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Ask HN: What languages of the last 20 years are here to stay?
I am curious after reading HN so much, and seeing so many language fanatics on here, what languages do you think are going to be used for the foreseeable future?
There are so many new ones, so which of the ones from 1999-present, so you think will gain popularity, or maintain a strong niche going forward?
- lamchob 8y agoDoes modern C++ count ( c++ >= 11) ? The modern standard changed a lot of paradigms of the language, like a multi threading aware memory consistency model. In the domain of system programming and gaming C++ is still paramount. While Rust will be an alternative in the system domain, the gaming "core" is still created with C++. Also, compilers. Most modern compiler projects (LLVM, TVM, Tiramisu, MLIR, Lift) are written in C++, and compilers are among the most long-lived software projects.
- danieltillett 8y agoC++ seems to becoming like Fortran. The old joke is we don't know what language physicist will be using in the future, but we know it will be called Fortran.
- clintonb 8y agoFor reference, here are some of those languages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_programming_languages#Current_trends https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_programming_languag.... Swift, Scratch, Go, and TypeScript seem like they will be around for a while.
- cimmanom 8y agoProbably Rust too. And Scala.
- 0_gravitas 8y agoI really think that Elixir has a shot at staying around for a while
- EnderMB 8y agoC# is nearly twenty years old, and is still developing at a rapid pace. As more people switch towards .NET Core, I can see more people adopting the language and framework. On the same stack, I can also see PowerShell remaining for a long time, due to its scripting power on the Windows platform. As long as Windows is around, PowerShell will stay and continue to evolve. Alongside these, I can see Rust expanding its reach, probably not to general purpose developing, but taking over more use cases from C++.
- jetti 8y agoYou bring up a good point with .NET Core potentially increasing the use of C#. I would love to see new languages coming out for the CLR as well. It seems like there was a bunch in the first few years but it has dwindled to only a few non-Microsoft CLR languages with some of those no longer maintained (Boo and Nemerle).
- EnderMB 8y agoAbove anything else, I would love to see F# get more love. From my experience, it's in a weird place where .NET devs would love to use it, but either don't see the benefit of switching, or don't see how to switch. If Microsoft were to tackle a new language, I'd love to see a systems language, especially as many industries still use Windows to build software in C++. A language that can be used alongside Rust for things like gaming would be fantastic.
- peterbozso 8y agoPowerShell is also cross-platform now: https://github.com/powershell/powershell https://github.com/powershell/powershell
- EnderMB 8y agoThat's fantastic! A lot of people laugh at building software on Windows, but one of the things I really miss since moving to OSX/Debian is using PowerShell for scripting tasks.
- Mindexperiment 8y agoJavascript will be the most long lasting language
- Simulacrum0 8y agoJavascript will be with us for a long time ( the new BASIC?) C99: while there is much to applaud in Rust and Swift, but i doubt C will be displaced in the embedded space given the pace of embedded device development and scale of legacy libraries and investments. Languages from Walled Gardens, even when open sourced, such as Microsoft/Unity & C#, Google & Go, Apple & Obj-C/Swift, etc., do not seem to expand far from their origins, and thus their fates seem entwined with their creator. Hard to call their futures, but i suspect the market will shift. LLVM's intermediate language (IR) and Vulkan's SPIR-V, seem to underlie many other languages compiled outputs so i'd expect they will be with us for a long time as a validating, porting, and research standard.
- Veen 8y agoSwift is an interesting one because IBM seem to be quite keen on it as a server language: https://developer.ibm.com/swift/ https://developer.ibm.com/swift/
- digitalsushi 8y agoPerl isn't as popular as it was 20 years ago, but it's still very present - and now that ruby has been around as long as perl had been, I'd venture that ruby will be a smell we find in code junk drawers for decades and decades to come.
- microwavecamera 8y agoBut Perl is more than 20 years old. It was released in 1987. Even Perl 5 is 25 years old now. Now I do think Perl 6 is going to be around for a long time and will eventually fill the niche served by Perl 5 while being able to compete with modern languages.
- deepaksurti 8y agoSwift, Elixir
- elamje 8y agoElixir seems awesome
- sgillen 8y agoI also think python is going to be around for a long long time. It has become the runaway favorite in the AI/ML space, and that space seems to be here to stay. Even bigger for its staying power is the fact that I see it more and more as the language universities use to teach, which is obviously going to be a big boon for its popularity and staying power.
- dpods 8y agoPHP is 25 years old this year. Despite all the hate it gets, the core team continues to move the language forward, and it most definitely has its niche in web development.
- gjvc 8y agoLISP will still be there running like a river of molten lava inspiring future generations of language designers :-)
- quickthrower2 8y agoSQL. I bet there aren’t many of you who haven’t had to use it.
- cbluth 8y agoEnglish, Spanish, and Chinese. They'll be around forever.
- sahinyanlik 8y agowow no one said Java yet!
- macando 8y agoJava once they merge all the nice features from Kotlin and Scala.
- elamje 8y agoI believe Java is more than 20 years old.