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Top Programming Languages 2025

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131–140 of 467 posts

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#131

As a backend dev (mostly working in fintech) I feel weirdly unable to find a target language to move to. After working with Node and Ruby for a while I really miss a static type system. - Typescript was limited by its option to allow non strictness. Nothing catches my eye, as it’s either Java/.Net and its enterprisey companies or Go, which might not be old but feels like it is, by design. Rust sounds fun, but its use…

If you want to stay in Fintech, I really don't see anything beyond Java, C#, C++, TypeScript (for the Web stuff).

Some Fintech companies might go a bit outside the norm and allow for Haskell, F#, Scala, which they tend to use as DSLs for some workflows.

Then if you into array languages, banking and fintech is one fo the few domains where that have managed to stay around, but those positions seem hard to get.

Dyalog (APL), J, BQN, Kdb+ (Q)

https://www.arraycast.com/resources

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#132
post #51

Kinda surprising that I see nothing from Zig on all these lists.

Don’t think zig will ever make it into popularity tbh. It is good for low level but it isn’t like rust or go. Rust and go are really good alternatives for c++ or java code, they just work, have good tooling etc. But I would never use zig for that kind of use case instead of rust since you don’t need to go full on engineering every dot mode.

I switched to zig from rust for implementing a database since 6 months and have no regrets but just don’t think anyone would use it for writing backend code or other similar smaller things.

I used to think similarly about rust before though so don’t really know anything

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#133

I’m shocked, Java is so high up in all categories. I have never met a single Java programmer, though to be fair I started my career fairly recently.

Never met Android developers? I'm not sure how much Kotlin has already taken over there, but if you develop for Android you'll have to deal with Java (for better or worse).

Also for backend services Java is a pretty solid option. Just compile a monolithic JAR and 'run' that anywhere, which is much more robust than some node.js app cobbled together from tens of thousands of leftpad-equivalent npm packages ;)

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#134
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scala is the best language I've ever used - all the good parts of Typescript and all the good parts of Java or Rust. And fintech is one of the few niches where you might still be able to find a job using it.

How's the tooling story with Scala these days? I played with it a long time ago and the IDE (eclipse plugin?) was a bit of a mess, sbt was prone to weird issues and lock ups and the compiler was pretty slow. Very fun language tho!

Some of the folks now work for JetBrains, thus InteliJ is the one with best support.

Then they decided to focus the remaining effort on Scala Metals, which is based on LSP protocol.

In both cases it is alright for Scala 2, there are some rough edges for Scala 3.

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#135

As a backend dev (mostly working in fintech) I feel weirdly unable to find a target language to move to. After working with Node and Ruby for a while I really miss a static type system. - Typescript was limited by its option to allow non strictness. Nothing catches my eye, as it’s either Java/.Net and its enterprisey companies or Go, which might not be old but feels like it is, by design. Rust sounds fun, but its use…

I feel the same way and I think that Gleam is best language that fits this criteria. It has the simplicity of Go but the ergonomics of Kotlin.

I really like Gleam. But if you want a job, that’s probably the worst choice ever. The language is just a few years old and lack libraries for mostly everything. Why are people recommending that here, do you guys work using Gleam??

Let’s be honest , your realistic options for work are Java, C#, C++, and depending on the industry, Swift, Go, Kotlin, Dart and Rust.

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#136
post #27

As a backend dev (mostly working in fintech) I feel weirdly unable to find a target language to move to. After working with Node and Ruby for a while I really miss a static type system. - Typescript was limited by its option to allow non strictness. Nothing catches my eye, as it’s either Java/.Net and its enterprisey companies or Go, which might not be old but feels like it is, by design. Rust sounds fun, but its use…

Take a page from janestreet's book: use ocaml. Rust is also a general purpose language, there's no reason you can't use it for just about any problem space.

I tried ocaml last year (I knew some Haskell and Scala already) and it was hell. The language itself was pretty, that's true. But the schism between Ocaml's stdlib and Jane Street's core lib was incredibly frustrating.

I guess when you're working at Jane Street, use only their core lib and you get some proper onboarding, things could work great. However you're programming very much in a niche community then.

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#137

As a backend dev (mostly working in fintech) I feel weirdly unable to find a target language to move to. After working with Node and Ruby for a while I really miss a static type system. - Typescript was limited by its option to allow non strictness. Nothing catches my eye, as it’s either Java/.Net and its enterprisey companies or Go, which might not be old but feels like it is, by design. Rust sounds fun, but its use…

Python with Pyright in strict mode. I work on a ~200kLOC fully typed Python project [0] and am having fun.

[0]: https://github.com/xdslproject/xdsl

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#138

What is "Arduino" ? If it's the "Arduino" that hobbyist using to DIY device, then "Arduino" is not a language, it's C++.

The Arduino docs call it the "Arduino programming language" for some reason, even though it's mostly just C++ with a few typedefs. I am not sure why.

Maybe they don't want to confuse beginner. Saying it's C++ means some beginners will assume you can use standard lib like cout or printf.

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Swift! It actually has a pretty big server community, Vapor and Hummingbird are both great frameworks, Apple has been replacing some of their Java services with it, it's open source and cross platform and Apple seems serious about making it viable on Linux, which it is. No need for Xcode, it has an open source LSP and first class VSCode plugin. Plus it's a fun language to write. Some people say it's a nicer, higher l…

I do like Swift but it also suffers a bit from identity crisis. The compiler experience is quite disappointing too—I found myself helping the compiler more than the compiler helped me. I've since moved to Rust and have not looked back. Importantly, rust-analyzer runs circles around the Swift VSCode plugin (or Xcode for that matter)

The identitiy is clear, it is a language first and foremost for Apple ecosystems.

It also needs to target GNU/Linux, because Apple got rid of their server offerings, thus anyone doing server code for applications on the Apple ecosystem, that wants to stay in a single language needs to be able to write such software on GNU/Linux with Swift.

Windows well, since they have the open source story, it kind of falls from there as complement.

On the revamped website they are quite clear about the identity.

Cloud Services, CLI and Embedded as the main targets for the open source version.

Re: Top Programming Languages 2025

#140

As a backend dev (mostly working in fintech) I feel weirdly unable to find a target language to move to. After working with Node and Ruby for a while I really miss a static type system. - Typescript was limited by its option to allow non strictness. Nothing catches my eye, as it’s either Java/.Net and its enterprisey companies or Go, which might not be old but feels like it is, by design. Rust sounds fun, but its use…

Have you really been using Node or even Typescript as backend dev in fintech? After 15 years in fintech I have never heard anything like that. For the backend it's mostly Java with some sprinkles of C#, Cobol or Python.
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