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Languages

Infographic: Programming languages adoption trends 2020

What do developers value in open source?

Languages are a beloved subject of debate and the kernels of some of the strongest developer communities. The choice of programming language matters deeply to developers because they want to keep their skills up to date and marketable. They matter to toolmakers too, because they want to make sure they provide the most useful SDKs. So which programming languages had notable changes in adoption trends in the last 3 years? Find the answers in our infographic with key findings from our Developer Economics 19th edition survey, which ran in June-August 2020 and reached 17,000 developers in 159 countries. 

JavaScript is the most popular programming language

As of Q3 2020, 12.4M developers globally were using JavaScript. We also estimate that in mid-2020 there were 21.3M active software developers in the world. So, 58% of all developers use JavaScript. Notably, the JavaScript community has been growing in size consistently for the past three years. Between Q2 2017 and Q3 2020, nearly 5M developers joined the community – by far the highest growth in absolute terms across all languages. Even in software sectors where JavaScript is least popular, like data science or AR/VR, over a fifth of developers use it in their projects. 

It’s a good idea to learn Python

For the second half-year period in a row, Python is the most widely adopted language behind JavaScript. Python now counts 9M users, after adding 2.2M net new developers in the past year alone, outranking Java at the beginning of 2020. The rise of data science and machine learning (ML) is a clear factor in its popularity. An impressive 77% of ML developers and data scientists currently use Python. For perspective, only 22% use R, the other language often associated with data science.

What’s new with Java and other well- established programming languages?

Java, with over 8M active users worldwide, is the cornerstone of the mobile app ecosystem – Android – as well as one of the most important general-purpose languages. It’s adoption may have remained stable in the past six months but, in the overall picture, the Java community has gained 1.6M developers since mid-2017, which corresponds to a 24% growth.

The group of major, well-established languages is completed with C/C++ (6.3M), PHP (6.1M) and C# (6M). The fact that C# lost three places in the ranking of language communities during the last three years is mostly explained by its slower growth compared to C/C++ and PHP. C and C++ remain core languages in IoT projects (for both on-device and application-level coding), whereas PHP is still the second most commonly used language in web applications, after JavaScript. On the other hand, C# may be sustaining its dominance in the game and AR/VR developer ecosystems, but it seems to be losing its edge in desktop development – possibly due to the emergence of cross-platform tools based on web technologies.

Android developers behind Kotlin growth

Kotlin is one of the fastest growing language communities, having increased more than two-fold in size since the end of 2017, from 1.1M in Q4 2017 to 2.3M in Q3 2020. This is also very evident from Kotlin’s ranking, where it moved from 11th to ninth place during that period – a trend that’s largely attributed to Google’s decision to make Kotlin its preferred language for Android development. 

Swift surpassed Kotlin in popularity this year, after attracting slightly more net new developers in the first half of 2020 (400k vs 300k). Since Swift became the default language for development across all Apple platforms, the adoption of Objective C has been decreasing steadily. This phase-out from the Apple app ecosystem is also matched by a significant drop in the rank of Objective C, from ninth to 12th place. 

Finally, the more niche languages – Go, Ruby, Rust, and Lua – are still much smaller, with up to 1.5M active software developers each. Ruby and Lua have been around for more than two decades now, but their communities have essentially stopped growing in the last three years. On the contrary, Go and Rust appear to be actively adding developers, although it is still unclear whether the two languages will climb the programming language ranking in the coming period.

What’s your favourite programming language? Take our Developer Economics 20th edition survey to support your choice!

Infographic: Programming languages adoption trends 2020
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Tips

10 Minute Comprehensive Guide on Modern Software Development with Agile Methods

Modern software development with agile methods

When it comes to custom software development, Agile methodology is preferred because it focuses on the requirement of the customer and fast delivery.  The principles are applied to small software products developed by a single team, as well as big ones developed by programs that consist of more than ten teams.

The goal of any software development company today, as well as the clientele, is producing software at the lowest cost possible, in the shortest time and the best quality. The right planning and management of the development process and the correct methodology are critical to achieve your business goal. The Agile Methodology is a growing trend that’s exponentially growing.

Agile methodologies have helped many business organizations respond to the evolving market conditions fast, boost customer satisfaction, and boost efficiency. Still, so many organizations are facing hardships in comprehending and adopting Agile. For your brand to overcome the challenges, let’s check out an extensive guide explaining everything about modern software development with Agile methods.

Who is this Guide for?

This guide is intended for:

✔ anyone who wants to learn all the ins and outs of the agile methodologies

✔ anyone who seeks out knowledge on what agile is and why it’s monstrously awesome

✔ anyone who’s afraid of adapting the methodologies in their next software project

Your Comprehensive Modern Software Development with Agile

An Overview

Most of you probably already know that Agile has taken the world of software development and testing by storm. The majority of organizations are already practicing the software development methodology in some form. Agile, in simplest terms, is a way of managing projects.

It’s worth noting that although the approach could be used for just about anything, it was nonetheless founded originally in India. Unlike the Waterfall approach in which all the requirements are gathered from the start, and design is all done next, and then development is executed, the Agile method enables designers, developers, analysts, and stakeholders to work together simultaneously.

Traditional Waterfall Approach Limitations

The Waterfall Model was presented first by Winston Royce back in 1970, and it was intended to be used in developing government projects. It was called a waterfall because of its cascading activities with phases, which keep the development process going forward. Because of this nature, the model does not leave room for doing unexpected changes.

Making changes would be difficult and demands a lot of work as well as a waste of money and precious time. Furthermore, it also excludes the client from the project because its focus is mainly on the internal team. Today, clients want to be involved in the development process as much as possible, and since the Waterfall Model pays so little attention to the client involvement, this could mean high change requests in the development later on.

Agile—How it Works

In contrast to the traditional Waterfall Method, Agile Methodologies adhere to the iterative approach. Basically, Agile software development involves several cycles, typically called ‘sprints,’ which are individually designed, developed, and tested. To put it simply, consider every sprint as a miniature project with its own phases of design, backlog, development, testing, and deployment within a predefined work scope.

A possibly deliverable product is shipped at the end of every sprint. Simply, with the completion of each iteration, new features are being added to the main software, resulting in software growth.

Agile Misapprehensions

Even though Agile has been majorly adopted all over the world, still there remain misconceptions about the approach, including the following:

1. It’s very different

Agile could be an entirely new concept to your organization and the entire team. It also demands a bit of rewiring regarding how all stakeholders would remain on the same page during development. Nevertheless, all companies that adopt the methodology know that the new approach runs the entire development cycle smoothly and consistently.

2. It’s unpredictable

It could indeed be unpredictable at times. But it’s the same with other development approaches. Honestly, it’s entirely impossible to determine what the software should be at the start of the development exactly.

Nonetheless, unlike the traditional approach, Agile embraces unpredictability and uses it to its own advantage that leads to producing better outputs.

3. All features are prioritized by developers

There are still some people who believe that with Agile, developers decide what’s relevant, what must be implemented, and when. However, this is far from the truth since, at the start of every sprint, there is always an extensive spring meeting in which all stakeholders get to participate and decide the features that would be developed and delivered.

4. More short-term-focused

It’s hard to understand why, but some still believe that since the Agile approach splits up projects into short sprints or iterations, it doesn’t consider the long-term goals. The Agile methodology, in truth, provides a lot more benefits and provides a better way than the traditional one. Furthermore, earlier testing lets you indirectly make better decisions for your long-term goals.

5. Works only for Software and Developers

Indeed, it started out in the tech industry, but today, as it benefits an organization as a whole, it’s widely accepted even in non-software industries, such as in the field of communication, manufacturing, healthcare, and so on.

The Actual Benefits of the Agile Methodology

Today, a software development company uses the Agile methodology to stay competitive. Majority of clients anywhere in the world demand that their software solutions be developed using the methodology. Why? Because of the many benefits that it brings to the table. Check out these benefits.

1. Business Value Concentration

One of the major benefits of Agile is an increased concentration of focus on the delivery of strategic business value through the involvement of business stakeholders in the process. With this, the development team understands what matters most and could deliver the features that provide the most value to the brand.

2. Enhanced Quality

Another of the great benefits of Agile is the improved quality of a product. By dividing projects into manageable units, the team could focus on high-quality software development, high-quality testing, and collaboration. Moreover, by creating frequent builds and doing reviews and testing on every iteration, quality is enhanced by quickly finding and fixing defects, as well as determining mismatches in the expectation early on.

3. Engagement of Stakeholders

Agile provides numerous opportunities for the engagement of the stakeholders and the team before, during, and after every sprint. Through involving various stakeholders each step of the way, there’s a higher collaboration degree between teams. The team will have more opportunities to genuinely understand the vision of a business, early delivery of working software, and boosts stakeholders’ trust often.

4. Predictable and Early Delivery

By using fixed, time-boxed Sprints of 1-4 weeks’ schedule, new features are quickly and frequently delivered, with a high predictability level. Also, this provides a chance to beta test or release software earlier than planned if there’s enough business value.

5. Enables Change

Unlike the Waterfall method, one of the key benefits of Agile is that it enables change. While the team has to remain focused on delivering an agreed-to subset of product features on every iteration, there’s a chance to refine and reprioritize the overall product backlog in a constant manner. Changed or new backlogs could be planned for the next iteration, providing a chance to introduce changes in a few weeks.

6. Transparency

Clients are involved throughout the software development project. This could include prioritizing iteration planning, features, review sessions, or frequent software builds that contain new features. This nonetheless requires the customers to understand that they’re looking at a work in progress in exchange for the added transparency benefit.

7. Predictable Schedule and Costs

Since each Sprint is a fixed duration, the cost is predictable and restricted to the amount of work that could be done by the team in a fixed-schedule time box. Together with the estimates given before every Sprint, the company could easily understand the approximate cost of every feature, which boosts decision making about prioritizing the features, and the need for more iterations.

Popular Agile Methods

Every organization differs, and so the internal and external factors that they face. Therefore, to meet the different organization requirements, let’s check out a couple of the most popular Agile methods. Which methodology works for you best would depend entirely on your internal and external factors.

Scrum

It’s a popular agile management method focusing on defining the major features and its objectives at the start of each sprint. Putting it simply, Scrum was introduced to minimize the overall risk in software development while providing faster value as well. Basically, it begins with the story or requirements, explaining how the particular features should work and should be tested.

Some of the most popular Scrum tools that help in increasing the teams’ productivity level are – Jira, Nutcache, monday.com, and ClickUp.  To manage teams & projects following Scrum methodology, you can choose monday.com. While on the other hand, Jira can also be your best choice for project management and creating customized work reports.

Benefits of Using Scrum Methodology

  • Increase in project visibility
  • Manage different priorities
  • Effective usage of money & time

Kanban

Originally, Kanban was developed by Toyota because of their need to boost factory productivity. It’s a very seamless, Agile methodology that could be defined as a prioritized, big to-do list. The requirements in Kanban, just like Scrum, are monitored by their present status as well, including in development, to-do, in a test, and delivery. 

Kanban tools offer the best services to software developers and project managers. They provide Kanban boards for the development teams. These tools are – Scrumwise, Kanbanery, Volerro, and Planview LeanKit.

Benefits of Using Kanban Methodology

  • Increases efficiency & productivity
  • Reduces work time
  • Continuous delivery approach

Lean Development

The Lean development methodology is created by Toyota and is used for the software development process. It offers conceptual frameworks and principles that enable software developers to apply the Agile development approach to their projects. This methodology’s seven essential principles are – quality development, differing commitments, fast delivery, deleting things that are not important, optimization, and respecting the team. 

Lean development offers some fantastic tools like Kaizen, Value Stream Mapping, 5S, and Focus PDCA. These tools enable the teams to improve efficiency and production levels.

Benefits of Using Lean Development Methodology

  • Strengthens knowledge
  • Optimizes value-stream
  • Eliminates delay in engineering  

Extreme Programming (XP)

Extreme programming is another very popular Agile development framework used by software development companies for various dimensions. This methodology follows the values like – simplicity, courage, respect, feedback, and communication to provide a perfect solution to the customers and satisfy them. The teams following XP methodology for their projects can choose any tool from – Project Planning & Tracking System, ExtremePlanner, and Targetprocess. Besides this, if you are a Java developer, you can select any tool from – JUnit, Maven & AntHill, and Cactus. For the .Net developers, the options are – NUnit and NAnt.

Benefits of Using XP Methodology

  • Increases product quality
  • Early product delivery
  • Empowers the team

Crystal

Crystal is a methodology that comes with different variations like Crystal Red, Crystal Orange, Crystal Yellow, and Crystal Clear. These variations specify the number of team members working on a project. It has a different range from 8 to 1000 (Clear to Red). Crystal methodology works on principles like – skills, community, talent, communication, and interactions. 

Benefits of Using Crystal Methodology

  • Flexible
  • Fewer team members required
  • Fixed-rate contract

Conclusion

Evidence reveals that the Agile methodology is very effective in modern software development these days. For most business organizations, the business and people’s results make the methodology well worth the effort.

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Tips

Productivity tips busy developers need to know

developer productivity tips

Software development is a dynamic field. This has always meant that it’s essential for developers to take an active approach, and stay on top of changes. And that, in turn, means that the best developers tend to have reliable ways of keeping themselves productive.

In 2020, this trait — being able to stay productive — is arguably more important than ever. Numerous industries related to software development have taken hits, and many developers are working under different conditions than they’re used to. The ones who are best able to keep up their standard and complete their projects are the ones who are going to handle these challenges most effectively. And that leads us to our main focus: a few productivity tips busy developers need to keep in mind.

Eliminate Distractions

This is a general tip for anyone working from home, like so many developers are doing today. Basically, when you’re working from home, anything from family members and roommates, to television, to your own mobile devices can become a serious distraction, and detract from productivity. Fortunately, avoiding this issue is a simple matter of discipline. Creative Bloq posted tips on avoiding distractions that can help give you an idea of what to focus on. The best ideas they highlighted include getting comfortable physically, closing unnecessary apps, and shutting yourself into a home office all as ways to start walling yourself off from distractions.

Frankly, we see all of these as part of one bigger tip: establishing a home workspace. Particularly these days, with more people working from home, it’s important to have an area where you can be comfortable and able to focus on projects. For starters, we’d recommend an ergonomic desk and chair and a piece of lounge furniture (even a beanbag can be brilliant). Make sure temperature control and lighting are available to you. And if possible, bring in some natural light and plants. All of this will make the workspace cosy and liveable, allowing you to feel your best, focus, and stay put without feeling shut in. With a space like this, you’ll be certain to see a spike in productivity.

Schedule (Including Breaks)

In just about any situation — working from home or otherwise — a clear schedule can boost productivity in a few different ways. A Verizon Connect piece on how to work intelligently explored this idea, suggesting (rightly) that scheduling every task does two things. First, the article said, scheduling gives you a clear picture of what you have to do in a given day; second, it gives you a clear path toward a small sense of accomplishment when you complete outlined tasks. These benefits can absolutely lead to more productivity by software developers.

How you schedule will depend somewhat on your specific work and the projects you have on hand. But we recommend breaking things down (something we’ll speak on more below), and writing your schedule out in a format that allows you to cross off tasks. Even a simple Excel sheet or note-taking app (such as Evernote, OneNote, or even a simple but perfectly functional Apple Notes) can serve as a scheduling book, where you can lay out each day’s activity and cross items off as you fulfill them.

Break Down Projects

As you go about scheduling, and looking for that little sense of accomplishment you get by moving through tasks, it’s also a good idea to break down projects into parts. This might not always be doable, but in development there are often ways to segment jobs into different stages. This can first and foremost make a job seem less formidable, and make you more willing to dive in and start doing the work. But it also leads to more of that sense that you’re checking things off your list and progressing successfully through a day’s work.

These benefits are in fact what many developers get out of tools like Asana and Jira, which exist in part to help organize projects and segment tasks in an orderly fashion. While it’s easy to think of “project management” as something meant for entire teams, busy developers make excellent use out of the idea and the tools that help to make it easier.   

Automate Where You Can

“Automate stuff” was arguably the most interesting idea within Developer Circles Lagos’s developer productivity ideas posted on Medium. While that same post had some other interesting points, what showed through is the notion that people working in software development tend to have some idea of how to do a little bit of automation — say, by writing scripts that accomplish certain tasks on their own. And this sort of effort can help to simplify a job in a way that significantly improves productivity.

Automation may not help with every project, and naturally, some developers will be better able to take advantage of this idea than others. But generally, automating where you can is a sound strategy. Even using your development skills to automate a sort of record-keeping that logs your hour-to-hour activity can be extraordinarily helpful. This example would afford you a better picture of your own working habits, and enable you to adjust accordingly.

Additionally, it’s worth noting that you may not even have to do this sort of automation on your own, given the ready-made tools that exist within modern work programs. As an example, consider Slack’s “Standup Bot,” which is essentially a built-in project management assistant that can help to keep you on task.

Maintain Personal Health

Personal health doesn’t always come up with regard to on-the-job productivity, but it’s a mistake to assume it’s not a factor. As stated in our piece ‘5 Challenges for a Freelance Developer’ it’s important not to forget to “eat well, sleep and keep an eye on your health” in order to stay productive. Simply put, if your body and mind aren’t healthy, you’ll be less prepared to focus and have productive workdays. You’ll be a better and more prolific developer the healthier you are.

Written/Edited by: Amanda Fuller

Amanda Fuller is a freelance writer for over seven years. Since becoming freelance she has written extensively about work practices, both at home and in the office. She maintains that in order for a company to be successful they must pay as much attention to their employees as their profit margins. In her free time she practices yoga.

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Analysis Community News and Resources

How are developers’ needs changing due to COVID-19?

developer economics, developer survey, state of developer nation, developer report, developers needs due to covid-19

Working and performing during a pandemic will leave deep marks behind, both financially and psychologically speaking. In our latest survey, we asked developers how their needs have changed due to COVID-19. The findings shared in this post are based on the Developer Economics survey 19th edition which ran during June-August 2020 and reached more than 17,000 developers in 159 countries.

At the time of writing this post, there have been more than 30 million COVID-19 cases around the world, with 7.3 million of those still active. The virus is ubiquitous and affects all continents to more or less similar degrees. Working and performing during a pandemic is an experience that will undoubtedly leave deep marks behind, both financially and psychologically speaking.

7.2 million developers report needing flexible working hours/workload

We asked developers to select from a given set of technical and non-technical needs, up to three extra needs the pandemic has created for their own development activities. 73% of developers reported having additional needs due to COVID-19. In particular, 34%, or 7.2 million developers, expressed their need for flexible working hours/workload. 

Quarantine and social distancing policies have encouraged many employers to allow their workers to work from home, where possible. A large proportion of workers are now facing the inconvenience of relocating their working space into their home. Among such inconveniences is the necessity of taking care of households while keeping up productivity. Under these circumstances, flexibility is seen as the key to success, or simply survival.

The next most common perceived needs, reported by about one in four developers, are: 

  • collaboration tools and platforms (26%), 
  • online training resources (25%), and
  • virtual opportunities to support networking and peer-to-peer interaction (23%). 

Among these three, the only technical one, strictly speaking, refers to the need for collaboration tools, such as video conferencing platforms. The other top needs are related to self-improvement and self-management, and to socialising. 

The supremacy of non-technical needs is striking. All of the technical necessities, except collaboration tools, sit at the bottom of the list, being reported only by about one in ten developers: 

  • better performance in terms of computing resources (13%),
  •  hardware components (9%),
  •  increased security (9%), and 
  • additional cloud space (7%). 

There are two explanations for these patterns. First, developers may have not indicated the need for extra technical support because it had been already fulfilled, i.e. their employers had already provided them with it. It could also be, however, that developers did not perceive technical considerations as being more important than flexibility, networking, and learning.

The bigger the company, the more flexibility developers need

We found that the most important factor in influencing developers’ needs in relation to COVID-19 is their company size. Compared to those in middle- or large-sized companies, self-employed developers and developers working in small businesses of up to 20 employees report fewer new needs overall. That is especially the case for flexibility in terms of working hours/workload, and for collaboration tools. The most probable explanation is that they would have already implemented a flexible working schedule prior to COVID19. This is likely to apply to contractors as well as to small, dynamic startups. When it comes to keeping collaboration and interaction going, it may just be easier for small groups of people to maintain old habits or find an easy-to-use tool, such as emailing, phoning, or even getting together whilst respecting the required social distancing.

On the contrary, the bigger the company, the stronger the need for all of the above, including opportunities for virtual interactions. A large company typically requires a structured system of communication, and usually that system needs to accommodate the various teams’ diverse needs; even more so when a company is locked into an IT vendor’s services. 

Interestingly, the need for mental health support also linearly increases with company size, probably as a result of those challenges experienced in terms of flexibility and peer-to-peer communication and interaction. Another potential reason is that employees in larger organisations, where nobody is indispensable by default, may be experiencing more performance pressure and be more scared of losing their jobs.

How COVID19 is affecting developers’ technical needs 

While developers’ technical needs due to COVID-19 do not change significantly with company size, they strongly correlate to the developers’ level of involvement in tool purchasing decisions. Those most concerned about increased security, performance, and cloud space are the ones responsible for tool specs and expenses, as well as budget approval, who usually fulfill roles within technical management. 

On the one hand, with the increasing number of developers working from home, more machines need to be available and connected via VPN and similar technologies. More layers to navigate introduces complexity barriers that affect work efficiency, but also the need for the implementation of extra security controls. Furthermore, servers are often overloaded and downtimes happen more frequently, affecting system reliability. If you add to this the fact that budgets are being reduced or even frozen, due to the economic instability the pandemic is causing, the situation is actually precarious. Those in charge are inevitably the ones noticing the need for technical support the most. 

Conclusion

In a relatively short time, the pandemic has generated and consolidated a series of working practices that had been previously known only to a very small proportion of the population. Such new practices, based on remote working and virtual collaboration, are likely to persist after COVID-19. If one acknowledges this, investing in optimising support becomes even more valuable. We recommend that, especially large enterprises, consider the delicate balance between self management and collaboration needs when designing policies and offering support to their employees in the face of the pandemic situation.

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Analysis

The state of AR and VR in Asia: Highly developed working practices and a strong pipeline of students

ARVR Asia

This article originally appeared on DevRelX.     

Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) have been on the cusp of widespread adoption for many years now, but technical and commercial hurdles have impeded this process. For VR at least, it seems that 2020 could be the year when the technology goes truly mainstream – there are already several consumer-grade headsets available on the market and many game studios are following Valve’s Half-Life: Alyx into VR with their own AAA titles. AR, though now ubiquitous on smartphones and available for many industrial applications, still lags behind in adoption due to the more complex technical challenges such as object occlusion. That said, the recent rumours around Apple’s entry into the Mixed Reality (MR) space may spark a wave of innovators hoping to get the jump on them.

What we do know is that as VR, AR and MR achieve greater market penetration, not only will more developers be needed to create the immersive worlds and experiences that consumers demand, but artists and designers will also be required to populate these worlds with convincing inhabitants, create 3D assets and help to realize a creative vision. Fortunately, there is no shortage of hobbyists involved in AR and VR. As we discuss in our State of the Developer Nation report, not only are most people in AR or VR involved as hobbyists but around a quarter of those who work professionally in the two sectors still consider themselves to be hobbyists on the side.

We also discovered that a lot of developers in AR and VR were taking on many different roles, often those that aren’t traditionally associated with being a software developer. In fact, we coined a new term to describe those people who not only write code but who also dip their toes into more traditional creative endeavors. Enter the Hybrid Developer, and we’ll find out more about her very soon indeed.

At SlashData, as the analysts of the developer economy, we have traditionally been focused on understanding developers. But given the contributions that people in more artistic roles make to many sectors, especially to AR and VR, we felt that in order to truly understand this transformational technology, we needed to understand those people who help shape how it looks and feels. So, for the first time, we sought out people working in AR and VR in non-developer roles. We asked artists, creators, filmmakers and their ilk just what it’s like to work in AR and VR and here I’ll be sharing some of our most interesting findings.

What, exactly, is a Hybrid Developer?

First things first. Let’s understand more about these so-called Hybrid Developers. These are people that have a traditional developer role (a software engineer, or a DevOps specialist, for example), but who also take on more creative or artistic roles (artists and filmmakers, for example). This means that we can fit people involved in AR and VR into three categories:

  1. Pure developers – people who only have developer roles
  2. Hybrid developers – people who have both developer and creative roles
  3. Non-developers – people who don’t have developer roles

Generally speaking, around 63% of those involved in software development projects are pure developers, 21% are non-developers, and 15% are in hybrid roles. But people involved in AR and/or VR show very different behaviour. The distribution amongst these roles is much more even, with fewer pure developers (39%), slightly more hybrid developers (31%) and twice as many non-developers. This is a pattern that is replicated, to a greater or lesser degree across many regions, but it is in South and East Asia where these differences are most pronounced.

State of AR VR in Asia

East Asia is further along the curve for adoption of AR and VR

East Asia has very quickly adopted AR and VR, with almost two in five people involved in software development projects contributing to this sector in some way. But as well as being ahead of the curve in terms of the sheer number of people involved in the sector, non-developer AR/VR practitioners here find it easier to enter the space.

From the chart above you can see that in East Asia, AR/VR practitioners are more than twice as likely to be non-developers than people elsewhere in the world. We see this phenomenon replicated to a lesser extent for people not involved in AR/VR, with a correspondingly lower proportion of hybrid developers. We can draw two conclusions from this:

  1. In East Asia, people involved in software development projects are more specialised, taking on fewer hybrid roles.
  2. Non-developers in East Asia contribute more towards software development projects than elsewhere in the world

Looking to South Asia, the spread of roles in this region is much more balanced – not only does this region have a healthy proportion of hybrid developers, but the distribution of AR/VR practitioners between the three categories of pure, hybrid and non-developers is fairly even. Many AR/VR practitioners here have a balanced and varied skill set, with four in ten of them taking on hybrid roles, and this is something that we see replicated in other developing regions, such as the Middle East and Africa.

What types of roles are AR/VR practitioners taking on?

When we delve more deeply into the developer and non-developer roles that AR/VR practitioners take on, we can tease out some more important insights. The chart below shows a subset of all the roles we ask about (out of a total of 25). In East Asia, only two in ten AR/VR practitioners identify as programmers or developers, the lowest of all the regions, and much less than the rest of the world, where almost half of AR/VR practitioners identify as developers. This is another result of the rapid adoption of AR and VR in East Asia – non-developers have been able to enter the space more easily, and the whole AR/VR ecosystem is at a later stage of maturity.

The incidence of AR/VR practitioners in East Asia that identify as product managers, marketers or salespersons provides further evidence for this – once development practises have matured, productisation and monetisation take a front seat. Here, East Asia is also ahead of the curve.

The eagle-eyed amongst you will notice that although East Asia has a much lower proportion of developers, there is not a correspondingly dominant role in East Asia which makes up for this. These ‘missing’ roles aren’t simply hiding in the ones I haven’t shown here. Instead, AR/VR practitioners in East Asia simply do fewer roles. 62% of them take on only a single role, compared to 47% of AR/VR practitioners in the rest of the world. Only 11% of them do four or more roles, compared to a whopping 27% in the rest of the world. Generally speaking, taking on many different roles is a hallmark of being involved in AR/VR (as we discussed in our State of the Developer Nation report), but this is resoundingly not the case in East Asia. Specialization is another result of a sector maturing – roles become more defined and people have to wear fewer hats, working instead collaboratively in specialized teams.

Finally, without wanting to labor the point, the lower incidence of data scientists and machine learning developers is yet another sign that East Asia is ahead of the curve. Data science and machine learning are foundational to the success of VR, and in particular, AR. Many of the advances here have come from image recognition and other technologies which mitigate some of the hardware difficulties faced by people creating for AR and VR. You might expect this to be reflected in the number of AR/VR practitioners identifying as data scientists, but this is not the case. One viewpoint is that these low numbers are simply a correlation with the lower number of developers in general. But it’s also possible that those who are into AR and VR use a higher level of abstraction – instead of building machine learning models, they simply plug into an API and get the results they need and don’t consider themselves data scientists.

As AR and VR become more established in other regions, we can expect to see many of these phenomena filtering throughout the globe, although the differing cultures and economic situations at play mean that each region will develop its own idiosyncrasies. This said, one good indicator that a sector is in ascension is a high proportion of students, and here, South Asia is ahead of the curve, with over half of AR/VR practitioners here identifying as students. Granted, there are more students in South Asia across all the sectors, but it’s particularly high for AR and VR (51%, compared to 38% for those not involved). South Asia is definitely a region to watch for AR and VR development in the future.

State of AR VR in Asia

If this post has piqued your interest or sparked some interesting questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out and let us know. We hold rich and varied information on people involved in AR and VR, and we’re adding to it all the time!

Want to see more? Check out our latest research reports and graphs based on data from developers like you who took our global surveys.

Categories
Tips

Infographic: What do you know about the gender gap in programming?

gender gap in programming, developer economics survey, developer data, female developer, female coders, women who code, women programmers

When you look around your classroom or office (mobile office at a coffee shop counts too), what do you see? Do you see mostly guy coders in t-shits and hoodies or is there a healthy mix of both male and female developers? Hopefully it’s the latter. But that often isn’t the case in many developer settings. It’s important to acknowledge that the gender gap in programming is still a challenge.

In our earlier post, we’ve identified that despite massive technological advancement, today only 1 in 10 programmers is a woman. To understand better possible reasons behind the gender gap, we turned to the data from our own Developer Economics survey. Our infographic sums up some of the findings from the the 18th edition of our Developer Economics survey, fielded between November 2019 and February 2020.  The survey reached more than 17,000 developers in 159 countries.

For a full story behind the data, head over to our blog post. Don’t forget to share the infographic and let’s start a discussion on this important topic!

gender gap in programming, female programmers, female developers, infographic, developer data, developer survey, developer economics
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Community

What did developers have to say about our Q2 2020 survey?

developer feedback

Do we read your feedback? Yes we do! We LOVE to see what our community has to say and always invite feedback in our surveys.

Our 19th Developer Survey was no different. 17,241 developers took part from 165 countries and 8,200 participants left feedback. We asked developers if there was anything we forgot to ask, whether they enjoyed the experience and how we can improve in our next Developer Economics Survey. This is what they said:

developer feedback

We loved hearing from our community and our team are taking on board all your comments to make our 20th survey even better. Did we say 20th? Yes that’s right, standby for our anniversary survey! To ensure that you are notified when it’s live, sign up. Don’t forget to make sure the survey notification option is ticked, so we can email you when we are ready. 

Categories
Community

Developer Prizes: Announcing our Q2 2020 survey prize winners!

developer prizes
developer prizes

Thanks to all of you who took part in our Q2 2020 Developer Economics survey! Your responses make a difference and contribute to the developer ecosystem. We’re super excited as it is now time to announce the full list of our developer prizes and their winners!

Developers who take our surveys earn 100 points for every new survey completed, plus 10 points for providing their feedback about the survey. You can see the list of benefits and rewards here.

Exclusive Community Prize Draw for members with 801+ points – Microsoft Surface Pro 7 and One Plus 7T

WinnerCountryPrize
j*****@h******.c** MexicoMicrosoft Surface Pro 7
m*****.t*********@g****.c** LithuaniaOnePlus 7T

Exclusive Community Prize Draw for members with 801+ points – Prizes: Vouchers, branded stickers, water bottles, surprise swag, and socks

WinnerCountryPrize
j*****@h******.c**MexicoMicrosoft Surface Pro 7
m*****.t*********@g****.c**LithuaniaOnePlus 7T
S********@h******.c**Pakistan$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
a*********@y****.c**United States$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
l*@l****.c**Colombia$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
p****@p**********.n***Australia$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
c****@h******.c**United States$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
c*******@y****.c**United StatesBranded stickers and water bottle
z*********@g****.c**TaiwanBranded stickers and water bottle
b*****@e*************.c**United StatesBranded stickers and water bottle
r******@g****.c**CanadaBranded stickers and water bottle
d*.b****@g****.c**CanadaBranded stickers and water bottle
t*******.h******@g**.d*GermanySurprise swag
s******.s******@g****.c**GermanySurprise swag
l***********@g****.c**CanadaSurprise swag
m*****@c*******.i*ItalySurprise swag
s******.t**@g****.c**MalaysiaSurprise swag

Here’s a sneak peak at the surprise swag!


developer prize - surprise swag

Exclusive Community Prize Draw for members with 501+ points – Prizes: Vouchers, surprise swag, branded stickers and socks

WinnerCountry Prize
j***********@g****.c**Japan$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
a***********@g****.c**Malta$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
a*************@g****.c**Spain$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
f***********@g****.c**Nigeria$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
n.s*******@g****.c**United Kingdom$50 Udemy or Amazon voucher
k******@g****.c**ItalySurprise swag
t****.a*******@g****.c**AlgeriaSurprise swag
p**********@g****.c**South AfricaBranded stickers and socks
j********@g****.c**United StatesBranded stickers and socks
k*****.k******@g****.c**GreeceBranded stickers and socks
n********@w****.c**IsraelBranded stickers and socks
s*********@g****.c**PortugalBranded stickers and socks

Exclusive Community Prize Draw for members with 301+ points – Prizes: Branded surprise swag, stickers and socks

WinnerCountryPrize
b*****@g****.c**HungarySurprise swag
g****.o**@o******.c**United KingdomSurprise swag
t***********@g****.c**United StatesBranded stickers and socks
m*********@g****.c**United StatesBranded stickers and socks

General Prize Draw

WinnerCountryPrize
h*********@g****.c**EgyptiPhone 11
d*****@y*****.r*RussiaJetBrains All Products Pack
o*********@g****.c**MexicoGitKraken Pro license
a******@o******.c**KenyaGitKraken Pro license
g****.c*****@h******.c**CanadaGitKraken Pro license
s******.a***@g****.c**IndiaGitKraken Pro license
z***********@g****.c**RussiaGitKraken Pro license
p************@g****.c**IndiaGitKraken Pro license
n************@g****.c**JapanCloud Guru x 6 months license
j*****@g****.c**RussiaCloud Guru x 6 months license
d************@g****.c**IndiaCloud Guru x 6 months license
m*******.m*******@g****.c**RussiaRaywenderlich.com 3 months Professional subscription
e****.s******.9*@g****.c**RussiaRaywenderlich.com 3 months Professional subscription
A*********@y*****.r*RussiaRaywenderlich.com 3 months Professional subscription
f.a*****@g****.c**TurkeySitePoint premium subscriptions x 6 months
n***********@g****.c**RussiaSitePoint premium subscriptions x 6 months
b****@l***.r*RussiaSitePoint premium subscriptions x 6 months
v****.m**********@g****.c**UkraineSitePoint premium subscriptions x 6 months
n*******@g****.c**RussiaSitePoint premium subscriptions x 6 months
s*************@y****.c*.u*United KingdomSeagate STGX5000400 Portable 5TB External Hard Drive HDD
r*****.c****.g*******@g****.c**VenezuelaCorsair K68 RGB Mechanical Gaming Keyboard
m*****.a********@g****.c**Nigeria$20 Amazon voucher
i***.f****@m*.e**.a*Australia$20 Amazon voucher
t***********@g****.c**Russia$20 Amazon voucher
a************@g****.c**Ghana$20 Amazon voucher
j************@g****.c**United States$20 Amazon voucher
g*****@g****.c**France$20 Amazon voucher
n***********@g****.c**Brazil$20 Amazon voucher
m***.l**.p*******@g*********.c**Japan$20 Amazon voucher
m*************@g****.c**India$20 Amazon voucher
d*******@g****.c**United States$20 Amazon voucher
m******@g****.c**Canada$20 Amazon voucher
m***.d*******@g****.c**NetherlandsBaseCode field guide – full kit
h********@g****.c**RussiaBaseCode field guide – full kit
h***@j*************.e*SpainBaseCode field guide – full kit
t*************@g****.c**South AfricaBaseCode field guide – full kit
d****.b****@f*******.c**FranceBaseCode field guide – full kit
a****************@g****.c**UkraineBaseCode field guide – full kit
r****@m***.r* RussiaIntroduction to Algorithms, 3rd Edition (The MIT Press)

The State of AR/VR Survey Prize Draw

WinnerCountryPrize
h******@g****.c**MexicoOculus Quest 64GB
i******@g****.c**United KingdomSketchfab 12 month Pro License
m*******.t*****@g****.c**United StatesOctaneRender Studio for Unity – 12 months license
d*********@g****.c**United StatesiPhone 11
a****.q**********@g****.c**CanadaVufori12 months Basic License
a***.p********@g****.c**IndiaVR Ninjas Virtual Reality Mat
n******.c******.f@g****.c**ChileVR Ninjas Virtual Reality Mat

Extra Prize Draws

WinnerCountryPrize
s*******.1*@g****.c**India$50 Amazon voucher
j**********@i*****.c**BrazilDeveloper Economics hoodie
s*****.b********@g****.c**United StatesAugmented Reality: Principles and Practice (Usability) book
m***.l****@g****.c**United StatesThe Pragmatic Programmer: 20th Anniversary Edition, 2nd Edition: Your Journey to Mastery book
f********@b*.r*KazakhstanInsomniPlus license ($50 value) – Debug APIs like human, not robot
p*********@g****.c**VietnamDeveloper Economics hoodie
s*******@g****.c**RussiaSoft Skills: The software developer’s life manual
s******.l*****@g****.c**South AfricaDeveloper Economics hoodie
t*****************@g****.c**South Africa$20 Amazon voucher
r*************@g****.c**NigeriaThe 10X Rule: The Only Difference Between Success and Failure book
r**********@g****.c**GermanyDeveloper Economics hoodie
2*******@w**.d*Germany$20 Amazon voucher
m********@b*.r*RussiaGame Engine Architecture, Third Edition book
m**************@n****.c**IndonesiaDeveloper Economics hoodie
m************@m***.r*Russia$20 Amazon voucher
m*****.b****@g****.c**SpainPrecision: Principles, Practices and Solutions for the Internet of Things book
g*********.s**@g****.c**VietnamDeveloper Economics hoodie
l*********@g****.c**India$20 Amazon voucher
d********@g****.c**NigeriaDeep Learning (Adaptive Computation and Machine Learning series) book
j**************@y****.c**United StatesDeveloper Economics hoodie
s***********@g****.c**Russia$20 Amazon voucher
s***********@g****.c**RussiaRaywenderlich.com 3 months Professional subscription
m******.b********@g****.c**IndiaDeveloper Economics hoodie
x*******@y****.c*.j*Japan$20 Amazon voucher
v************@g****.c**UkraineMastering Bitcoin: Programming the Open Blockchain 2nd Edition book
o******.m******@c**********.n**FranceDeveloper Economics hoodie
d*******@g****.c**United States$20 Amazon voucher
p***********@m***.r*RussiaThe Phoenix Project: Novel about IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win
j********@g****.c**South Africa$20 Amazon voucher
g*************@g****.c**IndonesiaDeveloper Economics hoodie

Dicoding Prize Draw – Dicoding Learning Path (Beginner Android or Beginner Web class or mixed) – Exclusive developers taking the survey from Indonesia

Winners
g**********@g****.c**
t**************@g****.c**
w********@g****.c**
y*******@g****.c**
d***************@g****.c**
r***********@g****.c**
a***************@g****.c**
s**************@g****.c**
a**********@g****.c**
h**********@g****.c**
w******@g****.c**
f*********@g****.c**
a***************@g****.c**
a******************@g****.c**
r****.h****@g****.c**
t****.i********@g****.c**
w**********@g****.c**
w**************@g****.c**
d**************@g****.c**
m***********@g****.c**
r********@g****.c**
a************@g****.c**
i******@g****.c**
s*********@g****.c**
m*******@g****.c**

We’ve already reached out to the winners by email. Do you recognise one of the email addresses as yours but haven’t received your email yet? Please contact us at community@developereconomics.com

The lists above only include prize-draw winners and not runner-ups. If the prize draw winners do not claim their prizes within 10 workings of us contacting them, then runner-ups will be invited to claim them instead. 

Some of the winners have generously donated the cost of their prize to Techfugees, the charity we supported during the survey. 

We’d like to say a special thanks to the lovely people at BaseCode, Dicoding, GitKraken, SitePoint, Sketchfab who supported us during our Q2 2020 Developer Economics survey by donating a prize – you rock!!

If you’re not a winner, don’t despair, our next survey, our 20th (!!), will be live later this year. We’re already on the hunt for some amazing prizes, and open to your suggestions. What prizes would you like to win? Drop us an email or send us a Tweet.

To ensure that you are notified when our next survey is live, sign up. Don’t forget to make sure the survey notification option is ticked.

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Tips

Common developer frustrations and how to overcome them

common developer frustrations

Derek Lee Boire, Senior Member of Technical Staff at VMware Pivotal Labs, addresses common developer frustrations, such as decision fatigue,  and the tools and methods to overcome them.

If you’re a developer, whether you realize it or not, you’ve probably experienced ‘decision fatigue’ at one point in your career. Decision fatigue occurs when the quality of the decisions we make deteriorates due to the mental fatigue of having already made a lot of decisions. While some people may want to believe that they have infinite willpower, our mental energy and focus has a limit no different than our physical bodies do. You can train long, or you can train hard – either way your body will tire eventually.

But just as we can train our bodies to endure additional stress, we can also train our minds to increase our focus. Or ideally – simplify our work to allow us to save our energy for the mental challenges that really make a difference. For example, a person with a clear idea of how they would like to manage their diet will be able to make easier decisions when grocery shopping, which can be helpful when different options are particularly abundant.  

While this example refers to a relatively simple, personal decision, it’s even more important to alleviate the burden of choice for more complex decisions which involve a greater number of stakeholders. These are the types of decisions software developers will make with each line of code written, putting them at a high-risk of experiencing decision fatigue. Here we look at some of the ways in which decision fatigue and other common developer frustrations that can manifest in software development, and the tools and methods that can be employed to combat them.

Common developer frustrations

Discoverability

If there is a task that must be performed many times, or takes a long time to do manually, or is complicated and error-prone, developers should consider using automation. Continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD), the practice of automating testing and deployment of your application, is one example of this. When you automate a process, you don’t just make it easier to execute, save time, and ensure consistency – you also make it discoverable. 

This means that if a new member joins the team and has never worked with CI/CD before, reviewing the script that manages this automated process will help them to easily understand how the application is deployed. 

This can apply to source-code as well. If you’ve ever worked on a backend API that is consumed by others, you know how important it is for your API to be easily understood in order for users to easily consume it. This same level of understanding can be applied to your internal APIs that you build for yourself, for future you, and for other members of your team. 

As software engineers, we are all authors. As such, we need to consider the audience who is consuming the code that we are writing. 

Rabbit Holes

When working independently, it can be easy to find yourself lost down a “rabbit hole” – deep into trying to solve a problem and unable to remember where you had started or why you went down this route in the first place. Developers working in isolation are particularly prone to finding themselves in a rabbit hole, which is a sure-fire sign that decision fatigue is settling in. 

Collaborative development processes, like pair programming, help developers avoid rabbit holes through creating a culture of fast feedback and knowledge-sharing. When there’s only one person who understands how a specific feature was implemented, this carries a risk for the team if that person is out on vacation, happens to get sick, or is out for any number of reasons, then the team can get stuck. 

One recommended practice for pair programming is to rotate who pairs with who daily to ensure that several different team members have knowledge of how each part of the system works. This is a great way to share knowledge throughout the team as well as to ensure that the team can always continue to make forward progress, even if a team member is unavailable. 

Pair programming is built upon equality and mutual respect, a by-product of which is the establishment and/or sustenance of a culture of knowledge-sharing. Approaches to collaboration based on equal parts observation and communication are always more effective in keeping people engaged. After all, too much of one or not enough of the other can make it difficult to concentrate, which is especially detrimental when trying to absorb or share knowledge.  For example, I recently learned from a pair programming session about how test-driven deployment (TDD) could be applied to configuring docker containers using scripting purely vicariously.

Domino Code

Unsure how to implement a new feature or enhance an existing feature? If there’s a similar feature in the application, it could be a good reference so you can just follow the existing code patterns and tack on the new functionality, right? Sure, this might work for the first or second time – but by the third or fourth time you’ve repeated this pattern, it could start to get unwieldy. The easy way may be to follow the same pattern, and this can be good to maintain consistency in the codebase. However, to ensure that the software can continue to evolve, a different abstraction might be helpful. 

Developers often see an existing pattern and simply copy and paste or tack on more of the same.  While the pattern may have been easy to understand when it was initially implemented, repeated use can eventually create a ‘domino’ effect –  whereby that same pattern, at scale, may no longer serve the code after it has evolved. 

While there are some developers who are strictly against code duplication, it can sometimes actually be helpful. There’s a delicate balance between code duplication and creating a premature abstraction. Sometimes duplication is, in fact, necessary if an abstraction or cleaner way of writing can’t yet be discerned. It can be good to just let the code “simmer” for a bit longer and see how it will evolve. 

Developers should therefore be aware of the code being copied or the patterns continually being promoted in the code. The next time you find an existing code pattern and your initial instinct is to simply copy it, consider this: the next time you or someone else encounters this code, would it make sense to continue using this pattern, or is it time to consider refactoring or creating an abstraction? A good example is when a class becomes so long that it is difficult to manage (also known as ‘long class code smell’ amongst developers). The easy action is to continue to add to it and make it longer. When you detect this “smell”, consider if it would become easier to manage if it was broken down into more than one class. Are there multiple responsibilities within the same class that could be separated?

Culture of Growing and Sharing Knowledge

This is by no means an exhaustive list of all practices for building code which works for everyone. Consistency in the practices deployed (i.e. code style, formatting, automation) is another significant area where many of the major barriers can be overcome. But the first step toward implementing any of the practices described here involves a more widespread, cultural change within the organisation itself. 

Developers work best when organisational culture promotes growing and sharing knowledge within the team. This should be approached comprehensively rather than on the basis of incentives: “lunch and learn” sessions are great, but free food will only get you so far when you don’t really get to take a break from work. Instead, development teams should tie core values like communication, courage and respect to every aspect of the work they do. Doing this will help alleviate common barriers faced by developers to writing great software, while also contributing to an increase in productivity, quality of work, and developer well-being.

About

Derek Lee Boire is a Senior Member of Technical Staff at VMware Pivotal Labs. Derek’s career as an IT professional and consultant has given him experience in every aspect of software development. From working with clients to understand and detail their requirements, prototyping solutions, designing technical architectures for large-scale systems, leading development teams and helping implement agile design methodologies. 

GitHub: derekleerock

Twitter: @derekleerock

Further reading

We cover Dev Ops CI/CD usage trends here. Interested in insights? Check out our latest research reports and graphs based on data from developers like you who took our global surveys.

Categories
Tools

A Guide to Choose the Right JavaScript Framework for Web Programming

JavaScript frameworks

The platforms of JavaScript probably are the best frameworks for developers as well as business organizations nowadays. Already, there is a vast ocean of JavaScript frameworks, with new ones pouring in constantly.  Frontend developers have difficulty in making up their minds as to which framework to stick to, particularly for single-page apps.

There are so many JavaScript frameworks and libraries to choose from on the web. Among the most popular however include React, Angular, Ember, Meteor, and Vue. The frameworks of JavaScript are preferred over others due to their functionality and interoperability. The libraries offer a better functional approach, good scalability, and most important of all platform independence.

JavaScript at present is used on the client and server-sides. The platform helps in designing an enriched user experience with many features to alter web pages in real-time. For fast web application development, JavaScript is the most preferred and acts as the perfect skeleton for single page applications, enabling developers complete focus on the interface elements, expanding the platform capabilities.

To further determine the best JavaScript framework to choose that best fits your web programming requirements, take a closer look at the five best JavaScript frameworks. 

Five best JavaScript Frameworks


Which JavaScript frameworks are you using? Let us know in our latest Developer Economics survey.

React JavaScript Framework


JavaScript frameworks - React

The brain-child of Facebook: it’s the framework in which the highest viewed social media platform, Facebook is based on. It’s supported by the FB team and also the driving force behind Instagram. It’s the choice of developers for many reasons to create dynamic and high-traffic web apps. 

Deemed as the quickest growing framework, with over 1000 GitHub contributors which increases the use of ReactJS in development with high demand.

React acts as a View in the MVC framework, and could be integrated seamlessly and smoothly into any architecture. One component file has the HTML markup and the business logic. You can either use Flux or a similar JS library for components communication. 

The seamless transfer of data between components is easy with the help of the props objects and the state. Credits to the Virtual DOM and special reconciliation algorithm, front-end gets a considerable boost. Changes could be done by developers in real-time, without having to update the View each time.

Pros:

The major component of boosting performance is the virtual DOM. Since React is framework-friendly, you could integrate it with other frameworks for inflated compatibility and performance. Moreover, it could be utilized on the client and the server-side. 

Cons:

Its flexibility is also its downside. It’s not easy to choose from the overabundance of frameworks. It works only on the MVC Framework’s View layer. 

In spite of the inclusion of the major code libraries, in some instances it still needs more code. And since it’s more of a library instead of framework, data changes need manual processing. 

Angular JavaScript Framework


JavaScript frameworks - Angular

The web-app platform is type-script based, making it exceptionally agile. Led by the Angular team at Google, a community of members and testers, it’s an open-source solution. Referred often as an MVW framework, it’s considered the best to use, particularly among startups and medium-size enterprises.

What sets Angular apart from the rest of the JavaScript frameworks is its two-way data binding, which makes backend changes reflect in real time on the user interface. As the most sought-after apps for Single Page Applications, an Angular JS development company enjoys high demand. 

It’s preferred for hybrid mobile apps as well. Features like switches, sidebars, and overlays integrate dynamic functionality to apps. It came about in 2016 with the version 2.0, the immediate release occurred in Angular 4 in the following year, with updates at regular intervals. Angular 5 was released in 2017 followed by 6 in the middle of 2018, then Angular 7 in September of the same year.



The diagram of the architecture identifies eight major building blocks of Angular 2 app.

Components – are a logical code for a JS app, consisting of a class, template, and metadata. 

Modules – used in creating a particular set of instructions. Rather than coding everything in a single place, you could build individual modules, which depend on the functionality. A module contains an export array, bootstrap array, and an import array as well.

Metadata – has the extra data defined for classes and is defined with a decorator.

Data binding – used for binding classes properties in the components.

Directives – a custom element of HTML. Used for extending the HTML functionality, with two directives as part of the Browser Module module.

Services – service is built to provide common functionality across various program modules. 

Templates – used for rendering the View for an app, consisting of the HTML code required for binding, rendering, and directives.

Dependency injection – used for extending module functionality during runtime.

Pros:

Yields huge performances, which is made possible by type-scripting. It offers libraries and functionalities for nested components, as well as web components support.

Cons:

It modifies a pre-existing DOM, which makes it slow and inefficient compared to React. It maintains a physical distance between the JavaScript driving an app and the HTML rendered.

Vue.js JavaScript Framework


JavavScript frameworks - Vue.js

Was introduced in 2016. It instilled the better parts of React, Angular, and Ember and put into a handy package. Vue’s learning curve was better than Angular and React.

What makes it stand out among the rest is the two-way binding, optional JSX support, Vue-cli, server-side rendering, and more. The ecosystem of the framework is composed of a view-loader as a component, library, Chrome, Vue.js devtools, Firefox, as well as a dedicated library Vuex to manage app state with the framework. Thus, it’s the better option than its counterparts for SPAs and cross-platform solutions.

You might see the Vue library as a combination of React and Angular, and somehow it’s true. It borrows the concepts of both React and Angular concepts. Layouts and logic, together with stylesheets are stored in a file. It also utilizes props objects and states, the same as React.

A reason to opt for Vue over React nonetheless is that React apps used the Redux library. As the app grows in size, building mini changes across files has the tendency to be tedious. This makes the Vue framework more favourable than others.

Pros

A collection of the best parts of the majority of frameworks. Thus, understanding the ease and deployment comes around. Very flexible, as well as facilitates a two-way communication, with a virtual DOM as well.

Cons

The downfall with Vue is its high flexibility. The high integrity makes choosing one for development hard. Most users of the Vue.js framework belong to non-native English speakers’ closed communities. The barrier in language is one of the reasons why developers are wary of using it.

React Native JavaScript Framework


JavaScript frameworks - React Native

It was a breakthrough when it comes to mobile application development. Before React, developing an Android and iOS app required various code sets. The whole deployment and coding functionality varied, and took a big toll on the expenses. 

React Native was launched by Facebook a few years back, revolutionizing the phone apps concept. You could write an app code and deploy at the same time on iOS and Android. The great success was the write once, deploy anywhere concept and React since then has been the foremost choice of native application development.

The framework takes the development of mobile apps to an all-new level, using CSS-like stylesheets, JS code, and HTML tags for lay-outing.

Pros

The concept of one framework, numerous platforms is a great React Native bonus. It has an extremely streamlined UI, and you could make apps faster with them.

Cons

The navigation is a turnoff, and transitions are not smooth either. It lacks the required custom modules for native application development. Native developers moreover are still required to accomplish the task.

Ionic JavaScript Framework


JavaScript frameworks - Ionic

It’s all about performance and nothing else. A cross-platform, and open-sourced, it’s used for developing hybrid mobile apps. A mobile HTML5 framework, it’s solely aimed at performance, using hardware acceleration. What’s great is that it does not require a third-party JS library. 

Ionic could be teamed up with Angular.js for building an interactive application. It comes with a set of its own icon set, called the Ionicons. Then it’s teamed up with reusable HTML classes for building an interactive mobile user interface. The HTML5 framework works with the help of Cordova or PhoneGap. 

Pros

A once code for all Ionic2 Concepts makes it favourable for developing an app.  Moreover, it’s open source and thus free entirely. The open source advantage of the huge developer community, as well as testers ascertain that the framework is top notch at all times. The open source benefit of a big community of developers and testers ensures that Ionic is on the top always.

Cons

Because of the code simplicity, creating an in-app navigation could be burdensome. It’s a very complicated task. The performance of the in-app is swift as the app when developed for individual devices. Because Angular.js is a must for Ionic 2, Angular.js knowledge is a critical factor in app development.

JavaScript is highly favoured among all the other programming languages. A few benefits are the following.

1. Safety. They are in continuous iteration, therefore they have a large community of members, as well as testers. 

2. Expense. Web applications cost an arm and a leg as most frameworks cost more. Most of the frameworks of JavaScript however are free of cost. This lowers the costs of web development drastically.

3. Efficiency. As earlier mentioned, the JavaScript frameworks are cutters of cost. In addition, they are also time savers, credits to the prebuilt functionalities for a faster web application development.

Conclusion

The whole website development community is extremely agile and continuously updates. Every month, a new framework is being released.  Those that are released are under constant upgrades and enhanced with the latest functions. We hope this guide helps you to choose the right JavaScript framework for you.

Author Bio:

Olivia D. is a technology observer, writer and blogger. Being a tech geek, she keeps a close watch over the industry focusing on the latest technology news and gadgets. Follow me on Twitter.

Are you using a JavaScript framework? Let us know in our latest Developer Economics survey.

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