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Two types of software recommendation When someone says "software recommendation" they may mean one of two quite different things, for which the answer to your question will be different. Recommen...
#2: Post edited
by
trichoplax
·
2025-04-28T19:16:45Z (11 days ago)
Improve consistency of example with request
- ## Two types of software recommendation
- When someone says "software recommendation" they may mean one of two quite different things, for which the answer to your question will be different.
- ### Recommendations for users
- If someone asks for software that they can use to do something unrelated to software development, such as editing an image using a graphical user interface, this is outside the scope of Software Development Codidact.
- If anyone would like to be able to ask such questions, they can propose a new community on [Codidact Proposals](https://proposals.codidact.com/categories/66).
- ### Recommendations for developers
- If someone asks for software that they can use in the course of software development, such as a recommendation of a library or some existing software to learn from or adapt, I would expect this to be outside the scope of the Q&A category. Although answering a question about how to fix a specific problem may lead to answers that happen to include a recommended library or existing software to adapt, asking directly for a recommendation does not seem a good fit for the Q&A category.
- However, new categories can easily be added. For example, we already have the [Code Reviews category](https://software.codidact.com/categories/44) where requests for feedback on code can be posted, even though these would be off topic in the Q&A category. If anyone would like to see a new category for software development related recommendation questions, they can suggest this in a Meta question so the community can discuss whether they would like to see this and what its scope would be.
For example, there would need to be a decision on whether such a category would only allow recommendation requests for libraries, or also allow asking about recommended IDEs and other development tools.
- ## Two types of software recommendation
- When someone says "software recommendation" they may mean one of two quite different things, for which the answer to your question will be different.
- ### Recommendations for users
- If someone asks for software that they can use to do something unrelated to software development, such as editing an image using a graphical user interface, this is outside the scope of Software Development Codidact.
- If anyone would like to be able to ask such questions, they can propose a new community on [Codidact Proposals](https://proposals.codidact.com/categories/66).
- ### Recommendations for developers
- If someone asks for software that they can use in the course of software development, such as a recommendation of a library or some existing software to learn from or adapt, I would expect this to be outside the scope of the Q&A category. Although answering a question about how to fix a specific problem may lead to answers that happen to include a recommended library or existing software to adapt, asking directly for a recommendation does not seem a good fit for the Q&A category.
- However, new categories can easily be added. For example, we already have the [Code Reviews category](https://software.codidact.com/categories/44) where requests for feedback on code can be posted, even though these would be off topic in the Q&A category. If anyone would like to see a new category for software development related recommendation questions, they can suggest this in a Meta question so the community can discuss whether they would like to see this and what its scope would be.
- For example, there would need to be a decision on whether such a category would only allow recommendation requests for libraries and example code to learn from, or also allow asking about recommended IDEs and other development tools.
#1: Initial revision
by
trichoplax
·
2025-04-28T19:13:36Z (11 days ago)
## Two types of software recommendation When someone says "software recommendation" they may mean one of two quite different things, for which the answer to your question will be different. ### Recommendations for users If someone asks for software that they can use to do something unrelated to software development, such as editing an image using a graphical user interface, this is outside the scope of Software Development Codidact. If anyone would like to be able to ask such questions, they can propose a new community on [Codidact Proposals](https://proposals.codidact.com/categories/66). ### Recommendations for developers If someone asks for software that they can use in the course of software development, such as a recommendation of a library or some existing software to learn from or adapt, I would expect this to be outside the scope of the Q&A category. Although answering a question about how to fix a specific problem may lead to answers that happen to include a recommended library or existing software to adapt, asking directly for a recommendation does not seem a good fit for the Q&A category. However, new categories can easily be added. For example, we already have the [Code Reviews category](https://software.codidact.com/categories/44) where requests for feedback on code can be posted, even though these would be off topic in the Q&A category. If anyone would like to see a new category for software development related recommendation questions, they can suggest this in a Meta question so the community can discuss whether they would like to see this and what its scope would be. For example, there would need to be a decision on whether such a category would only allow recommendation requests for libraries, or also allow asking about recommended IDEs and other development tools.