Announcing the CodeNewbie Community

Wait, hasn't the CodeNewbie Community been around for years? Doesn’t the community already gather through the long-running #CodeNewbie Twitter chats and the #codenewbie tag here on DEV? Isn't CodeLand an annual conference where members of the CodeNewbie community gather?

Absolutely. But just as DEV has served as an additional community outlet that has been able to help thousands of developers connect with people and ideas in career-impacting ways, we want to make room especially for code newbies and their specific needs.

After all, each of us starts off as a beginner. There is so much value to be gained in creating an environment specifically for newer developers to gather, ask and answer questions, and share their experiences.

CodeNewbie Community, Powered by Forem

Forem is the open source code we extracted from DEV and are rolling out in 2021 to be a viable solution for online communities of all sizes. It's especially helpful when the community can benefit from the build up of knowledge over time. It's an async-first space for publishing, giving and receiving help, and uplifting your fellow newbie.

If you’re reading this here on DEV, you are already part of the Forem ecosystem, and we hope you’ll consider joining the CodeNewbie community as well.

Wait, why isn't the tag on DEV enough?

We believe that the developer community and the internet at large is better served by medium-sized spaces curated and moderated for the specific needs of its members. That is to say: When the conversation happens in a massive global namespace, it trends toward shouting in an effort to be heard. Any community that is too small may not be sustainable compared to massive knowledge-networks elsewhere, but we believe there is a size that is big enough to sustain, and not so big that it becomes a black hole that sucks up everything around it.

We also believe that discussions will blossom in different places with different results. We are excited for folks to cross-post between DEV and CodeNewbie whenever it makes sense to hear different perspectives. Just as the same conference talk can find a different energy based on the crowd and setting, it is worthwhile to have different spaces with subtly different approaches to conversations and moderation.

This is one step closer to your Forem.

We are continuing to march towards broad scalability of the Forem ecosystem, and we thank you for your patience as we push towards making Forem more generally available for new community leaders. As of now, we can't go too broad without the time to build and experiment, but we believe that every new space in the ecosystem helps validate our ideas and gives us new product challenges to build for. In the not-too-distant future, you will have the opportunity to build your own community on Forem, creating a space to elevate the conversations you care about most.

Every Forem has its own domain, and its own database, and is built on open source technology for transparency and security— But the Forem ecosystem as a whole can be helped by tools which make discovery between Forems more seamless.

Current state of the Forem "ecosystem"

• List of early public Forems
• Forem iOS app: Private beta, coming soon.
• Forem for Android: Early stages, will follow iOS release.
• Forem browser extension: Live on Chrome and Firefox.

Takeaways

Here are your next steps to make the most of this new thing:

• Sign up for CodeNewbie Community
• Introduce yourself on the Welcome Thread
• Check out the monthly writing contest happening now on CodeNewbie Community
• Follow @codenewbies on Twitter if you don’t already and join the next Twitter Chat
• Install the Forem Chrome extension for seamless navigation between DEV, CodeNewbie Community, and any other Forem you are a part of, etc.

Thank you to Saron Yitbarek for founding CodeNewbie and helping so many developers along the way. Check out her kickoff post on CodeNewbie as well.

Happy coding. 💚