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I think there is severe bias in their results simply because of the content in stack overflow and the people that visit. For example, the data on a lot of deve
by matt_s 10y ago
I think there is severe bias in their results simply because of the content in stack overflow and the people that visit.
For example, the data on a lot of developers only having 1-3 years of programming experience. That would naturally follow that a majority of active users on a Q&A site would not have much experience, right?
Same can be said for data about what technologies are represented - JavaScript was at the top of "Most Popular Technologies". There is a lot of churn in JS frameworks... which probably leads to a lot of questions for inexperienced programmers... which would visit the site more frequently.
There definitely are some good results in there - I would just take anything regarding popularity with a grain of salt. I also suspect the population of people taking the survey don't fully represent all software developers equally. People that are in a stable role using "unpopular" or proprietary technology have no use for stack overflow.
- Kiro 10y agoI agree. Anecdotal but I used to visit SO all the time during my first years as a programmer compared to now where I only need it occasionally. It was also a long time ago I posted an actual question.
- steveklabnik 10y ago> It was also a long time ago I posted an actual question. This doesn't necessarily mean it's about your experience, that is, as more and more questions are asked and answered, it is more likely that an answer already exists, so you don't need to ask a new question.