Essays, opinions, and advice on the act of computer programming, from Stack Overflow.
Visit stackoverflow.blog → RSS feedOn Hacker News Nov 2016 – Jul 2026
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Now, that’s not because most Stack Overflow contributors are hostile jerks. The majority of them are generous and kind. Sure, a few are… just generous, I guess? But our active users regularly express their frustration that we haven’t done more to make outsiders feel more welcome. The real problem isn’t the community …
When people ask me what they should know first about going into technical interviews, they get the same answer: be prepared to talk .
Kristina Lustig, formerly our Director of Design, explains why she took a new role as an associate software developer.
Last March, I shared that we were starting to look for a new CEO for Stack Overflow. We were looking for that rare combination of someone who could foster the community while accelerating the growth of our businesses, especially Teams, where we are starting to close many huge deals and becoming a hyper-growth…
Absent a time machine, telling others how to avoid my mistakes is the best I can do.
Why replacing programmers with AI won’t be so easy.
Big news! We’re looking for a new CEO for Stack Overflow. I’m stepping out of the day-to-day and up to the role of Chairman of the Board. Stack Overflow has been around for more than a decade. As I look back, it’s really amazing how far it has come. Only six months after we had launched Stack Overflow, my co-founder…
Today, we launched the Stack Overflow Salary Calculator , a tool that allows developers and employers to find typical salaries based on experience level, location, specific technologies, and education. We did this because we believe developers should be empowered with more information around job searches, careers, and…
There was a time where it seemed like we barely even needed to talk about this: Joel had won the argument , the Internet agreed that private offices were the future, and only incompetent management (or a tight budget) was still putting developers in cubicle farms. A glorious future lay before us.
Moving into a management role may be a rewarding step in your career, but you should know about the things you're leaving behind.
Absent a time machine, telling others how to avoid my mistakes is the best I can do.
A question on Stack Overflow’s Software Engineering site caught our attention recently. It tries to come to terms with the impact of scrum on developers' ability to do a great job. The claim is a bold one: Scrum is turning good developers into average ones. Could that be true?
Copying and pasting can be dangerous, but then again, so can many aspects of software development when done incautiously. In this post, I’ll take a look at what code copying actually means for software development, what good code theft means, and the pitfalls of copying badly.
When I graduated from college back in 2014, I did so with two bachelor’s degrees, one in computer science and the other in design. I originally chose design because I wanted to learn the necessary design skills in order to improve the usability and appearance of my personal projects. While I originally joined the…
In a previous role, I was an engineering manager for a well-known company for a particular tech stack. One way we sorted through all the applications was requiring coding tests for potential candidates. One truly stood out, and it taught me to think about what I am really looking for in these sorts of submissions.
Defining and measuring programmer productivity is one of the most difficult parts of an engineering manager or CTO’s job description. When everything you do is intangible, how should you measure it? Can it be measured at all?
After interviewing several developers, a pattern started to become clear: great developers share a lot. This takes different forms for different people, but is very often a blog. But for many top developers, their sharing mindset came before their success, and was the direct cause of it, not the result of it.