CoderWall – Build Your Reputation As a Coder

Having a good professional reputation means everything in an industry like web development, where everybody knows everybody and personal recommendations are the key to landing coveted jobs. CoderWall is like LinkedIn for developers, providing a way for people to collect endorsements from colleagues and establish credibility in a notoriously competitive industry.

Connect with fellow developers, learn from the mistakes others have made, collect feedback on your latest ideas, and promote your projects (as well as yourself) to peers when you sign up for a CoderWall account. Join your company’s “team,” just as you would on LinkedIn, and start networking with peers who are interested in the same professional topics as you are. When you connect CoderWall to your Twitter, LinkedIn, and GitHub accounts, the web-application automatically pulls data from those networks and uses it to award you with special badges – known as “achievements” – based on the technical skills you possess.

Although CoderWall is built primarily as a way for individuals to establish credibility within the development community, the application also offers a team component. Groups of people (like colleagues or friends) can link their profiles together and form their own teams. Teams are then pitted against each other and awarded points based on each member’s achievements and endorsements from others on the site.

Practical Uses:

• Establish yourself within the coder community
• Learn from colleagues who work in the same industry
• Form a team with colleagues, and compete against people at other companies
• Become a “resident expert” by sharing pro tips with other CoderWall users

Insider Tips:

• CoderWall connects to LinkedIn, GitHub, and Twitter
• People can show their Bitbucket repos on their profiles
• Users who write useful pro tips can become the “mayors” of certain networks
• Team scores are re-calculated each night

What we liked:

• Coders can use CoderWall to promote their professional work
• People can offer endorsements to professionals they’ve worked with before
• People can apply for jobs at certain companies through the CoderWall site
• Companies can compete against each other based on skills and achievements

What we didn’t like:

• CoderWall is built for coders specifically, which leaves out professionals who work in other areas of the online development community

Alternatives:

• Folyo – http://folyo.me
• Geeklist – http://geekli.st
• Masterbranch – https://masterbranch.com

Company Info:

• Launched: February 2012
• Privately Held
• Headquarters: San Francisco, California
• Founded by: Matt Deiters
• Web site: http://coderwall.com

Costs:

• Individual profiles are free
• Companies can pay $99 to be featured on the site