Our dilemma: How do we remove the barriers to knowledge about Klocwork’s toolset and developer best practices for creating high-quality code?

The answer: Klocwork Developer Network–a new online portal designed for learning, sharing and discussing all things source code analysis. We have had a lot of fun and a few sleepless nights as we assembled industry knowledge, online forums, computer-based training, best practices from industry experts, and lots of reference and learning resources.

A significant portion of the content on the Developer Network is open for public consumption. By registering and logging in, you get additional videos, demos, CBT and more.

We have a lot of fresh content to add to the site in the upcoming weeks and months, and we want to hear from you about what you would like to see. Why not register now at developer.klocwork.com? Then tell other Klocwork users about the portal too.

Visit Klocwork’s Developer Network at developer.klocwork.com.

Already a my.klocwork.com user? Access the Klocwork Developer Network using your existing my.klocwork.com login. (But note that my.klocwork.com remains the place to go for support tickets and for FTP access to the latest software releases.)

In the beginning was the word. And thanks to Guttenberg, the word was often enclosed in a glossy book and sold for $49.95 at my local computer store. The noble computer book with a shelf-life of six months was the perfect solution for a piano with a missing wheel. Computer books (part of the discipline of book-learnin’) are an increasingly endangered species. Sales of computer books have been off by 8 to 10% year over year for a decade, a trend that shows no sign of slowing.

Still, I miss old-school, printed computer books. It wasn’t so much what they contained, as what they quantified. Using the Rumsfeld model, a nice fat computer book helps me quantify the unknown unknowns. As I tackle a new body of knowledge – say a new language or IDE – the unknown unknowns are infinite. As soon as I have that book in my hand, the unknown unknowns turn into known unknowns. I now know how much I don’t know, and the table of contents is my new best friend – whether I read the book or not. It is hard to beat stretching out at the cottage with a refreshing beverage and the latest tome on source code analysis.

But software developers don’t typically think in linear ways. While many of us are college or university trained, in spite of years of classroom training we run away from learning new knowledge in the old school way. Developers search for the answer to their current problem, rather than accumulating knowledge for its own sake. They listen and watch communities, RSS feeds and blogs for trends. They look for on-line videos, podcasts, newsletters, and magazines. They may even find a book in PDF, and print out a few pages that they want to use for reference.

The challenge for technology companies is to make our collection of facts, tools and interfaces accessible without binding it all up in a single document with a cover. Wikis, on-line API tutorials, developer communities, and a host of other information bits need to replace the old book model.

Of course, it’s hard to argue with Groucho Marx, when he said “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.”