whereas 6-8 months ago I might see 10-12. Stackoverflows filters don't actually filter anything.

      Yet I keep going back, because it's got great answers, and smart people, and the trolls are worth it. Just like slashdot.

  18. Just use google by turing_m · · Score: 1

    Seriously, what mouth-breather decided you should only be able to search tags instead of a full-text search?

    About the only time I don't preferentially use google to search on any site (e.g. {site:stackoverflow.com words I want to search for}) is when I want to search for all posts by a given user. That's the only case I can think of where google isn't superior.

    --
    If I have seen further it is by stealing the Intellectual Property of giants.
  19. The average BB experience is TERRIBLE by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Even the commercially supported and very expensive ones are *terrible*. They're full of distracting and useless information, their design is full of lines and tables and outlines that serve no purpose whatsoever, they don't present information in a sensible manner (usually signatures, dates, names and navigation take 5 times more space than the actual messages, for instance), and they just simply suck.

    Look at stackoverflow. What do you see? Pure information. Navigation is the bare minimum. There is no useless labels. Things work as expected, along the principle of least surprise. The site is snappy. It uses Ajax where it's useful, not for the sake of it. It uses OpenID. It does tag quite well. The wiki markup is one of the most sensible around, and the editor is the best trade-off I've seen between unreadable markup and slow, clunky wysiwyg.

  20. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by fortyonejb · · Score: 1

    great point, but seriously, this guy clearly has to be Mr. Right, it's pretty insensitive of you to deflate his ego like that.

  21. Re:The average BB experience is TERRIBLE by Achromatic1978 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Check out Vanilla for a better BB experience: http://vanillaforums.org/discussions

  22. I like Stack Overflow by nEoN+nOoDlE · · Score: 1

    I really like their site and have used it for a number of questions in the past, so I'm happy they're branching out and using their engine to generate revenue. Isn't what they're asking, though, a bit too much? The minimum price point is $130 a month! When there are a dozen open source CMS packages, and countless other sites charging nothing or very little for monthly fees for similar functionality, I can't imagine someone using Stack's engine at that price.

    --
    Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
    1. Re:I like Stack Overflow by ChienAndalu · · Score: 2, Interesting

      When there are a dozen open source CMS packages, and countless other sites charging nothing or very little for monthly fees for similar functionality

      Show me

    2. Re:I like Stack Overflow by D+Ninja · · Score: 2, Funny

      I have to agree with you, ChienAndalu - I haven't seen anything with the kind of functionality that StackOverflow has. I mean, there are moderation sites, but they don't have nearly the functionality or the usability.

  23. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by Scrameustache · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Is it true what they say about under-30s in America, thinking they are so smart when in fact, they're not?

    That's true of everyone everywhere.

    --

    You can't take the sky from me...

  24. Great by ChienAndalu · · Score: 1

    I know slashdot likes to fling poo every new internet phenomenon, but I am really excited by this and wish Jeff Atwood and Joel Spolsky good luck. StackOverflow is amazing and their mission to destroy those shitty phpBB-forums with their clean and organized interfaces is very noble to say the least.

  25. The reason why SO (stackoverflow) works... by elenathequiet · · Score: 1

    is because it's based on really nerdy, objective, technical pursuits where there are usually pretty discrete and/or black and white answers.

    I'd be really interested to see how well it'll work on things that are more subjective.

    The question that I think is more interesting about SO is what happens when 80%+ of the basic answers are already in there (how do I do x in y), and every answer will be RTFM (after about a year I think this is already starting to creep in). Will the site have less activity generally? Will the technology be providing us with so many more new questions it will off-set the decrease in questions about old tech available to ask? Will it become a big newb-on-newb-on-wiki-style-admin-person* fest?
    *ie those who know the system well enough to game it to get mega-rep to the exclusion of all normal, helpful punters.

    Though for the record I don't think it'll ever go as low as yahoo answers.

  26. Except it's a terrible site. by kuzb · · Score: 1, Troll

    The problem with stackoverflow is that the answer most likely to get modded up is the first answer. There are a lot of times when the very first answer is completely wrong. Another example of how stupid Joel is.

    --
    BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
  27. Actually yes, it's easily worth that by SuperKendall · · Score: 2, Interesting

    How much would you pay? For this forum / QA software?
    With Stack Exchange? A THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH.

    If I felt like I had an idea that would have a good community around it, yes. StackOverflow is simply the best forum software I have ever used for a site oriented around questions and answers (for general discussion I do not think it would work as well, for instance it could not replace Slashdot). The motivational system between badges and voting and scores is well thought out, the software works really well on whatever browser I use it on, and the site has remained very stable even under heavy load.

    After having used it for a while, and having developed server side software for a long time, I know the amount of work it would take to replicate all the good things Stack Overflow would be tremendous, and frankly I'm not sure I could really improve on it.

    There's nothing wrong with paying for quality and a proven solution. Something is only "expensive" if it provides no value for what you pay.

    I'm not sure if all the stack exchange ideas are really winners, but if I had something that I felt would work well I would not hesitate to use that as a solution - and furthermore I would hesitate to build any solution going against an equivalent Stack Exchange site.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Actually yes, it's easily worth that by Jurily · · Score: 1

      StackOverflow is simply the best forum software I have ever used for a site oriented around questions and answers (for general discussion I do not think it would work as well, for instance it could not replace Slashdot).

      In programming, the correctness of an answer is easily definable and verifiable. Stack Overflow is designed to let that one best answer float to the top, and it's perfect for its purpose.

      But if you were to ask "when should my 8 year old kid go to bed?", the answers aren't that clear anymore.

  28. BB is the reason Stack Overflow exists by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Jeff Atwood has said a number of times one of the reasons Stack Overflow came about is because he hated all of the BB systems around. And he was right, the existing BB systems are terrible to use, especially so for a Q&A site.

    The site is also better than a wiki for Q&A, because it has really well thought out community moderation aspects. You get more duplication than you would with a wiki, but it works out because you also get heavy user moderation redirecting you to better questions. And because it's a cross between a wiki and a forum, you have a much better ability to have different viewpoints of solutions expressed - for instance a user asking a question can accept an answer as valid, but other users can all vote up other answers as being more correct and those get prominent placement too.

    If BB software and wikis are all so good, why is it nothing with the popularity and update of Stack Overflow has existed until now? I've never seen a programming site with such traction and quick uptake, never mind one that covered such a gamut of subjects! It's not just at the top of the list for C# (which is to be expected given the pedigree) but also iPhone development, and is the first place I would go for Emacs elisp questions... even Java.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  29. idjits by cratermoon · · Score: 1

    Nine times out of ten, the correct answer to a question posted to stackoverflow is "quit your job and go back to something you're qualified for, like working the register at McDonalds".

  30. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by darkstar949 · · Score: 1

    I didn't know karma-whoring could be so powerful. Weee! 100.000 points! I must be *great!* (My mom loves me...)

    This looks a bit like a troll, but I'll bite. The person on Stack Overflow with over 100,000 reputation is Jon Skeet who also happens to write technical books which is part of the reason he has so much reputation on the site. There are a lot of questions on Stack Overflow relating to C# that were answered by Jon Skeet which is where all of those reputation points came from.

  31. Just as clear as many programming questions by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    In programming, the correctness of an answer is easily definable and verifiable.
    But if you were to ask "when should my 8 year old kid go to bed?", the answers aren't that clear anymore.

    With a statement like that, I'd have to wonder how long you had actually been programming.

    Should you use singletons? What is the "best" development process? Is test-first the best thing ever or the spawn of satan?

    VI or Emacs - or IDE?

    These are all easily questions as the same level as "when should my eight year old go to bed" because just like the answers to those questions, it can vary based on the team (the team being the family). Just like those questions, you can share conditions and how something worked out for you even when there's no obviously correct answer.

    Furthermore even for questions with a more correct answer even possible, there are in fact instant solutions at hand because you have things people have tried on kids who are "fully processed" for want of a better term. It's not like parents don't like sharing advice even after kids are grown. I read elsewhere some response claiming you couldn't determine how some piece of advice had worked out and it's nonsense - there's a wealth of advice from former parents and people have been parenting a lot longer than computers have been around. I still am not sure the family idea is one of the best extensions to Stack Overflow but I think it has potential just based on the similarity to programming in terms of questions asked and the ability for the community to upvote sets of answers each subgroup finds most correct.

    One thing to look out for, is how well they have described the meta-tags - it helps people a lot if they can pay special attention to a subset of the data they care about (and this would I think not be by age so much as by subject).

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Just as clear as many programming questions by Jurily · · Score: 3, Informative

      With a statement like that, I'd have to wonder how long you had actually been programming.

      Should you use singletons? What is the "best" development process? Is test-first the best thing ever or the spawn of satan?

      While I would generally agree, StackOverflow is the place for immediate questions you have problems with, not general bullshit. That's why it's popular.

      Here's an example from the front page: "In Perl, how can I concisely check if a $variable is defined and contains a non zero length string?"

  32. Good asking is key - but not key by SuperKendall · · Score: 2, Insightful

    However, the difference is programmers usually know how to -ask- questions that make sense to other programmers.

    That's more true than average. But it's not wholly true, as another poster noted you get plenty of ill-formed questions on Stack Overflow.

    So why does stack overflow work so well? Because unlike the site you mentioned, the community can upvote good questions, and close or cancel bad ones. Users who have gained a lot of credibility with the system by way of points awarded for good questions or answers, can edit a question they feel in fundamentally decent but badly worded.

    So a good question is important if you are asking, because it's more likely to be answered or voted up (which again makes it more likley to be answered), but the bad questions will generally fall of the map and not really matter to the system as a whole. It's a great system for discarding the noise which is ever-present in any forum.

    Furthermore, people who post good questions and good answers, get rewarded for doing so via points and badges, which keeps them coming back to offer more good questions and answers. The Stack Overflow model is very good at retaining exactly the members of the community that offer the most value, while subtly deflecting those who are not as useful by lack of reward. If you've listened to the Stack Overflow podcast much, you'd realize every part of the system is designed to encourage healthy behavior on the part of users and generally the approach pretty much scales.

    Never as there been a more civil programming website, with very little in the way of language wars and so on because people are more motivated to help than to hinder.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  33. Re:StackOverflow creates more work. by dakameleon · · Score: 1

    Don't consider it an issue, consider it an opportunity - have a person or a roster of people assigned to looking at Stack Overflow for instances where package XYZ is mentioned, and be quick and accurate to respond, providing a link to a more specific forum if necessary. It serves as a profile-raising exercise, and gives a big tick for attentiveness in the mind of the person who raised the issue, as well as any who happened to see it.

    This isn't an idle in-theory suggestion; it's worked well on the Whirlpool.net.au forums for Australian ISPs - a couple of attentive customer service agents answering queries quickly within a more generalised internet forum gives that ISP credit for being customer focused, and positive experiences there have often translated into sales.

    --
    Man who leaps off cliff jumps to conclusion.
  34. Site was designed for Google, but search works by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    Seriously, what mouth-breather decided you should only be able to search tags instead of a full-text search?

    First of all, the site search searches on subject and question text as well. If you search for "If you're using PCRE" for example (no quotes), one question that comes up is only tagged "qt".

    Secondly, what mouth-breather (hint: that's a subtle slam at your own cognitive abilities since you seem willing to belittle others) doesn't realize Google is your full text search? Honestly, when is the last time you used full-text search on a site itself? The only time I do so is when the content is behind a wall Google cannot cross.

    If you listen to the podcasts they have stated even from the beginning that the site is designed exactly so that people searching on Google will end up with a Stack Overflow question/answer. And the model has worked very well for them, because just as planned a large percentage of traffic is from google. When I search I still start with Google, and if Stack Overflow answers my issue great - if not I've found something else (though almost without fail a Stack Overflow response is going to have a more targeted question with better answers).

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  35. Linux site! by CopaceticOpus · · Score: 1

    Someone please start one of these sites for Linux questions, particularly with regard to questions about install, graphics, sound, and drivers. It could actually make the Linux experience much smoother for someone just getting started.

    I appreciate sites such as LinuxQuestions.org, but the StackOverflow approach could really bring some improvements. Looking at the highest ranked answer is a much nicer approach than scanning through 14 pages of comments.

    1. Re:Linux site! by 644bd346996 · · Score: 1

      They've had Super User for a while now. It's not linux specific, but linux questions are very much welcome.

  36. Just as true in either case by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    While I would generally agree, StackOverflow is the place for immediate questions you have problems with, not general bullshit.

    No, it is a place for both. It is just as valid to discuss the pros and cons of methodology as it is to ask how to copy a string in C. I have found over time that programming is really more about esoteric issues than practical immediate ones.

    In parenting the same is true, there will be some questions needing very near term answers that others will have had prior experience with, and others that are more opinion oriented without any clear single answer.

    In Perl, how can I concisely check if a $variable is defined and contains a non zero length string?

    Although there's nothing currently with exactly that level of specificity (although there are of course multiple ways to accomplish that so there are multiple "right" answers even there), moms4moms currently has this question on the front page:

    How do I know if my child is lactose intolerant?

    A question with a direct question that can have a few distinct answers and can be important for the near term.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Just as true in either case by CastrTroy · · Score: 1

      Actually, in you followed the site, you would know that they seriously discourage questions with no real or definitive answer. Ask a question like "VI vs. EMACS" and your question will be immediately flagged as subjective, and probably deleted. There's a few questions that get by while still being subjective, but for the most part they are frowned upon.

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    2. Re:Just as true in either case by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

      Actually, in you followed the site,

      Since you seem to want to "whip it out", I have over 7,000 reputation points and have been on the site since day 2 (having just missed the beta period when I decided to join). I have also been listening to the podcast long before Stack Overflow was live. I visit the site multiple times per day to answer questions because I enjoy doing so, and learning from other answers posted.

      You would know that they seriously discourage questions with no real or definitive answer.

      There are endless number of such things, such as "favorite programming cartoons", all sorts of methodology questions, questions on things like "should I use singletons" and so on. Some of them, in fact many of them are often voted up quite highly.

      What is not tolerated by the site owners, and by proxy the community, are non-programming related questions. That is the forbidden zone.

      Ask a question like "VI vs. EMACS" and your question will be immediately flagged as subjective, and probably deleted.

      If you post flamebait yes of course it gets deleted. But a slight twist gets you a question with a number of upvotes and some good discussion from both sides of what historically has been an acerbic issue.

      Since I follow the emacs tag closely I know there are a number of such threads there. So you see, subjective is totally fine - if it were not why would they make a separate tag devoted to it, and not a close reason instead? Remember that everything is there for a reason...

      If you just take a moment you can easily verify what I say to be true - simply search on "subjective" and you'll get a big ol' list of things marked subjective. The highest upvote from immediate review is 839 votes, and most things on the list are upvoted. Subjective is far from meaning the question is not accepted by the community, it's just a way of indicating there is not one correct answer. Programmers can tolerate lack of solid answers as long as they are told so ahead of time.

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    3. Re:Just as true in either case by ckaminski · · Score: 1


      No, it is a place for both.
      </quote>

      I would agree with you - I'd like that vision to come to fruition, and 6 months ago, that was pretty much true.

      It's not anymore. People get threatened to turn their subjective questions into objective ones, or make them community wikis, and it's so someone doesn't get 10,000 rep for a really insightful debate, which is how half these 30,000 rep people got their rep in the first place.

      It's more of the Wikipedia-moderator-effect - I have the power, and you don't, and I'm keeping you there because I'm now the overlord of the moderation system.

      It's annoying, and it's motivating me to not contributing anymore, just as experts-exchange registration and paywalls motivated me to stop contributing there 6 years ago.

    4. Re:Just as true in either case by ckaminski · · Score: 1

      Sorry, but you're only partially right.

      I've seen plenty of comments to the effect - make this community wiki and i won't vote to close your subjective question.

      And I think the mentality is simply to prevent someone from earning 895 rep from something that's highly engaging. It's hypocritical.

      I've written replies to a dozen questions that I thought were well thought out and subjective, only to have them closed by overzealous admins. And the constant "move to SuperUser/UserFault", while sometimes appropriate, sometimes isn't.

      I'm not calling anyone out on abuse, but it's a (herd) pattern of behavior I'm starting to see more and more of over the past 6 months.

      If you've a subjective question, and it's not community wiki, your probability of being closed is near 100%.

  37. Actually it comes up a lot by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    First, I never heard of the site before. Is it really popular?

    Yes, there are a lot of people that go there now, for just about any language you can name there are a decent set of users there (take a look at the tags).

    It's not come up in my daily searches for technical info.

    That is strange, as I have seen it come up a number of times. It's not always at the top but often on the first page.

    The next time you have a question search there (you can try google site specific, or the site has a search bar that looks through summary and questions) and if you don't find an answer try asking. The community is highly motivated to answer questions quickly, the better your question (in terms of clarity and brevity) the more likely someone will answer.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  38. For Example by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    The original search term "cvs branch advice" did not yield a Stack Overflow hit, but there's a lot of good looking questions when you search StackOverflow via google:

    Stack Overflow Results

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  39. Re:There is a better site by Gwala · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Umm, stackoverflow is free; and doesnt bomb Google with it's completely obnoxious results.

    --
    #!/bin/csh cat $0
  40. Jon Skeet by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1

    Jon Skeet - the "top user who just passed 100k" - is an awesome guy, and that score is well-deserved. I had a pleasure of discussing things with him back when he was inhabiting microsoft.public.dotnet.* newgroups, before he moved on to StackOverflow, and he was already very helpful back then. On SO, with his nigh-unreachable (and steadily growing) score, he quickly got a kind of a cult following.

    An interesting background, too. He's working in Google (mostly developing in Java, so far as I know), and at the same time he's the author of one of the best advanced books on C#, and most of his SO answers tend to be C#/.NET related. That book is well worth the read of everyone who has to deal with the tech.

  41. Re:There is a better site by Ant+P. · · Score: 1

    More illiterates too apparently, you can't even copy and paste the URL correctly.

  42. On a related note, this exists already (Shapado) by kiwibird · · Score: 1

    http://shapado.com/ is an AGPL "StackOverFlow clone", just recently started, but has some neat features ( http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/9mzjg/hey_reddit_checkout_my_agpl_stackoverflow_like/ ).

    Of course, the _community_ is what makes StackOverFlow great, so no matter how many neat features Shapado has, they're gonna have trouble getting as big...

  43. Re:The average BB experience is TERRIBLE by trib4lmaniac · · Score: 1

    Vanilla is excellent. Another lightweight BB project I like is FluxBB

  44. Looks very nice indeed by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 1

    Thanks for the link, this looks very nice indeed. I've heard from a PHP developer that the Garden framework is great.

  45. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by gbjbaanb · · Score: 1

    a lot of those repp points are there because of his reputation.

    Not to take anything away from Jon, as he's an intelligent and helpful fellow (but confused when confronted with something in .NET that is crap), but take a look at a few of his answers where someone else has given a better answer - Jon will still get a mass of points.

    The community seems eager to self-promote (especially for fanboi answers) rather than moderate 'fairly'.

    eg. I've answered a few questions now, all my top-scoring ones were bullshit answers to useless questions. eg. 'what was that scary code comment about dragons' (here be dragons) gets 12+ points. My in-depth technical answers to people's questions get 1 or 2 points if I'm lucky.

    StackOverflow is a good site, but the reputation system is somewhat broken by the community it serves. Ignore it.

  46. What is ugly and poorly usable? by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 1

    What are you talking about?

  47. linuxquestions is horrible by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 1

    I've blacklisted it from my google results along with sex change expert. It's so ugly and hard to read, the superfluous cognitive load is too much too bear when you're already trying to solve a complex problem.

  48. Re:The average BB experience is TERRIBLE by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

    It uses OpenID.

    Good. Thanks for this, I didn't realise - maybe I'll therefore add an answer if it pops up in a Google search, which for every other forum I am unable to, and I can't be arsed to faff about making an account (at least Slashdot allows anonymous comments, but even then, I don't see why it would be a worse thing to allow OpenID, as you could then at least have a better chance of telling AC's apart).

  49. StackOverflow is "staffed" by junior devs by ergo98 · · Score: 1

    The posters at Stack Overflow know what they're talking about.

    I entirely disagree. The average Stack Overflow poster seems to have a low level of expertise and knowledge in the topics that they comment upon.

    But it is far from useless. It's a very useful site when used and exploited correctly.

    StackOverflow is essentially a mechanical turk, similar to various other attempts to "pay" people for spending their time doing your legwork. In this case the pay is ribbons and badges and points (similar to Slashdot points, only imagine that it has no limit and comes with a myriad of cute icons and designations).

    I could go and waste valuable time searching all around to try to find out how to do X, or I could just post it to StackOverflow, letting hoardes of trying-to-get-acknowledged devs rabble to earn some reputation points. Until the crowd gets wise, the latter is a very efficient (for me) choice.

  50. Re:The Karma-Whoring Generation by ergo98 · · Score: 1

    Yeah, but just picture being able to put "100,000 StackOverflow points" on your resume!

    I hope you're being sarcastic, but I'll answer as if it were serious given that Joel and others have tried to hold up StackOverflow points as some sort of hiring benchmark.

    If someone sent me a resume saying that they 100,000 StackOverflow points, I would have to consider it a negative (not an instant "no hire", as Joel would put it, because it could just be an aberration), firstly that they thought it was wise to put it on the resume, and secondly that they actually spent so much time and energy accruing SO points.

  51. I don't have an iPhone you moron by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 1

    Because I use only Linux and it's a bitch to sync with an iPhone.

    The fact remains that the iPhone is simply twice as good as the next best phone OS I've tried, which is Android. And it in turns is 10x better than CrapBerry I have from work or any crashy kludgy clanky winmo phone. The Palm Pre is supposedly coming very close to the iPhone but I haven't tried it yet.

    I'm talking from a usability point of view. How easy it is to get shit done, how easy it is to understand, how confused or not you get when you're trying to do something simple, how fast it reacts and how logically it does.

    1. Re:I don't have an iPhone you moron by ckaminski · · Score: 1

      The Palm Pre is what the iPhone could be if the iPhone had a physical keyboard.

      The only downside to the Pre right now is lack of applications and no SDHC slot - so I could shove a 64GB card in there and forego getting the iPod Touch for a media player.

      Oh, and the fact that it's Sprint only. :-) Which is why I returned mine. :-/ Boo. I really liked it.

  52. Ubuntu Question Answers by ZyYyXy · · Score: 1

    Here there is one for ubuntu question answers http://www.ubun2.com/

  53. Parenting Answers by mark0978 · · Score: 1

    And how many reliable answers you will find on that subject...

  54. What makes it so good? by axlash · · Score: 1

    Why would StackOverflow would succeed in a space that the likes of Yahoo Answers already occupies?

    --
    Deal with reality - the world as it is - rather than ideality - the world as you would like it to be.
  55. Race to the bottom by Martin+Spamer · · Score: 1

    It's questionable to call it a success, with out stating the criteria used to measure it.

    It was supposed to be the fount of all knowledge for complex IT issues. However it's rapidly devolved into the fount of home work answers. It is experiencing a dumbing down and race to the bottom. It's riddled with fan boys and script kiddies with limited knowledge and no depth of experience. So it suffers a massive problem with group think. This is probably why they are trying to leverage it into other subject domains. As a platform for community content creation it will probably succeed. As an authoritative source of technical/developer advice it's failing.

    1. Re:Race to the bottom by ckaminski · · Score: 1

      I think there's a bit of both.

      There's a real battle going on between those who want to make SO/SU/UF into discussion sites and not just question/answer sites. There's a place for both I think, particularly as so much of software and computing in general *IS* subjective.

      There's a higher incident of rabid under-5-minute question closings now than a year ago, and maybe that's just because there's more moderators, or higher ranked people, but maybe it's also the wikipedia Cult-Of-Better-Than-You overlordship.

      That said, I have a high incidence of finding answers to my questions on SO. I think it can get better with more community maturation, better editing of questions, etc.