Python, C# & Flash are hot – Java, Ruby & Ajax are not
Book sales by and large provide a fair picture of what’s buzzing in
technology and what might be the technology to watch out for in the
near future. There’s certainly an assumption in this that all
books are well written and well marketed and they are being bought
based solely on reader interest in the technology.
Tim
O’Reilly in a recent
post has noted which books and technologies are hitting
the mark for O’Reilly. Here are some of the highlights –
“A lot of people have missed just how
much Flash is on a roll. Ajax
books have slowed down considerably, while books on Macromedia’s
Adobe’s web technologies are really moving.”
“I noted that the AJAX meme seems to
be waning, but that doesn’t mean
that the underlying technologies of AJAX are suffering. Javascript: The
Definitive Guide continues to be one of our all time bestsellers. “
“C# continues to gain significantly
on Java in terms of book
sales…”
“What’s notably missing from the
bestseller lists: books on programming
languages (besides Javascript). The top programming language books in
last week’s bookscan report were Learning Python, followed closely by
the just-released Head First C#. Books on Java, Perl, PHP, and yes,
even Ruby, are well down the list. Books on Linux, MySQL, and security
ditto. In the professional computer area, networking, software
engineering, and database books that weren’t specific to any particular
database product were the overall winners.”
Do you think these facts depict a true picture of what’s happening in technology? Which technologies do you think are hot and buzzing?
Reference – A Year in O’Reilly Books (2007)
Related
* Pirates
of the IT world: The Curse of the Black Bazaar
* Eric
Sink On The Business Of Software – Book Review
* Python Programming Resource
What! Cobol!!!!! I couldn’t agree more. I’m 70 years old and have been developing in cobol for years but no one wants to talk about it anymore cause they are more dazzled by .Net and Java. Frankly, I have developed 30 years worth of code and with the newer cobol OOP dev tools I can do anything I want. This is the first time I’ve ever heard of anyone talking about cobol these days. It’s a way for us old programmers to show that we are still good and keeps us from having to dump all the knowledge that we have. I tip my hat to you my fellow cobol programmer. Maybe they’ll remember us.
In Java there is nothing completely new and worth learning from a book. That is good for the developer but not good for the growth of Java. So Java is cold is correct
Maybe Java is so hot that there’s enough on-line documentation & examples that no one needs books any more. Besides, doesn’t everyone already have 5 or 10 good Java books? I don’t deny that C# is on the rise though – one more thing to learn…
Book sales don’t reflect the market. And other editors?
No mention of – Java Scripting? JavaFX or JRuby Or Groovy? Thought these were hot
Although general Ajax books are past their time, specific Ajax skills like GWT are still very much hot and sought after
A drop in book sales denotes a maturing of the technology. Java and Ajax are still very much hot. Ruby has always been more hype but little actual penetration