135
votes

We know Jeff and Joel use Stack Overflow (obviously), but what other "famous" developers or at least working on popular projects, or important blogs do you know of that are using Stack Overflow?

Define famous: Book authors, popular project leaders/developers (think VCS, an IDE, a database engine, etc., stuff we ask about here at Stack Overflow). I mean famous as in "has done something important for the rest of us".

22
  • At least you should put that Wiki... and this has been already discussed... let me find the old post.
    – Patrick Desjardins
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:18
  • I think this would be best as a community wiki.
    – EBGreen
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:18
  • Oops...9 second spread on those. :)
    – EBGreen
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:18
  • EBgreen edit some words in the text. We need 4 edits to make that wiki. I already edited.
    – Patrick Desjardins
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:19
  • Alright, now it's wiki. I can't find the previous post about that question. This might be deleted.
    – Patrick Desjardins
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:22
  • I definitely remember the previous question, but yeah, might be deleted
    – Jimmy
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:24
  • I haven't read the previous post, but it would be cool if you could find it though.
    – Fernando Briano
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:28
  • What if you're famous but not for programming?
    – MusiGenesis
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:30
  • That doesn't answer the question MusiGenesis.
    – Fernando Briano
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:31
  • 9
    Yes it does. If Charles Manson ever takes up programming, he will instantly be a "famous developer".
    – MusiGenesis
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:38
  • 6
    Now you've gone and made Angelina and the kids cry. Shame on you!
    – MusiGenesis
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:39
  • :P I guess I should have made my question more specific. But yeah, I guess if an already famous celebrity became a developer, it would be a famous developer. I meant famous as in "has done something important for the rest of us".
    – Fernando Briano
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:42
  • 1
    Is it a reflection on them or on me if I say I haven't heard of any of these people?
    – dacracot
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 18:59
  • 1
    @dacracot, you should at least have heard of Jon Skeet!
    – Robert S.
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 19:16
  • 4
    What i love about checking out the profiles of these people is to read the answers they give to their own specialization.
    – Ólafur Waage
    Commented Jan 6, 2009 at 0:33

65 Answers 65

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135
votes

Stack Overflow exists because Jon Skeet allows it.

17
  • 3
    Are you in love with jon skeet or something? that is kinda creepy
    – theman_on_vista
    Commented Dec 15, 2008 at 18:23
  • No, @theman, he is continuing a joke started on Stackoverflow earlier.
    – Andrei Rînea
    Commented Dec 17, 2008 at 2:08
  • 8
    Although new readers could be forgiven for thinking that being in love with JS was a condition of membership...
    – ChrisA
    Commented Jan 12, 2009 at 13:45
  • 18
    Members aren't in love with Jon Skeet. Members are in love with up-voting Jon Skeet. You get $1 every time you do. It's auto-tracked.
    – Kieveli
    Commented Jan 12, 2009 at 14:02
  • If you want to move from purgatory to heaven vote for jon skeet!
    – Binoj Antony
    Commented Mar 17, 2009 at 15:26
  • 77
    jon skeet fanboyism makes me sick, even if its a joke started earlier.
    – Richard J. Terrell
    Commented Mar 17, 2009 at 21:10
  • 22
    i laugh at you being sick
    – Eric
    Commented Mar 18, 2009 at 0:26
  • > jon skeet fanboyism makes me sick every religion has to start somewhere and somehow ... ;-)
    – none
    Commented May 20, 2009 at 21:51
  • 3
    is jone skeet Neil Patrick Harrison of C#?
    – CodeToGlory
    Commented Aug 12, 2009 at 21:40
  • I saw Jon Skeet's book in a local Barnes & Nobles recently. Congrats, Jon - your book is famous enough to make it across the pond and not be bought in bookstores in the American South.
    – Super Long Names are Hilarious
    Commented Oct 13, 2009 at 14:30
  • 8
    @CodeToGlory - Who is Jone Skeet and who is Neil Patrick Harrison? Get your names right, dude.
    – Super Long Names are Hilarious
    Commented Oct 13, 2009 at 15:44
  • What do you mean allows it?
    – Starx
    Commented Mar 30, 2012 at 4:42
  • 1
    He's in the top .01% for rep.
    – CoffeeRain
    Commented Apr 5, 2012 at 14:27
  • 2
    I thought Stack Overflow exists because Chuck Norris allows it.
    – Diego Pino
    Commented Oct 5, 2012 at 14:32
  • 1
    When he hits 1.000.000 reputation, will he throw a party?
    – BRHSM
    Commented Feb 18, 2016 at 15:02
111
votes

We're all famous, aren't we? :)

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  • 2
    I'd like to think so!
    – Frank V
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 17:41
  • Five minutes of fame!
    – dacracot
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 18:57
  • 92
    "My Mom says I'm cool." --Milhouse (The Simpsons)
    – cletus
    Commented Dec 17, 2008 at 2:19
  • yes we are famous :)
    – Yassir
    Commented Jun 24, 2009 at 18:14
  • 1
    at least in our own minds.
    – JohnFx
    Commented Dec 21, 2009 at 15:55
  • 1
    @Esko : No. Only if you have a ♦, or if you're among the top 10% of highest rep users.
    – rlb.usa
    Commented Jun 30, 2010 at 19:37
  • @rlb: My gravatar has multiple stars, does that count?)
    – Esko
    Commented Jul 1, 2010 at 6:04
  • @Esko : No. We think of gravatar avatars as laziness.
    – rlb.usa
    Commented Jul 1, 2010 at 13:47
  • @rlb: But I'm lazy by definition, I'm an engineer!
    – Esko
    Commented Jul 2, 2010 at 13:57
  • @Esko, well, since you're so determined to be famous, you just might be some day. Perhaps you may rank #2 on SO rep - right behind Skeet of course.
    – rlb.usa
    Commented Jul 2, 2010 at 19:54
108
votes

How about Eric Lippert, one of the principal developers on the C# compiler team?

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  • 4
    Surprised this one was six answers down the page.
    – Justin Morgan
    Commented Mar 16, 2011 at 14:22
  • 13
    He is one of the developers of the compiler, but I'm sure he would be surprised to find out that he was one of the people who created the language.
    – Gabe
    Commented Mar 22, 2011 at 3:08
  • 5
    He's so cool he can talk about himself in third person (on his profile) (no disrespect intended)
    – keyser
    Commented May 16, 2012 at 12:51
79
votes

Alan Kay is in the house!

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  • 31
    Define "in the house" ;) - he's answered one question, which was about himself ... ;)
    – Thomas Hansen
    Commented Jan 6, 2009 at 0:45
  • 2
    he's asked one now which i predict might be quite popular :)
    – Colin Pickard
    Commented Jan 11, 2009 at 13:33
  • @Thomas Hansen - Mind you, so did Jon Skeet, although it's not the only question he's answered ;-}
    – ConcernedOfTunbridgeWells
    Commented Jan 14, 2009 at 0:28
  • 21
    >2000 reputation with 1 question and 1 answer. Wow.
    – Stu Thompson
    Commented Sep 18, 2009 at 17:31
  • 12
    The answer about himself being: I don't remember. Congratulations!
    – mouviciel
    Commented Nov 4, 2009 at 9:44
  • 1
    Does it count as Metaprogramming?
    – Diego Pino
    Commented Oct 5, 2012 at 14:34
  • Apparently, this user prefers to keep an air of mystery about them. but you still sharing .. ehhh
    – Muhammad Omer Aslam
    Commented Mar 29, 2019 at 8:50
74
votes

John Resig (Mr. jQuery)

2
  • 1
    +1. I wasn't able to find him using search :)
    – galymzhan
    Commented Feb 25, 2011 at 9:23
  • 2
    +1 finally,ONE postwhere I can't say 'not enough jquery'
    – Manishearth
    Commented Apr 5, 2012 at 6:12
61
votes

Bjarne Stroustrup - a computer scientist most notable for developing the C++ programming language. He joined Stack Overflow in May 2009.

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  • 31
    He joined in may, answer one single question, got 20 up votes and never come back.
    – OscarRyz
    Commented Aug 21, 2009 at 17:05
  • 2
    Its now one hundred thousand votes!
    – user1228
    Commented Jun 21, 2011 at 14:34
  • 1
    I guess that if he had engaged more in Stackoverflow he should have to answer many questions :)
    – Diego Pino
    Commented Oct 5, 2012 at 14:37
  • 1
    "stackoverflow.com/help/badges/13/yearling Active member for a year, earning at least 200 reputation. This badge can be awarded multiple times." Yet he got it 5 times in 2 days lol.
    – AMDG
    Commented Aug 12, 2014 at 20:55
  • and the only answer he provided seems more like a Link Only answer :D
    – Muhammad Omer Aslam
    Commented Mar 29, 2019 at 8:53
52
votes

Chief Mono Monkey and father of Gnome

That Microsoft guy who writes about Africa (among other things) - ;)

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  • 6
    w00t i have more rep than both of them, does that make me cool?
    – Ólafur Waage
    Commented Jan 6, 2009 at 0:28
  • 11
    I'm sure they have better things to do
    – Jimmy
    Commented Jan 6, 2009 at 17:14
  • Which this had been two separate answers.
    – Alex Angas
    Commented Sep 18, 2009 at 14:46
  • 11
    About Africa, amongst other things. That's hilarious.
    – Scott Hanselman
    Commented Oct 21, 2009 at 8:39
  • @Olafur, I asked about this somewhere. If a God like Miguel de Icaza were answering questions on .Net and not just on Mono, he'd have a much bigger rep. Perhaps as big as yours?
    – Dan Rosenstark
    Commented Dec 31, 2009 at 10:32
43
votes

Python Guru, Alex Martelli.

I wasn't sure if it was really him at first, but given the amount of reputation he has amassed so quickly, and the fact that Joel gave a talk at Google a couple weeks ago... seems legit :-).

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36
votes

Randal Schwartz was a high-profile Perl god at one point and has written quite a few books on the subject (eat your heart out Jon Skeet). I don't know to what extent he's still involved in Perl development, but he's turned up now as a Smalltalk/Seaside consultant.

Martin Von Lowis is quite a major contributor in Python Circles (at least I'd heard of him).

I think we've invented a new game - Stackoverflow Celebrity Watch.

Ewww. Now I feel like a stalker :-p

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  • 6
    Although Stonehenge, the company Randal and I run, mostly does Perl consulting, we now do Smalltalk consulting too. We haven't abandoned Perl and we just updated our Learning Perl book this summer.
    – brian d foy
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 19:15
  • +1 for Randal. Awesome guy, and what Intel did to him was an extreme injustice.
    – John Dunagan
    Commented Dec 12, 2008 at 17:21
  • +1 - As far as I know, Randal Schwartz is the only regular SO user (besides Joel) who has written a book that I've actually read.
    – Bill the Lizard
    Commented Jan 12, 2009 at 13:42
  • @Bill - you haven't read any of brian d foy's? :)
    – DVK
    Commented Apr 9, 2010 at 5:50
  • @DVK: My Perl skills are ancient and crusty, so much so that I have to stay out of the tag. I have an early edition of Learning Perl from before @brain d foy was listed as an author (maybe he was a contributor but didn't get full author credit? I don't know, he'd have to answer that). I should probably get an up-to-date copy of the book. Maybe this is why the 5-10 perl answers I've left on SO have mostly been downvoted. :)
    – Bill the Lizard
    Commented Apr 9, 2010 at 12:38
  • @Bill - I count a total of 5 perl tag answers for 25 total votes. Not too shabby as far as averages go :)
    – DVK
    Commented Apr 9, 2010 at 20:50
30
votes

For the Delphi community: Nick Hodges is quite famous.

2
  • He's great for Delphi, at least what I remember from the borland.public days ...
    – CheGueVerra
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 17:07
  • 3
    He's still great for Delphi
    – Argalatyr
    Commented Dec 13, 2008 at 2:59
28
votes

There are only two users here (besides Jeff and Joel) that I have heard of before (=famous?). Those are Kent Beck of Extreme Programming fame, and Bill Karwin (a lead developer on the Zend Framework library).

11
  • I hadn't even heard of Jeff and Joel until recently...
    – Brian Knoblauch
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:24
  • Bill Karvin: an EX lead developer at Zend Framework
    – markus
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:46
  • :o The "Kent Beck" ??? I though someone took his name, like... CheGueVerra... Is that him really?
    – OscarRyz
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 16:46
  • Are you crazy, I'm less than dust besides the great Kent Beck, but feel somehow pleased that, someone thought he might be me ... :D
    – CheGueVerra
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 17:04
  • I'm still hyped about Oscar's comment .. must be a slow day at work ... Him and Fowler, are guys that I really respect there work.
    – CheGueVerra
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 17:11
  • @[CheGueVerra]: LOL - no one thinks you're Kent Beck or Che, Oscar was referring to Kent! But I am curious why you'd choose the notorious communist revloutionary and executioner Che Guevara as your avatar...and then misspell his name!
    – Steven A. Lowe
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 20:43
  • Easy, I'm not him or claim to be, as for the reason see here stackoverflow.com/questions/357167/…
    – CheGueVerra
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 23:25
  • Yup, I misunderstood that completly ... lol ah well, still made my day.
    – CheGueVerra
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 23:27
  • @Che: Me and Fowler? ? ? :-O Well thank you Now you made my day LOL :P :P Nahh sorry man, I attempt to say : " Probably someone took Kent's name in the same fashion someone took Che's" And I understand. Kent, Folwer [and Me ;)] Are those who you really respect.
    – OscarRyz
    Commented Dec 17, 2008 at 2:23
  • @tharkun: Doesn't his profile still says he is?
    – alex
    Commented Feb 11, 2009 at 0:37
  • @alex: I was the project lead on ZF through their 1.0 release. I left Zend in October 2007, and stopped contributing to the project.
    – Bill Karwin
    Commented Jul 31, 2009 at 23:11
27
votes

Walter Bright is the father of the D programming language.

I think it's interesting to note that most of these famous developers have rather low reputations (Jon Skeet excluded of course) it almost makes you think they have better things to do with their time...

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  • 1
    I'm a big Fan of D, but I don't think Walter Bright is that famous, or else, D would've been more famous, i.e. more mainstream
    – hasen
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 22:20
  • it's time is coming...
    – Phil Nash
    Commented Dec 12, 2008 at 17:42
  • brian d foy is a leader in Perl tag.
    – DVK
    Commented Apr 9, 2010 at 5:52
  • 3
    Andrei Alexandrescu is also here now.
    – mmyers
    Commented Jul 21, 2010 at 19:09
  • 2
    @hasen: Walter used to be famous for Zortech C++ before he invented D.
    – sbi
    Commented Dec 18, 2010 at 9:43
26
votes

Jan Goyvaerts is the webmaster of regular-expressions.info: a true Regex Master.

26
votes

I consider brian d foy to be famous, and he's quite active here (rep 6K+ and a very frequent editor of questions and answers). Interesting that I don't see his name mentioned with a couple of other Perl programmers who were mentioned.

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  • 6
    Well, outside of Perl I'm a nobody :)
    – brian d foy
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 19:14
  • 22
    Coincidentally, outside of Perl I'm a brian d foy :)
    – Kyle Cronin
    Commented Dec 11, 2008 at 19:38
  • 5
    Nothing that exists is truly outside of Perl! :)
    – skiphoppy
    Commented Dec 12, 2008 at 17:07
  • 2
    @skiphoppy - You don't know how right you are. xkcd.com/224
    – Chris Lutz
    Commented Mar 11, 2009 at 9:07
  • @Chris Lutz They say Emacs has a macro for that, too.
    – Mark C
    Commented Nov 7, 2010 at 0:27
  • 2
    No longer this user exist...
    – nicael
    Commented Nov 6, 2014 at 0:13
  • @nicael I fixed the link.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Feb 7, 2016 at 19:20
24
votes
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  • 1
    Obie posted a single question and leave. I think forever. Probably I think he would have liked SO to be written RoR
    – OscarRyz
    Commented Dec 17, 2008 at 2:14
  • I don't see Allison Randal's page. Am I crazy, or is that link broken?
    – James Thompson
    Commented Jun 24, 2009 at 18:16
  • Updated the link to an Allison Randal answer. Looks like her user account is closed.
    – Corbin March
    Commented Jun 25, 2009 at 5:40
  • Randal's answer has since been deleted. For those of you who don't believe it ever existed, see this screenshot.
    – zondo
    Commented Jul 24, 2016 at 18:22
24
votes

Allen Bauer and Barry Kelly are also quite famous in the Delphi community.

21
votes

I am a famous programmer, just not yet. Maybe another ten years.

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  • 15
    yea keep dreaming "karl".. ive seen your code
    – theman_on_vista
    Commented Mar 17, 2009 at 15:14
  • 5
    so... still hopefull?..... for the next 10 years?....
    – Muhammad Omer Aslam
    Commented Mar 29, 2019 at 8:56
20
votes

Andreas Hausladen writes a lot of useful fixes for the Delphi IDE, we call him "The Delphi God", when he posts some new fix on his blog we just say "The Delphi God strikes again!".

Seriously now, for me and my coworkers he is the guy we admire the most, because he contributes a lot to make our work easier and less stressful (as he fixes a lot of stuff before, and some times better than even codegear).

1
  • My vote for him. Very useful stuff.
    – Dmitry Kramarov
    Commented Oct 14, 2009 at 6:31
18
votes

From the Apple / Objective-C / Cocoa community, there are several well-known individuals...

18
votes

Larry Osterman , a pretty well-known MSDN blogger.

0
17
votes

The creator of Python: Guido van Rossum

13
votes

I read a post of Bruce Eckel today.

1
  • 14
    The account is no more.
    – Stu Thompson
    Commented Sep 18, 2009 at 17:32
13
votes

Robert Martin - Aka Uncle Bob - from ObjectMentor. However, imho, Robert Martin doesn't pay attention to SO as much as he used to after Joel Spolsky and Jeff Atwood's childish sarcasm on him. I might be wrong, though.

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  • 2
    I doubt that. He subsequently appeared on the podcast as a guest (blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/02/podcast-41) and it seems like he was on relatively good terms with Atwood and Spolsky.
    – Kyle Cronin
    Commented May 12, 2009 at 18:16
  • I could be wrong, but I think Uncle Bob occasionally appears where there is mention of one of the SOLID principles. I answered this question a while back linking to his paper on SOLID, and Uncle Bob popped up later that day and answered the question himself (much better than I managed to, as well.)
    – razlebe
    Commented Sep 6, 2011 at 9:37
13
votes

I (Marco Cantù) am the author of over a dozen books on Delphi, published around the world. Do I count as a famous developer? Probably only in the given community, "Delphi"...

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  • 4
    I don't know you, but if that's true, then yes you're geek famous.
    – Dan Rosenstark
    Commented Dec 31, 2009 at 10:26
12
votes

D. Richard Hipp the maker of SQLite and Fossil to name a few of his open source and public domain projects

One of the un-sung heroes in my books

2
  • page not found?
    – llimllib
    Commented Jun 24, 2009 at 18:19
  • 2
    The page seems to have disappeared. His name is D. Richard Hipp, not Dr. He may also be a doctor but the D. is an initial.
    – delete
    Commented Nov 4, 2009 at 8:44
11
votes

Herb Sutter joined Stack Overflow in March 2010.

Herb Sutter is a prominent C++ expert. He is also a book author and a columnist for Dr. Dobb's Journal. He joined Microsoft in 2002 as a platform evangelist for Visual C++ .NET, rising to lead software architect for C++/CLI. Sutter served as secretary and convener of the ISO C++ standards committee for over 10 years. (from Wikipedia)

10
votes

The creator of Scala: Martin Odersky

10
votes

Andrei Alexandrescu, an author of several C++ programming books and one of the creators of the D programming language.

2
  • That's not actually the Andrei Alexandrescu, as far as I can tell. This is his real account.
    – mmyers
    Commented Nov 7, 2010 at 3:47
  • @Michael: Oh, okay. I'll edit it.
    – uɐɯsO uɐɥʇɐN
    Commented Nov 7, 2010 at 17:20
9
votes

I saw Kent Beck on here a while ago

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