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So ignore his arguments and opinions and take a look at that graph. That's one of the more informative pieces of "what language should I learn" dialogue I've ev

by tel 16y ago

So ignore his arguments and opinions and take a look at that graph. That's one of the more informative pieces of "what language should I learn" dialogue I've ever seen. Take a look at the github and stackoverflow communities. If you think they're doing cool stuff, then you can probably feel safe tackling any language in the upper right corner of that graph. It's a safe bet. And look what's up there! javascript, python, php, ruby, c/c++, perl scala, actionscript, haskell The angle above the regression line suggests whether the language is more talk (so) or walk (github), the clusters are sensible based on my domain knowledge of the languages: useful workhorses, weird and developed. I love the informative display of quantitative information. This is especially true when everything rhetorically boils down to opinions.

myusuf3 16y ago
I not sure whether to thank you or write another post just talking about the graph I made.
- Tichy 16y ago
  Definitely write another blog post.
- tel 16y ago
  Write more! And make more graphs if you think of other cool ways to consider the usefulness/impact/community/power of languages (beyond the analyzed-to-death language shootout stuff).
barrkel 16y ago
I don't think distance from the line is a talk/walk dichotomy. Rather, I think it's about the respective limitations of SO and github as metrics of popularity. SO's core audience came from people who followed Jeff and Joel, who are both pretty Windows-centric folks. Meanwhile, github's basis - git - came from the very creator of Linux! It seems to me that above the line means more in the MS camp, and below the line more in the open source / early adopter group. The standouts on above the line, things like Delphi, F#, C#, are all primarily Windows oriented. The things that are to the south-east of the broad thrust are things like CoffeeScript, Ruby, Lua, D, Go, etc. - a lot of stuff that's either fairly cutting edge, or played with by people who like to think they're on the cutting edge.
- tel 16y ago
  That's a much better interpretation. I was definitely playing fast and loose and saw IO so far out on the SO side.

by tel 16y ago

myusuf3 16y ago

I not sure whether to thank you or write another post just talking about the graph I made.

Tichy 16y ago
Definitely write another blog post.
tel 16y ago
Write more! And make more graphs if you think of other cool ways to consider the usefulness/impact/community/power of languages (beyond the analyzed-to-death language shootout stuff).

barrkel 16y ago

I don't think distance from the line is a talk/walk dichotomy. Rather, I think it's about the respective limitations of SO and github as metrics of popularity. SO's core audience came from people who followed Jeff and Joel, who are both pretty Windows-centric folks. Meanwhile, github's basis - git - came from the very creator of Linux! It seems to me that above the line means more in the MS camp, and below the line more in the open source / early adopter group. The standouts on above the line, things like Delphi, F#, C#, are all primarily Windows oriented. The things that are to the south-east of the broad thrust are things like CoffeeScript, Ruby, Lua, D, Go, etc. - a lot of stuff that's either fairly cutting edge, or played with by people who like to think they're on the cutting edge.

tel 16y ago
That's a much better interpretation. I was definitely playing fast and loose and saw IO so far out on the SO side.