[nn2]

Not sure about sourceforge. It lost its lustre to github, but there are still a lot of good project there.

freshmeat/freecode is really great. Lots of great software there (I liked the old name better)

Browsing the freecode frontpage is far more satisfying than the HN page because it's all about real code that does something and very little hype and BS.

[astrodust]

Reading Sourceforge is not unlike reading magazines at the dentist's office while awaiting a root canal. All the magazines are old, dog-eared, and full of things you don't care about and the environment is extremely disconcerting.

This latest redesign takes Sourceforge from Slashdot-flavored ugly into domain-squatter horrendous.

[nn2]

True for the html layout, but not the content (the projects/code). For a code site layout in the end is very secondary.

Besides github is doing its best to compete on the "largest number of useless buttons/toolbars on the webpage" front with sf. I also found that finding something based on keywords works better on sf than on guthub.

[astrodust]

For code, layout is everything.

Consider how excruciating it is to try and view source code on SourceForge compared with GitHub. On the latter you are literally shown a listing of files with the README already open for any given repository.

Sourceforge has this absolutely useless "Download" link where you have to grab an archive, extract it, dump it into your text editor, and only then will you find out it's not what you want.

It is not an understatement to suggest that Sourceforge is by people with no idea about open source.

[nitrogen]

It is not an understatement to suggest that Sourceforge is by people with no idea about open source.

This comment is quite simply out of line. SourceForge played a crucial role in the promotion and distribution of Open Source software well over a decade ago. It was the first successful repository that freed projects from the uncertainty of university or personal web hosting, it provided collaborative development tools and multi-developer project management years ahead of Github's very existence, and continues to distribute some of the biggest names in Open Source.

Learn your history! (Man, I feel old saying that)

[astrodust]

SourceForge wasn't SourceForge back then, it was other things that were later aggregated into it. I've been on the internet before there were browsers, so I know my history.

Freshmeat was never a spectacular platform, but it was the de-facto open-source distribution center at the time. It played an important role in that environment, but was more of a distribution channel than a collaboration tool.

Today SourceForge is the GeoCities of source hosting. It has almost no redeeming features.

[nitrogen]

SourceForge may have started as something else, but it was already SourceForge by 2000. Check out my account, created January of 2000: http://sourceforge.net/users/nitrogen

It's not my intention to try to one up others with my four-digit UID. All I'm saying is, I was there, I was heavily involved in Open Source at the time, and SourceForge was critical.

Edit to add: Geocities was pretty important to the development of the web, too. Part of me prefers the days when everyone made their own eye-gouging web site instead of relying on Facebook. There was a much more eclectic selection of content available back then.

[zeruch]

Github would never have existed without SF. That isn't to defend what SF has become, but to put it in context; to pretend that all its progeny (and they are exactly that) somehow don't owe something to that (not reverence, but just an acknowledgement...because that actually does matter as a learning exercise) is a bit daft.

[coffeeaddicted]

Download contains the easy to use end-packages for users. I guess this is because it's more aimed at end-users which usually look for exactly that package first. Developers can certainly also browse code online - you just have to go into the "develop" or "code" sections of a project (you can find the code from both).

[gknoy]

It's possible that I'm misunderstanding Sourceforge's goals, but for a site that is ostensibly about hosting software development, having the developer-oriented part of the experience be less convenient than that of an end-user seems backwards. I'm ashamed to say that I've never had anything on either Github or Sourceforge, but Github seems to be very much about sharing the sources, whereas Sourceforge seems to be much more about conveniently distributing the project's binaries.

This is probably largely related to the behavior of their users, though: Github's interface is not a lot more informative than Sourceforge's if no one writes a useful readme, and there have frequently been well-written projects hosted on Sourceforge that have lots of good information on how it works, or how to use it. However, I rarely seem to hear about new projects at Sourceforge, and frequently do see stuff at Github that has well-written introductory documentation accompanying the sources.

I frequently want to read about projects that solve interesting problems, but might not have the interest in installing or using it. Moreover, many people seem to now be using Github as a "Host my interesting document easily" host, which reinforces the "I go to Github to read code / read about code" perception. I'm sure a large part of it is confirmation bias, since most of the interesting code-related things I read about here are hosted at Github. ;)

[coffeeaddicted]

Yes, it is very user orientated. Offering users free software with access to sources for those which are interested. And well, for a lot of software that just makes sense. Maybe not for the kernel or for web-development, but a lot for typical desktop software. SF isn't just about source-hosting, it's about hosting complete projects including distribution of binary packages, allowing that projects use custom homepages (instead of scary source-browsing...) and even support for user (and developer) forums.

I don't think it's that hard to see that this is still preferable for many projects.

[JohnTHaller]

It may have lost its luster, but SourceForge is a far more popular site than Github. Granted SourceForge is more for apps and Github is more for code, so SF gets more visitors stopping in to download apps like Pidgin, OpenOffice, GIMP, PortableApps.com, etc.