Re: forum and blog for developers

On Sunday, May 22, 2011, fei <xjianz@gmail.com> wrote:
> I have been using Django for a while. The documentation for the Django
> official web page is great, plus the free online django book. There
> are enough documentations to get started using Django. However, I feel
> there is a missing blog for Django developers.

Django has a blog - it's linked from the homepage.

http://djangoproject.com/weblog

However, it's only used for large project announcements (releases,
conferences, and so on).

> Having a blog for developers is very useful. The blog can publish
> articles regarding the latest features, design decisions behind the
> scene and useful tricks. For example, Django introduced class base
> generic view from version 1.3. An blog article can talk about why to
> move from function based generic view to class based.
>
> As Django developers, it's better not just to know how to use Django,
> but also to understand why Django is doing this way. Learning it this
> way can help developers write better code. Having a official blog is
> also a form of advertising for Django, so more people will start to
> use Django. The Android blog is a very good example (http://android-
> developers.blogspot.com/). I found out the Android blog is very
> useful.

Is a developer blog, in principle, a good idea? Sure. however, we
simply don't have the power or resources to compel anyone to write
entries.

There's a significant difference between Android and Django - Django
is an open source project maintained by volunteers, whereas Android is
funded and is being actively promoted by Google. Google pays for
people specifically to write this sort of blog content; Django doesn't
have those resources. If we want a blog entry, someone has to
volunteer the time to write it. And that means that writing blog
entries is competing for attention with fixing bugs, answering
questions on mailing lists, and so on.

The good news is that because we are a volunteer organization,
*anyone* can help out. If you think a developer blog would be
worthwhile, start writing! You don't need to be officially blessed to
start a blog. Once you've got the blog, you can add it to the
community aggregator, so everyone knows about it. If you make a habit
of writing good blog entries, you will become known as a valuable
community resource, and the entire community will benefit.

Yours,
Russ Magee %-)

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