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Ask HN: What are the current trends in programming?
3 points by xmmx 4714 days ago
Languages, web vs standalone, etc. I'm extremely out of the loop and I'm not sure where to start looking. I've tried looking at the top tags in stackoverflow - c#, php, java - but these don't seem too relevant from what I've seen lurking around on HN.
3 comments
ScottWhigham 4714 days ago
Another vote for "It's often a matter of where you look and what you read". Like others have said, HN has a slant towards some languages - if you only took thoughts/advice from this site, you'd be led to believe that everyone everywhere uses those languages. That's not the case though - look at lots of sources.
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shubb 4714 days ago
From reading job ads, I think most people work in the languages you mentioned.

HN is more oriented towards python/ruby/objective C because it's demo is making relatively simple applications as fast as possible, and critically don't have legacy code.

C# and Java have moved a lot in the past 10 years. You could say that Scala is the next natural transition for Java. Microsoft have a really compelling offer in terms of Azure and .net 4.5, and have a functional language of their own (F#) if they take off.

Personally, I'm watching C++11. It is really transformative, making the language feel much more modern (even sort of python like). If it improves C++ productivity enough we may see a resurgence, although I think it does too little to make coding for parallel/asynchronous natural.

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andrewcooke 4712 days ago
don't suppose there's a great c++11 book that shows that, is there? (seem to have been searching forever for a good, modern c++ book, so sorry if this is a repeat)
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tubbzor 4714 days ago
you are going to see different langs here than what's generally trending at stackoverflow purely due to the culture that surrounds hn (which is start-up based), so you're going to see more Ruby, Python, Go, ect (although you should be able to search all those tags on SO as well).

In the industry (as far as what I read anyway), it seems mobile programming and 'Big Data' are currently at the forefront.

Web vs standalone: depends on the application. If there is a need to make it web-based...then make it web-based. If there's no need then why put in the extra work/resources.

It really is a very broad question, but you want to pick the best tools for the job. You wouldn't use a spoon to saw a tree down, similarly you wouldn't use Java for a car control system. The only way to know the differences is to dive a little into each language and learn it's pros/cons.

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