Ben GreenbergEvery year, the Stack Overflow Developer Survey provides a treasure trove of insights into the state of the developer ecosystem. The 2024 edition is no exception, with over 65,000 developers sharing their experiences, preferences, and aspirations. As someone deeply interested in Ruby, Rails, data management, and web dev, I found this year’s survey particularly interesting.
Let’s dive into some of the key takeaways from my perspective!
Ruby and Rails Insights
Ruby continues to hold a special place in the hearts of many developers (including yours truly). While it may not top the charts, its following remains strong. According to the survey, Ruby maintains a respectable position among programming languages, reflecting its enduring appeal. Ruby on Rails, with a usage rate of 4.7%, also enjoys significant admiration, with 56.4% of respondents expressing a desire to continue working with it. This tells me that Rails is consistently seen as an enduring tool to build maintainable and lasting applications.
Databases
What about NoSQL?
Data doesn't come in one shape, and our use of data varies greatly even in the same application.
Adaptive and flexible data management can often be best achieved through the use of NoSQL databases. I would argue that the shift towards NoSQL has been one of the most significant trends in recent years. The 2024 survey confirms and continues this trajectory.
MongoDB has an impressive developer usage rate with a 24.8% respondents reporting they use it.
Couchbase though has a strong following among those who do use it. The admiration and desired metrics for Couchbase are particularly noteworthy, with 32% of users admiring it. This suggests that Couchbase users are highly satisfied with its capabilities, likely due to its all in one platform ability (data caching, eventing, analytics, vector search, etc.), and its friendly dev experience (no need to learn a new query language to use it).
Web Development Trends
The web development landscape is as fluid and rapidly changing as ever, with several frameworks vying for developers’ attention. React and Node.js continue to dominate, with 33.4% and 31.8% of respondents respectively expressing a desire to work with these technologies. React’s admiration score stands at an impressive 62.2%, while Node.js is admired by 64.2% of respondents.
Next.js, Vue.js, and ASP.NET Core also feature prominently, each with strong usage and admiration metrics. Svelte, in particular, is worth mentioning. With 73% of developers who used it wanting to continue, Svelte has carved out a niche as a highly appreciated tool for building fast and responsive web applications.
Programming Languages
There are other languages than Ruby, apparently. :)
JavaScript remains the most popular programming language, with 41.9% of respondents expressing a desire to work with it, followed closely by Python (39.8%) and SQL (37.4%). HTML/CSS and TypeScript also rank highly in both usage and admiration metrics.
Rust, though not as widely used, stands out with an impressive 83% admiration score, highlighting its growing reputation for safety and performance.
If you're curious to learn a bit about Rust, you can watch my talk from a little while back on the topic from Devoxx Greece.
Wrapping Up
The 2024 Stack Overflow Developer Survey offers a comprehensive snapshot of our industry. While I focused in on the areas that were fascinating to me, I encourage you to dive into the survey yourself to discover the areas you are interested in!
Go explore and share your insights:
