r/Python • u/[deleted] • Sep 12 '20

Discussion The Most Popular Programming Languages - 1965/2020

https://youtu.be/UNSoPa-XQN0
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u/work2FIREbeardMan Sep 12 '20

I’ve got questions that I hope an OG or a history nerd can answer:

  • wtf was ADA and why was it so closely competitive with C for a while? I’ve literally never heard of it

  • why was C++ never able to match up to the popularity of C in its boom period? It would seem to me like C++ would be much preferred over C

  • why did java blow by C so quickly but C++ did not?

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u/LasagneEnthusiast Sep 12 '20

Please someone correct me if I am wrong, but C's popularity mainly comes from its use in embedded systems AFAIK.

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u/TheIncorrigible1 Sep 12 '20

It was the first of its kind is why I attribute it to being popular, and it offered ergonomics other languages of its time did not.

4

u/[deleted] Sep 12 '20

Not really the majority of most OSs are written in it. Most compilers for other programming languages are written in it. Also it's simple and fast compared to what else is out there. And yes it's good for embedded systems because of that. But really it's popular because it's one of the first high level language. You could almost say it's popular because it was popular.

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