Throughout the years, there have been various attempts to make programming streamlined and digestible for everyone. Few people have the time and patience to hunch over the laptop for months, years, and zillion hours to acquire coding skills and know-how. This ushered in the budding trend of low-code platforms. The trend has quickly evolved towards data sciences and analytics, reducing the pressure, time, and cost.
How StackOverflow Changes The Way We Code And Collaborate
As a developer, you might have dreamed of a Google created specifically for techies. Just imagine, a digital platform brimming with content for coders, including Q&A and job listings. Every question about programming is answered. Each inextricable bug is solved. A larger audience of qualified experts is come-at-able. Sounds dreamlike, right?
But what if we tell you that this coding mecca is already up and running? The majority of developers and even tech recruiters must have already landed on the most famous place for techies. A place to exchange questions and answers about a bazillion of tech' topics aka StackOverflow.
What’s in it for developers?
Programming solutions on a plate (almost)
Without a dedicated community of developers, you’d probably get bogged down in books or frustration. Just think of it. In pre-community times, all you could do if you faced difficulty implementing any functionality was to scour the Internet in the hopes of finding an answer. But with StackOverflow, we now have a programming retreat in the case of a coding emergency. Today, it takes a few clicks for developers to throw their questions and a few moments to get an expert answer.
Another game-changer is a one bin for all questions. If you have ever seen the old-timey discussion boards with questions stretching over a few categories, you know the drill. It’s a small detail that saves tons of time.
Centralized knowledge management ecosystem
How many times have you retrieved a piece of information that is scattered across multiple channels and platforms? Muddling through emails, messages, and chat conversations just to put together the info you need? StackOverflow has transformed the way we collaborate as well. Its Teams product serves as a private cloud-hosted instance of StackOverflow for internal collaboration and knowledge sharing. They have even integrated it with two other critical tools in the modern workflow: Jira and GitHub (Microsoft Teams and Slack are at this party as well). Basically, it’s a social media hub but privatized to a select group. Teams can ask questions and post blog-like articles that can be used to update the documentation, share announcements and policies. If you are still reading this.
Job opportunities
Once you get the feel of rescuing others on SO, you might find a few more colors in your account, that is a CV to your future life. Wait, getting a job just for gaining a reputation in a certain category? Yep, you heard it right. It may not be that easy to earn points, since you have to answer the questions with wind velocity to be the first. But it’s definitely less challenging than knocking on employees’ doors to get a chance. Just don’t forget to create a career profile and provide quality answers to get upvoted.
Wrapping Up
The world has already seen a nice thousand innovations that better our lives. And one day all developers who wanted a free and quality resource where they could get the appropriate answers, finally got their problems solved. Here’s to the even brighter and easier future of the coding universe. *** Got a tech story to share with our readers? Everything you've ever wanted to know about how to get published on Hacker Noon - get it here.
