Microsoft launched another community resource called MSDN Code Gallery, yesterday. After GotDotNet, the former community portal, has been phased out, Microsoft now launches another successor in addition to CodePlex.
CodePlex and the MSDN Gallery serve two different purposes. In order to develop, plan, and release an open source project and to provide a collaboration platform for your project, CodePlex is the right place to go. The MSDN Code Gallery is a community platform for sharing all kinds of resources, ranging from code snippets to whole sample applications.
S. Somasegar, Corporate Vice President of the Developer Division at Microsoft, announces the MSDN Gallery as follows:
The MSDN Code Gallery is a portal for snippets, samples and other resources. In it you can find pages that describe samples and supporting documents including screenshots and design documents. In addition, you will find hosted conversations about these samples, sample projects or other resources that have been provided to the community. This destination is open to the entire community to contribute content to.
Jim Galasyn talks about the features of the portal and explains how contributions to the community can effectively be presented:
The MSDN Code Gallery is a great place to put any sample projects you may have to help the developer community. Here you can create a Wiki-style page to describe your sample and upload supporting documents including screenshots, design documents, or even video files. In addition, you can host conversations about your samples, sample projects or other resources that you have provided to the community. You then place your code file on the releases tab to automatically receive a download count and an MS Public License click through.
The Gallery offers an intuitive user interface, which allows for sorting community contributions and applying filters based on search criteria and tags.