6 ms·

Tiobe: Lua enters the top 10 for the first time in history

42 points by kephra 15y ago

va_coder 15y ago
More people use Lua than Javascript? lol
- Impossible 15y ago
  This seemed strange to me also. Lua shot way up and is currently right ahead of Javascript and right below Perl and Python. TIOBE attributes it to iPhone apps, which is probably helping but still wouldn't put it past Javascript. A lot of people write Lua scripts for World of Warcraft UI mods but WoW has been around forever and is actually waning in popularity, not rising. Maybe its the hype around LuaJIT being the dynamic scripting language the best performance?
  - d0m 15y ago
    I think there are more Website containing javascript than any WoW plugins.
    - Impossible 15y ago
      Oh yeah, there definitely are by a far margin. I'm just grasping for straws trying to figure out why Lua would have jumped so much. I know TIOBE isn't the end all be all of programming language usage or popularity but something had to cause Lua to jump so high in their rankings in the last year.
figital 15y ago
In a perfect world I'd have the power to downvote links to articles regarding "tiobe".
Twisol 15y ago
I wonder how much of the increase can be attributed to Redis' Lua scripting.
- Raphael_Amiard 15y ago
  i would say, not a lot. The fact that you think this is a big use of lua just speaks about what kind of programming environnement you are in.
  - Twisol 15y ago
    Where did that come from? I never said I thought it was a big use. In fact I've never used Redis, but I'm an avid user of Lua and I was glad to see Redis adopt it. Since Redis is so popular, is it wrong to suppose it was at least partially responsible?
ruethewhirled 15y ago
Javascript seems pretty low on that list..
sedev 15y ago
Oh hi, Tiobe. Hmmm. You have some plaintext content for me to read, but you don't want to let me see if I won't let you run JavaScript? Hmmm. Hey, fuck you, Tiobe. I hate it when sites do that. Here's a Google Cache link for anyone else who hates that bullshit: http://is.gd/bLdB5b http://is.gd/bLdB5b
acangiano 15y ago
Not even close: http://langpop.com/ http://langpop.com/
- xinuc 15y ago
  this seems like a better ranking
chrisaycock 15y ago
On StackOverflow, Lua has barely 1.1K questions, while JavaScript has over 100K questions. As a point of comparison, Clojure has 1.6K. The Tiobe method seems flawed. http://stackoverflow.com/tags http://stackoverflow.com/tags
- wmobit 15y ago
  Perhaps the people using JavaScript are the more likely the kinds of people to go asking more questions.
  - w1ntermute 15y ago
    Or JavaScript is the kind of language that requires a lot of question-asking to accomplish anything significant (poor language design/documentation).
    - anonymoushn 15y ago
      I'm not sure that I would frame it that way, but I think that is more or less correct. Lua is such a small language that you generally don't need to ask questions before you do stuff.
- minimax 15y ago
  The index is basically defined as Google for "<language> programming" then massage the numbers via hand waving and "false positive detection." It's a silly way to measure programming language popularity given all the possible alternatives. My guess is that their "false positive detection" is penalizing Javascript more than anything. I can understand Lua being #10, but Javascript being #11 is preposterous.
jbk 15y ago
Although I believe this to be over-valued, we use lua in VLC for writing extensions, and so far, we are quite pleased. It is fast, simple, close to the C or C++, quite portable and quite portable. I just wished they had a set of official extensions, like for xml or json parsing; because now they are a few competing around...
- palish 15y ago
  Use LuaRocks. http://luarocks.org/repositories/rocks/ http://luarocks.org/repositories/rocks/ Very easy to use, and has a lot of modules. lua-xmlreader is the one that I used for a project. It's a wrapper over libxml2.
  - jbk 15y ago
    Great to know, thx, but that shows exactly what one issue is: there are at least 5 json modules... How are people supposed to know which one to pick?
    - pyre 15y ago
      Probably by testing them all out. Though it would probably help if there were more reviews of the options out there.
      - jbk 15y ago
        That is indeed what we did. My above point (mis-interpreted, since I got voted down) is that an official set of extensions approved the core lua team would help quite a bit in those choices.
    - palish 15y ago
      Eh, just pick one. I actually did use a lua JSON module, but I forgot which one. It had a simple interface, though. They probably all do.
      - jbk 15y ago
kephra 15y ago
I was mainly confused of http://www.tiobe.com/content/paperinfo/tpci/images/tpci_trends.png http://www.tiobe.com/content/paperinfo/tpci/images/tpci_tren... when I posting this link. Looking at Lua in the graphic it looks like a typical exponential hype started in early 2011. I'm using Lua myself, wondering - did I missed a hype?
- anonymoushn 15y ago
  I also haven't heard anything about this.
dons 15y ago
https://github.com/languages/Lua https://github.com/languages/Lua #16 https://github.com/languages/Haskell https://github.com/languages/Haskell #15
bendmorris 15y ago
And yet Haskell is still #44, below some rather obscure languages (I'm looking at you, Alice and Q). There are serious flaws in Tiobe's methodology.
dimmuborgir 15y ago
Tiobe index is the single biggest source of language holy wars. Don't know why it is so highly regarded.

42 points by kephra 15y ago

va_coder 15y ago

More people use Lua than Javascript? lol

Impossible 15y ago
This seemed strange to me also. Lua shot way up and is currently right ahead of Javascript and right below Perl and Python. TIOBE attributes it to iPhone apps, which is probably helping but still wouldn't put it past Javascript. A lot of people write Lua scripts for World of Warcraft UI mods but WoW has been around forever and is actually waning in popularity, not rising. Maybe its the hype around LuaJIT being the dynamic scripting language the best performance?
- d0m 15y ago
  I think there are more Website containing javascript than any WoW plugins.
  - Impossible 15y ago
    Oh yeah, there definitely are by a far margin. I'm just grasping for straws trying to figure out why Lua would have jumped so much. I know TIOBE isn't the end all be all of programming language usage or popularity but something had to cause Lua to jump so high in their rankings in the last year.

figital 15y ago

In a perfect world I'd have the power to downvote links to articles regarding "tiobe".

Twisol 15y ago

I wonder how much of the increase can be attributed to Redis' Lua scripting.

Raphael_Amiard 15y ago
i would say, not a lot. The fact that you think this is a big use of lua just speaks about what kind of programming environnement you are in.
- Twisol 15y ago
  Where did that come from? I never said I thought it was a big use. In fact I've never used Redis, but I'm an avid user of Lua and I was glad to see Redis adopt it. Since Redis is so popular, is it wrong to suppose it was at least partially responsible?

ruethewhirled 15y ago

Javascript seems pretty low on that list..

sedev 15y ago

Oh hi, Tiobe. Hmmm. You have some plaintext content for me to read, but you don't want to let me see if I won't let you run JavaScript? Hmmm. Hey, fuck you, Tiobe. I hate it when sites do that. Here's a Google Cache link for anyone else who hates that bullshit: http://is.gd/bLdB5b http://is.gd/bLdB5b

acangiano 15y ago

Not even close: http://langpop.com/ http://langpop.com/

xinuc 15y ago
this seems like a better ranking

chrisaycock 15y ago

On StackOverflow, Lua has barely 1.1K questions, while JavaScript has over 100K questions. As a point of comparison, Clojure has 1.6K. The Tiobe method seems flawed. http://stackoverflow.com/tags http://stackoverflow.com/tags

wmobit 15y ago
Perhaps the people using JavaScript are the more likely the kinds of people to go asking more questions.
- w1ntermute 15y ago
  Or JavaScript is the kind of language that requires a lot of question-asking to accomplish anything significant (poor language design/documentation).
  - anonymoushn 15y ago
    I'm not sure that I would frame it that way, but I think that is more or less correct. Lua is such a small language that you generally don't need to ask questions before you do stuff.
minimax 15y ago
The index is basically defined as Google for "<language> programming" then massage the numbers via hand waving and "false positive detection." It's a silly way to measure programming language popularity given all the possible alternatives. My guess is that their "false positive detection" is penalizing Javascript more than anything. I can understand Lua being #10, but Javascript being #11 is preposterous.

jbk 15y ago

Although I believe this to be over-valued, we use lua in VLC for writing extensions, and so far, we are quite pleased. It is fast, simple, close to the C or C++, quite portable and quite portable. I just wished they had a set of official extensions, like for xml or json parsing; because now they are a few competing around...

palish 15y ago
Use LuaRocks. http://luarocks.org/repositories/rocks/ http://luarocks.org/repositories/rocks/ Very easy to use, and has a lot of modules. lua-xmlreader is the one that I used for a project. It's a wrapper over libxml2.
- jbk 15y ago
  Great to know, thx, but that shows exactly what one issue is: there are at least 5 json modules... How are people supposed to know which one to pick?
  - pyre 15y ago
    Probably by testing them all out. Though it would probably help if there were more reviews of the options out there.
    - jbk 15y ago
      That is indeed what we did. My above point (mis-interpreted, since I got voted down) is that an official set of extensions approved the core lua team would help quite a bit in those choices.
  - palish 15y ago
    Eh, just pick one. I actually did use a lua JSON module, but I forgot which one. It had a simple interface, though. They probably all do.
    - jbk 15y ago

kephra 15y ago

I was mainly confused of http://www.tiobe.com/content/paperinfo/tpci/images/tpci_trends.png http://www.tiobe.com/content/paperinfo/tpci/images/tpci_tren... when I posting this link. Looking at Lua in the graphic it looks like a typical exponential hype started in early 2011. I'm using Lua myself, wondering - did I missed a hype?

anonymoushn 15y ago
I also haven't heard anything about this.

dons 15y ago

https://github.com/languages/Lua https://github.com/languages/Lua #16 https://github.com/languages/Haskell https://github.com/languages/Haskell #15

bendmorris 15y ago

And yet Haskell is still #44, below some rather obscure languages (I'm looking at you, Alice and Q). There are serious flaws in Tiobe's methodology.

dimmuborgir 15y ago

Tiobe index is the single biggest source of language holy wars. Don't know why it is so highly regarded.