Awesome Awesomeness: an index of indexes, in one Markdown file, last touched in 2024

The repository is a README, and the Ruby is the Dangerfile

The top level of this repository holds seven entries and no source code: a .github directory, two continuous integration configuration files, a Dangerfile, a contributing guide, a code of conduct, and the README. That is the entire project.

It is worth pausing on why the repository's language is recorded as Ruby. There is no Ruby application here. Danger is a tool that reviews pull requests, and its configuration is a Ruby script, so the Dangerfile is what makes the project register as Ruby. That is the entire toolchain: a Markdown document, a bot that comments on incoming pull requests, and the CI that runs it.

The two CI files are also a period marker. One is a Travis configuration, the other is a .varci.yml, which is the configuration format for a hosted continuous integration service that ran on Travis. Both are from an era when a repository like this was small enough to be reviewed by a bot plus a volunteer.

For an adopter, the practical consequence is that there is nothing to install, nothing to run, and nothing to depend on. The value, such as it is, is entirely in the text of one file.

The language section is alphabetical, and several languages carry several lists

The README opens with a package manager entry and then a Programming Languages section that runs alphabetically from Ada through V, through Ansible, AutoHotkey, C, C/C++, CMake, ColdFusion, Common Lisp, Crystal, D, Delphi, Elixir, Elm, Erlang, F#, Fortran, Go, Haskell, Idris, Java, JavaScript, Julia, Kotlin, Lua, Nim, OCaml, Perl, PHP, Python, R, Ruby, Rust, Scala, Shell, Swift, TypeScript and V.

The nesting is where it gets awkward. Most languages have one entry, but several have several, and the deeper level is where the choice happens. Python has five links under it, Ruby four, Swift four, Erlang three, TypeScript three, Common Lisp two with one for libraries and one for learning, Clojure two, Lua two. JavaScript expands into a second level of its own with Angular, Ember, Koa, Node.js, React, Svelte and Vue, and Node.js expands again with cross-platform Node and Node ESM.

The consequence is that this index cannot answer the question people usually bring to it. There is no single Python list here, so you are choosing between five, and the README gives no description of what distinguishes them. A reader who wants the largest one has to open several and compare.

Several entries announce their own age in their own name

Look closely at the entry names and some of them are timestamps. There is a JavaScript entry for Angular 2 rather than Angular. There is a Coronavirus entry sitting between Common Lisp and Crystal, which dates that section to the period when the pandemic lists were being written. There is Kotlin and Kotlin/Native as separate entries, and MongoDB and MySQL filed under programming languages rather than under databases.

None of that is an error. It is what an alphabetical list looks like when nobody renames anything, and it is the clearest signal in the file about how the file is maintained: entries are added and the old ones stay.

The last push to the repository was 2024-06-02, and the project is not archived. So the file is still there, still readable, and still more than two years past its last edit. That is the honest summary of a curated link list with no releases and no version history to check against: it is a snapshot, and the entries inside it are snapshots of a different vintage each.

One language list is not hosted on GitHub at all

Almost every link points at github.com, which is unremarkable for a list of GitHub projects. One does not. The C entry goes to notabug.org, a different forge, at an account named koz.ross.

That single exception tells you what this index really is. It is a map of the community's curated lists wherever they live, not a list of repositories on one platform. The same is true of the Swift section, which includes a link described as coming from ZEEF, a bookmarking service, rather than from a repository.

So there is no consistent host, no consistent naming convention across the entries, and no consistent level of curation. Some are single curated lists, some are directories of directories, and one is a set of bookmarks. Treating the output as uniform is the first mistake, and the cure is to open the thing you were sent to and judge it on its own terms.

The general section mixes Android UI, Agile and security research

After the languages comes a General section, and the categories run alphabetically alongside the languages. In the visible part of it there is .htaccess, Accessibility with two entries, Agile, Algolia, Algorithms with a visualisation entry and a Big O notation entry, Amazon Web Services, Analytics, Android with four sub-entries, Software Architecture, Arduino, Artificial intelligence, API with two entries, Apple with two sub-entries covering macOS and macOS and iOS security, Beacons, and Big data with two entries.

Under Android, the sub-entries are Apps, Release Notes, Security and UI. So the section carries practical reference material and security material in the same alphabetical run, with no marker distinguishing them.

That is worth naming as a property of the artifact rather than a criticism of it. An index of links carries no information about whether a linked project is alive, whether its licence suits you, or whether its advice is current. Its only editorial act was the decision to include the link. Everything else is your verification, and the README has no template asking a submitter for a version or a date.

There is no version to pin and nothing to diff except the file

The repository has no GitHub releases, and the project is a single document, so there is no artefact to install and no version to depend on. If you want to know whether an entry was added or removed, the only thing you can compare is the README itself between two commits.

That is a real constraint for anyone who wants to use this as a source. A package manager gives you a version and a changelog. A container image gives you a tag you can pin. A list of links gives you a file that changes under you, and the only signal of change is the date of the last push, which for this repository is 2024-06-02.

The one piece of process the repository does have is the pull request review. A Dangerfile next to two CI configurations means a bot is configured to comment on incoming changes, which is the mechanism a list like this uses to keep entries formatted consistently. If you want to contribute, that bot is the thing that will read your pull request, and the contributing guide in the root is the document that says what it wants.

The README does not tell you how to submit anything

There is a contributing guide and a code of conduct in the repository root, and neither is reflected in the README. The file itself is a list of headings and links from the first line to the last, with no statement of what belongs, what does not, how to format an entry, or what a reviewer will check.

For a list whose entire editorial surface is a bullet list, those rules are the project. A link with a consistent label, a working target and a sensible place in the alphabet is the whole contribution standard, and a repository that does not state it will accumulate the kind of entry that makes an index less useful rather than more.

So the practical sequence for a contributor is short. Read the contributing guide first, since that is where the rules are. Then look at the entries around where yours would go, because the existing formatting is the de facto standard. Then expect a bot rather than a person to respond first, because that is what the Dangerfile is for.

Editorial conclusion

Use Awesome Awesomeness as a starting map for finding a community-maintained list about a language or a topic, and to find out who maintains one, because several entries name a maintainer directly. Do not use it as a source of truth about any tool, since it is an index of links with no description, no version and no freshness marker, and the file itself has not been touched since 2024-06-02. Before you follow anything it points at: open the linked list and check its own last update, since this index says nothing about the state of what it lists; read CONTRIBUTING.md before opening a pull request, because the README carries no submission instructions; and prefer the per-language lists over this one where both exist, since a list dedicated to a language will have been maintained by people who use it.

Frequently asked questions

Official sources

1. Official README
2. Project repository