TIOBE index is a horoscope for programmers — it's useless junk, and you can only use it to reinforce your pre-existing beliefs.

TIOBE has shown that beteen 2016 and 2017 the C language has dropped by 50%, and then in 2018 it miraculously doubled in usage.

What's more likely: that the slowest-moving most-conservative language just collapsed in one year, and later had a renaissance, or that TIOBE data is so shit that they have +/- 50% error margin? They're displaying percentages to two decimal places, but don't have a single digit of precision.

According to TIOBE, Visual Fox Pro is 2.5 times more popular than TypeScript. In case you haven't heard of Visual Fox Pro, it's a niche language for a database product that has been discontinued 16 years ago.

What's more likely: that Visual Fox Pro has still a massive userbase and almost nobody has heard of TypeScript, or that TIOBE's methodology is so stupid, that they can't even tell apart dead niche languages from the most popular ones?

If you must use some ranking, use RedMonk which is at least trying to have accurate data https://redmonk.com/sogrady/2024/03/08/language-rankings-1-2...

Rust hype seems to have got ahead of language maturity and stability. Most new languages get a period of attention and experimenting but eventually the rubber has to hit the road. In the case of Rust I think it can only attract senior devs using C++ in large numbers, for serious work, and that group will likely resist change without a compelling 10x improvement along some axis. The huge crowds of Python and JS programmers might tinker with Rust but I doubt Rust will make inroads in those environments.

Go got more traction but hasn’t made a big dent in the C++ or Java numbers. Go got to stable and mature faster too.

A few Linux kernel devs use Rust, maybe that will help it break out of hobbyist mode.

Cloudflare serves ~20% of the Web traffic, and several critical components on the request path are written in Rust (proxies, caches, firewalls, compression, some encryption, etc.)

At Cloudflare Rust is de-facto the default language for new network infrastructure projects. It is stable and mature. Teams using Rust are productive, and deliver fast software. Rust is here to stay, and there's no going back.

Cloudflare is hiring for positions that require Rust, but doesn't require "Rust programmers" specifically — other knowledge/experience is more important. Rust's safe/unsafe boundary and a lot of hand-holding by the compiler allows hiring people who are new to Rust. This is working fine, and ability to work on large real-world Rust projects is attracting a lot of applicants.

AFAICT most commercial bread-and-butter systems doesn’t need something like Rust. E.g. if one’s writing a payroll system or a CRM, they would probably use C# or Java. They wouldn’t use C/C++/Rust.

If they where to write the kernel for a new OS, Rust might be a viable alternative. But very few people are paid to write new kernels.

Rust looks very cool and interesting, but AFAICT it doesn’t seem intended to be become the default language for a majority of programmers.

I think this is one of the main reasons so few people use Rust in their day job.

the hobby statement implies this 16% is a ceiling, but the SO survey indicates growth potential. And what’s missing to draw any conclusions is the potential size of the addressable market, which can be inferred by the variety of solutions rust can be applied to.

> So I went digging around a bit and I found that apparently only something like 16% of people who use Rust use it for work. That essentially makes Rust a hobby language, does it not?

So, less people use it = hobby? How does that work? There are way more web developers than Linux kernel developers. Does that make it a hobby?

> That's crazy, considering ever since it's release Rust was consistently voted "most loved" language on Stackoverflow annual survey

And do the most highly rated movies always have the most revenue? How is it related?

...

By now there are plenty of important systems written in Rust. That doesn't mean there are a lot of them. Either way it has nothing to do with being a hobby or not. Popularity and importance aren't related.