English is the lingua franca of programming but the DEV community is polyglot

Should I write in English or in my mother tongue ?

I think many of us here have asked us this question.

But the answer is actually obvious

Writing is its own reward

Social Media and its vanity metrics everywhere taught us the wrong lessons.

Writing, even just for yourself, on paper or on your computer, is always a useful exercice.

Writing in english is a great idea for your career, for too many reasons to write down.

Writing in your mother tongue is also super positive, because at playing with mother tongue is actually a very big deal in life.

Also don't worry about the DRY principle here. You write for a different audience, with different references, a different mindset.

Translating is a creative act.

No one will be mad at you for writing in a language they don't understand

Most people will ignore you, but that's what we already do most of the time.
It's absolutely fine.

Cross posting is good

Editor Note: I will now cross-post all my english and french content on DEV.to and on my website https://desviesdedevs.jmfayard.dev/

That's how I now start all my posts on DEV.to
I do that to get the best of both world.
On my substack, I have a small but great audience that likes my posts and receive them by email.
Even if nobody interacted with my content on DEV.to, the platform has a SEO strength that I will absolutely never have.

But people do interact on DEV.to

Here are some proof that you can have readers in your mother tongue

A bilingual brazilian portuguese - english interview

Featured Org of the Month: Feministech

Michael Tharrington for The DEV Team ・ Mar 22

#interview #community #wecoded #devto

A read who has read 4 ways to judo mansplaining and then went on to read 🇫🇷 4 prises de judo contre le mansplaining

Drazen Dotlic • Mar 20

Just saw the French version and it is even more funny, kudos!
I absolutely loved "...vous pouriez mec-spliquer" 😂

A cool comment in esperanto

axel584 • Mar 17

Bonega artikolo. Mi komencis pasigi tian intervjuon kaj viaj kolsiloj estas saĝaj 😉
Tamen kiel kandidato mi ĉiam diris ke mi deziras plu esti programisto kaj post kvin jaroj, mi havos pli da kompetencoj kaj pli bone laboros 😁
Kelkaj firmaoj starigas tiun demandon por scii ĉu la kandidato povas evolui en tia firmao (se la kandidato deziras iĝi arĥitekto kaj la firmao ne havas tian postenon, ili scios ke la kandidato deziros ŝanĝi post 5 jaroj)

A german reader who take the time and effort to answer me in french

Ingo Steinke, web developer • Mar 26 • Edited on Mar 26 • Edited

Je pensais toujours que c'était les Allemands qui ne savent pas accepter aucune faute grammaticale ou formelle et qui toujours trouvent quelque chose qui est fausse. Mais les mauvaises examples de ce type of gens étaient et sont les profs de francais aux écoles allemands.

Les gens que j'ai rencontré en France, Belgie, Suisse ou Tunisie etaient tranquil sans fixation sur leur langue, sauf en Paris ou on m'avait donné des lecons.

J'aime les "FOTES", ca resemble un peu les bandes dessinées underground à l'age des "K7" (cassettes de musique).

Merci pour l'inspiration de trouver du contenu en francais ici! Je suis étonné que je le sais encore. Et excusez moi pour ne savoir comment écrire une cédille sur cet ordinateur. Ma FOTE!

I rest my case : write in all your languages

The emoji convention

I suggest to follow my convention to start the title with the "language emoji" (actually country emoji) to make us all visible

And follow your language tags

In no particular order

Merci beaucoup - muchas gracias - grazie - danke sehr - obrigado - arigatou gozaimasou

In particular to @ingosteinke @michaeltharrington @lelepg @morgannadev @pachicodes @axel584

What Should You Do Next ?

A thousand miles journey begins with a single step.

🇫🇷 Prends un article que tu as déjà écrit. Publie le sur DEV.to avec l'emoji qui va bien. Fais en la pub dans les commentaires ci-dessous. Comme ça tu peux être sûrε qu'au moins une personne va le lire.

🇩🇪 Ich vermute, du hast bestimmt irgendwann in deinem Leben, etwas interesantes auf Deutsch geschrieben ? Nimm den text und veröffentlicht es auf DEV.to. Dann mach mal ein bisschen Werbung in die Kommentare

🇪🇸 Busca un articulo bueno qué ya has escrito en otro lugar. Publicalo aqui en DEV.to. Y después mandame el enlace en los comentarios. Asi qué pudedes estar seguro qué almenos una persona lo lee.