Perl Surges to 10th Most Popular Programming Language, Sparking Debate on Its Relevance
The TIOBE Index has ranked Perl as the 10th most popular programming language in September, marking a significant rise from its position of 27th last year. This surge has sparked discussions among developers about the reasons behind Perl’s resurgence, with experts pointing to its robust text processing capabilities and strong open-source community support. The TIOBE rankings consider factors such as the number of skilled engineers, courses, and third-party vendors.
The eight most popular languages in September’s rankings haven’t changed since last month, with Python at the top, followed by C++ and C. Despite this, Perl’s climb to the 10th position has raised questions about its relevance in the ever-evolving programming landscape. The TIOBE CEO, Paul Jansen, noted that the rise could be attributed to Perl’s extensive book availability on Amazon, with four times more books listed than PHP or seven times more than Rust. However, the underlying reasons for this increase remain unclear. While some speculate that the renewed interest in Perl 5 has contributed to its popularity, Perl 6/Raku remains at position 129.
The article highlights Perl’s text processing capabilities, emphasizing its unmatched ability to handle tasks such as XML, JSON, YAML, and Markdown through extensive libraries and powerful regular expressions. Developers are encouraged to reconsider Perl’s potential in their projects, despite its relative obscurity among new trends. The ranking also sees other languages like Delphi/Object Pascal and SQL moving up, suggesting a dynamic shift in the programming landscape. The article cites the i-Programmer blog’s opinion that Perl’s resurgence could be due to its unmatched text manipulation abilities. The blog argues that in an era dominated by AI, text formats such as XML, JSON, YAML, and Markdown still play a crucial role in various applications, and Perl’s specialized tools make it a formidable contender in these areas. The blog also points to Perl’s strong open-source community backing and its recent improvements in object-oriented programming, which have drawn attention from developers who may have overlooked its capabilities in favor of newer, more popular languages.
Perl’s creator, Larry Wall, addressed questions from Slashdot’s readers in 2016, and the article invites current developers to share their experiences with Perl or its successor, Raku. This highlights a continued interest in Perl’s evolution and its potential contributions to modern software development. Meanwhile, Perl’s previous position at #9 means Delphi/Object Pascal has risen to the 9th spot, gaining traction in the programming community. The article also notes that SQL is close to re-entering the top 10, as it dropped to #12 in June due to the increased use of NoSQL databases for AI applications. Despite these changes, Python remains the most popular language, with its dominance continuing despite a slight dip in its percentage of popularity from August to September.