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April 2009: Java Still The Most Popular Programming Language

Java is the most popular programming language. C and C++ are still at the ranks two and three - what is remarkable.

Comments:

You get a different picture when looking at the ohloh statistics on open source LOC:

C 1,119,934,913
Java 608,797,774
C++ 523,479,571
PHP 302,877,812
Python 93,094,625
Ruby 42,682,324

Very nice feature is that you can compare language metrics and graph loc/contributions/contributors over time there:
https://www.ohloh.net/languages/compare

Posted by Ralf Ebert on April 14, 2009 at 04:00 PM CEST #

@Ralf,

yes but you could express with 1 line Java about 5 lines C. So we are clear winner again :-).

thanks for the comment!,

adam

Posted by Adam Bien on April 14, 2009 at 05:31 PM CEST #

I'm pretty sure you can use loc to compare popularity of languages as "expressiveness" imho is determined more by api than by language syntax sugar. If you want something stable, use contributer numbers in open source projects, also from ohloh:

C 37,478
C++ 26,498
Java 24,345
Python 16,229
php 14,525
Ruby 5,676

For practical purposes it doesn't matter anyway - I think any language in the upper ranks can be used to build great software without too many maintenance hassles. If there is the slightest chance that it will last longer than a decade and get very big I would stick to the Top 10 :)

What surprised me is php on rank 4. I guess this is because of their low entry level - you don't need to grasp a lot of theory to start building something. But you'll pay the price for that later :)

Posted by Ralf Ebert on April 14, 2009 at 06:07 PM CEST #

"What surprised me is php on rank 4. I guess this is because of their low entry level - you don't need to grasp a lot of theory to start building something. But you'll pay the price for that later :)"

It doesn't surprise me, because of the low entry level. Especially with XAMPP, which makes it very easy to setup quite a nice stack of services. Plus there's lots of hosts that support AMP (apache+mysql+php).

I liked PHP a while ago because it made it quite easy to make server side applications.

Then recently I saw Netbeans is getting increasing support for PHP and thought I'd give it a go again, and now realize why I like Java and it's technologies (Spring, Acegi, JPA, EJB, JSF, etc. make things so much cleaner).

Posted by James on April 15, 2009 at 10:01 AM CEST #

According to TIOBE, Ruby has stabilized - which strikes as surprising to me.

Posted by Ignacio Coloma on April 15, 2009 at 01:09 PM CEST #

I think in coming days. PHP will become No1

Posted by sunilkumar on October 23, 2009 at 03:38 PM CEST #

java suxs

Posted by 216.49.181.254 on September 08, 2011 at 01:08 AM CEST #

@216.49.181.254,

It seems like do not like Java :-). Your comment is not very constructive: I would expect something like: "I don't like Java because ..., and ... rocks and is #1 because...".

Have fun with Java!,

adam

Posted by Adam Bien on September 08, 2011 at 03:43 PM CEST #