If you're a programmer, you've likely used Stack Overflow. You might also know that Stack Overflow is part of a large network of Q&A sites called Stack Exchange. I'm finding one of their sites incredibly useful, and I think more people should know about it.
The site is called Code Review, and it uses the Stack Exchange question and answer format for code review.
To better understand what kind of community this is, here's an excerpt from their help center
If you are looking for feedback on a specific working piece of code from your project in the following areas…
- Best practices and design pattern usage
- Security issues
- Performance
- Correctness in unanticipated cases
then you are in the right place!
Give it a try.
Top comments (3)
As much as I find many sites on the Stack Exchange network interesting and informative, there is one thing to be cautious of on Code Review.
Unlike the other software development sites, on Code Review, you are expected to post large-ish chunks of exact code from your project. The Help Center page that you linked to even says that "pseudo-code or example code" shouldn't be posted there. Sites like, for example, Stack Overflow recommend the concept of a Minimal, Complete, and Verifiable Example.
If your chunk of code is something that crosses the threshold of originality and can be protected by copyright, by posting it on a Stack Exchange site, you are releasing it to others as CC-BY-SA 3.0. Ignoring the fact that the Creative Commons licenses aren't recommended for software, there may be legal implications of this.
This is one of the reasons why I have almost no participation on Code Review, even for my personal projects. I don't like the licensing implications. Although the Stack Exchange team has talked about resolving this in the past, it's been very divisive discussions.
In short: Understand the implications of posting significant chunks of your real-world project code on Code Review (or anywhere on the Internet, really). If you are the source code owner and are planning on releasing the project to the public, you can always license it any way you want, but code posted on other sites may be available under other licenses that may not be desirable to you.
There are some discussions on the Code Review Meta site about this, too: "Which licenses are compatible with Code Review?" and "Put into FAQ: “Will submitted code be licensed under the copyleft CC-BY-SA?”"
I reviewed the code of this article and determined the second URL requires an improvement.
Thanks! Fixed it.