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Ingo Steinke, web developer
Ingo Steinke, web developer Subscriber

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Relevant DEV posts - an updated reading list (no developer must read this)

As DEV got hit by another wave of spammy listicle posts thanks to "artificial intelligence" (and natural stupidity, hubris, or desperation), instead of compiling a personal 2023 DEV wrapped I decided to publish an update of my 2021/2022 DEV reading list to give good, high-quality posts some more links and visibility!

Some good, high-quality posts - a subjective and incomplete selection by a senior web dev:

Table of Contents

About DEV, Quality, Creation and Curation

DEV might have become a victim of its own success, having attracted a large community of beginners and a growing number of shady creators trying to trick them into becoming followers and customers of their low-quality schemes. There have been similar discussions elsewhere, and I still think that DEV can offer an alternative to (e)X-"Tech Twitter", medium, or StackOverflow for people tired of toxic gatekeepers and hateful sinfluencers.

Rants and Parody Posts

About Coding, Web Design, and various aspects of (Web) Development

Frontend Development focused on CSS, HTML, a11y

JavaScript and TypeScript Development

Other Web Development Articles

WordPress and WoCommerce Development

Using Linux and other Developer Resources

Finally, here are some more posts that caught my attention on the practical DEV, that did not fit in one of the technological or community categories.

Other Excerpts from my DEV Reading List

Remarks

This list is based on its 2021/2022 predecessor. I added new stuff from my 2023 bookmarks and kept most of the previous content. I will probably update this post several times to add some more finds in 2024.

"No developer must read this" negates the Dunning-Kruger claim prevalent in spam post titles, which we sometimes try to mock in the parody section. Post like "24 repositories EVERY developer MUST use in 2024", plus several emojis and some pseudo-high-quality images generated by "artificial intelligence". Please spare me!

I used to claim that the main reason to save and publish a reading list like this is to help myself and other senior developers find content apart from the many beginner's React and JavaScript tutorials, but I'd rather have that kind of low-quality content back than the more obvious spam that prevails the "relevant" selections these days. Hopefully, DEV will find a way to curate and eliminate. Otherwise, this community will eventually become history, and AI will quote some of our posts from back when we still made an effort.

This is a very subjective list, but we are subjects. It is basically another annotated collection of some DEV posts, including my own and other people's work, that I consider to be valuable reading, covering CSS, JavaScript, HTML, PHP, WordPress, Shopware, Symfony, Laravel, Linux, tools and hardware setup, as well as conceptual aspects like accessibility, usability, sustainability, performance optimization, and ethics. I also like to read and write rants, and I engaged in discussions about DEV itself and other communities and social media platforms.

I regularly cross-post articles on various platforms, including my own weblog, open-mind-culture.org, my DEV blog, my tealfeed, medium and my new hashnode blog.

Where to find your own Reading List on DEV.to

dev.to/readinglist is a link to my full reading list, but beware, it will take everyone to their own DEV reading list instead.

Top comments (4)

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dagnelies profile image
Arnaud Dagnelies

Usually I profoundly dislike such lists of links ... But this one is actually quite nice and superior to the feed. πŸ‘ŒBookmarked!

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ingosteinke profile image
Ingo Steinke, web developer

I would have preferred to make my forem/DEV reading list public, but that's not possible, and it has no categories or sorting options and it has been getting too long. Like many of my posts, this list is mainly for myself, but I'm glad that you also find it useful.

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ingosteinke profile image
Ingo Steinke, web developer

I updated the list again! There is still a lot of valuable discussion on various topics, and some fellow developers have come up with solutions and proposals for the specific DEV spam problem, like forem algorithm changes, UX changes to remove unhelpful incentives and stop rewarding the wrong kind of engagement, and a Chrome browser extension to filter garbage posts based on obvious signals.

Of course it's not only DEV affected and it's not only AI to blame. I get spam emails in my inbox that seem to be written by aspiring individuals, probably very desperate or very ill-advised or both.

I heard that DEV is working on a feature request making it possible to make reading lists public, so hopefully this will be the last update of this kind of content on my behalf. Happy 2024 everyone!

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jmfayard profile image
Jean-Michel πŸ•΅πŸ»β€β™‚οΈ Fayard

Actually I found interesting articles to put in my reading list there.
Also I had forgotten about my own article about Twitter !