Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That’s why
it’s so hard.– David McCullough.
Surprising, isn’t it? A lot of programmers assume, or rather, they think writing is only for journalists or bloggers. But the truth is, most respected developers built their reputation by sharing what they know in writing. Think of Dan Abramov, co-author of Redux, who started his career by writing blog posts that later became a go-to resource for developers all around the world.
Which reminds me of a friend of mine when he started learning how to code. He thought he needed to keep all his notes private; he didn’t want anyone to access them. All his notion page was packed with half-written tutorials and bugfixes. He told me about it, and I told him to try publishing some of the things he kept to himself. Fortunately, he was able to publish one short article about how he solved a database error, and something surprising happened.
A junior backend developer from India left a comment saying ’’Thank you, I was stuck on this for four days’’
That’s when he realized that programmers don’t just write code, they write for people, and sharing what you know can help someone on the other side of the world. Also, writing as a programmer is not just for helping others; it makes you more visible in the tech space.
The best way to learn is to teach – Frank Oppenheimer
Which then begs the question. Where should you publish your work? We all know how crowded the internet is; most platforms give you good visibility by helping you put your work out there for people to see, while others feel like you’re just shouting into a void. But fear not, let’s go through some of the best platforms I feel you can and should be using to publish your work.
How to choose a good platform
Before walking you through the platforms you can be using to publish your work. How do you know the platform that works best for you? To pick a platform suitable and perfect for your work, you need to consider and think about what you want:
Do you want a large audience?
Do you want to be able to connect with other developers?
Do you want to have control over your work?
Do you want to earn money?
If you’ve considered all this and you’ve made your decision, let’s then have a look at the best websites you can choose to work with.
1. [Dev. to
Dev. to](http://dev.to) is more like a coffee shop for programmers. It’s a place where most developers love to hang out. A lot of developers post their tutorials, personal experience, and lessons on a project they’re working on or a failed project so others can see and learn from it. Take, for example, you posted a project on your latest debugging tricks, and within an hour, another developer saw your post and commented. ’’Hey, I came across this a week ago. Your solution worked. That’s the kind of vibe you’d get on Dev.to. It’s developer-focused and also a friendly community for developers.
2. Medium
Medium is more like a library for the internet because articles on Medium tend to reach a wider audience and not just programmers. You come across a lot of stories from developers, tech founders, and engineers sharing their knowledge. If you are leaning towards the part of wanting your work to reach a lot of people, Medium is the one for you, and on the other hand, you can also earn a little money through Medium's partner program. Imagine you wrote about a project, and some recruiters or start-up founders come across it; that’s a life-changing opportunity. Quincy Larson, the founder of freecodecamp, also started publishing his works on Medium, and it went viral. That exposure was what helped build one of the biggest coding communities today, so who says you can’t do that, also?
3. Daily Dev
Daily Dev is more like a newsfeed for developers. It’s designed for developers who want quick or easy-to-understand tech content. You can write, publish your work, and your work gets noticed by other programmers scrolling through the feed. Daily dev is gaining more attention from programmers, even though it's less formal than Medium; it's one of the best platforms to use for quick exposure, if you want your work to reach developers who often check for updates daily.
4. Hashnode
Hashnode is also one of the best platforms out there. It's just like you having your own personal blog; you can use your domain, and with that, it makes it look professional. Most programmers who want to grow their personal brand tend to use Hashnode because it gives them control and reach over their work at the same time. If, as a programmer, you are probably looking for a space to share your journey as a programmer, Hashnode is the one for you. Most people even land jobs as a result of them sharing their journey posts and projects because recruiters tend to see their consistent posts.
5. GitHub pages/GitHub Gists
You are probably wondering, what about GitHub? Well, GitHub is a place where code lives, and a lot of programmers use GitHub pages to publish from their repositories. Repositories are more like a storage location on GitHub, a place where code and other files for projects are stored, and developers often use them to publish their blogs or share code snippets.
The same thing goes with Gists, which are perfect for small write-ups and explaining a function. If you are looking to document your code or tutorials, this works perfectly.
Tips to Get Started
You don't need to be an expert to start writing; you just need to share what you know because somewhere, a developer like you is probably searching Google at 2:00 a.m. for an error he/she is having, and your article might be what helps them move forward. So:
Write about what you’ve just learned
Share mistakes that you've made
Be consistent, even if it's one article a month
Conclusion
As a programmer, when you write, you don't just teach; you learn better. Explaining a work you did forces you to simplify it for others to understand, and the more you write, the more you build credibility and opportunities for yourself. Don't keep your knowledge locked in your head; rather, choose one of these platforms and write that article about the new framework you tested or the API you built using Rust. Someone somewhere is waiting to read it.
See you next time.
Top comments (2)
I dislike the paywall of Medium. I don't have a good answer, as hosting websites costs money, but we had a period where major development influencers and advocates posted large quantities of free content that helped drive the community and support the rapid growth of software across many industries. That has significantly diminished in favor of courses which have an even more substantial cost than services like Medium.
Totally understand your point, Samuel. The shift from free community-driven content to paid platforms has changed a lot of things. But i think there's still space for programmers to share freely especially on platforms like DEV. Hopefully, we’ll keep finding and creating spaces where knowledge stays accessible.