At some point each of us has wondered if there are any other programming websites like daniweb. This is my list of many I have come across, if you have any other sites to add or comments please post them!


Sites worth checking out:

stackoverflow definitely one of my favorites, I strongly recommend you check this one out. The site has a very refined reputation system. Ever post you make can either be voted up or down, giving or taking reputation from you. SO is run by the community, you are not appointed by the webmaster as a moderator, if you have enough reputation, you have access to moderation tools (hence there are over 175 mods when this site has about 15). The more rep you have, the more you can do.

SO is not forum based like all of the other sites here. In these sites, you ask a question in a forum, and users browsing that forum see you question. In SO, you ask a question and give it up to 5 tags. Users can search by tags, see the newest questions, and view questions many ways. This provides a lot of flexibility, and makes the site easier to use. If you have a question about your windows vista app gui, tag your question 64bit, windows vista, C#, .net3.0, gui (or pick different tags).

SO is very new, currently less than a year old, but it has exploded in popularity. It has many new ideas and cutting edge features. Another difference with SO is that it has less emphasis on user profiles. There's no signatures or messaging between members.

My unofficial tests have shown that SO has the most questions and posts per day than any other site, also the fastest responses. Don't worry about how many users a site has, what really matters is how much activity in questions and answers is on the site. I don't mean to squash smaller sites, but its a lot nicer when your questions get answered faster and you have more questions to answer. here's this same question asked on stack overflow

SO is actually part of a trilogy of websites, all using the exact same design, but about different topics. SO if for programming help, serverfault for " people who manage or maintain computers in a professional capacity. If you are in charge of servers, networks, or many desktop PCs (other than your own), then ask your questions here." and superuser, (coming soon) for absolutely anything else related to computers.

dreamincode (one of my favs): programming and web dev help, large site. Unique feature: very good tutorial and code snippet submission. Users can share their knowledge by submitting their own helpful tutorials and code snippets, which are then approved or disapproved by a moderator. They have 1000 tutorials and 4000 code snippets on a variety of languages. Users have the chance to become famous around the site with developer blogs and their submissions. rep system based on thanks for posts, submissions of tuts and code snippets, and a badge system (8 badges, stuff like contributor, moderator, expert, etc.) SO lets you submit stuff by asking a question, then answering it yourself, so when people search for that question they see your answer. Very few sites have features like this. here is this question answered on dreamincode

codeproject 6 million members, 5.4 million more than closest competitor. I think their forums are a little messed up, but Code Project has tons of features about programming besides the forums, including dev articles and competitions.

devshed little smaller than the others, but I do like their weekly email industry newsletter. [a sample][5] You can sign up for it when you sign up for the website.


Average sites, nothing special:

bytes.com medium sized

codingforums.com much smaller than the others, same idea.

codecall same comments as codingforums, small, nothing great.

wrox programmer to programmer Wrox publisher's help website, goes with their books.

codeguru: based on submitting articles, not forums.

The sites listed in "worth checking out" are very general and have forums for everything. But you can always find sites on more specific issues. Here are some webdev only sites. These will be very useful to you if you don't care about the software development stuff.

Web dev sites:

good, large: sitepoint

good, large: web developer.com

digital point not great, lots of emphasis on search engines.


There are many sites that are specifically directed at one language. Tons of these sites exist, though they are usually smaller but have more focused scope. I will only list a few here as they are extremely easy to find through search engines.

java: sun forums

C# C# friends

PHP php freaks

sorry for the ton of stuff on stack overflow, its just very different from the others, and if you visit it it takes a little while to understand it and how it works. If anyone else has suggestions for websites, please add them, thanks guys!

I really love codeproject.com, if I need a code snippet or example program for MS-Windows that is the very first place I look., and I can usually find something that I can use. codeproject has the best online repository of MS-Windows programs/functions/libraries that I know of.

IMHO Digital Point sucks. I've browsed around there before and it seems to have a lot of spam in all its forums, and its moderators could care less. They will ban a user, including long-time posters, at the drop of the hat for the littlest infraction of their rules. One of their rules I do like -- no "me too" posts, they are deleted and posters infracted.

Ancient Dragon, I hate Digital Point as well. Most of the people there are just posting in the Politics section it seems like. They abuse rep systems if they don't agree with someone. The moderators don't enforce the rules equally and fairly. There is a lot of SPAM and a lot of Scams out of there. If anyone is looking for ANYTHING I wouldn't recommend posting it there. You'll likely get scammed. I got banned there after 20 posts for asking why the moderators don't ban the scammers/fraudsters. I was told they aren't responsible for it. I then did a whois and noticed they are located in the US (California to be exact) and that they are knowingly providing a medium for scammers and fraudsters, as well as SPAMMERs to operate, and that it was borderline illegal.

I'll be checking those other sites out though.

Also, if you are looking for a webhost that isn't a ginormous one like Host Gator (like you want a more personal touch to it or something along those lines) or you're looking to advertise one that you're just getting up, I'd recommend www.webhostingtalk.com

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