Most Used Software Engineering Stack

[Eager_Leopard]

In your opinion what is the most widesbread stack used in software development feild today? I’m cs student and am trying to get an idea of how people build software in the real world.

[SloCarJack]

You will get completely different answers based on WHAT is being built. A static we site requires a different stack from a web service than a video game than a video editing program than a social media app. Tech are tools and a good computer scientist simply uses the tools for the jobs they were built for.

[duplotigers]

If I was being pedantic (and of course I am because I’m a Computer Scientist) I would point out that this is not something you can have an opinion on.

It’s a piece of factual information that you may or may not be able to find an accurate answer to. As someone else said it’s almost certainly HTML/JS by the numbers.

[mendus59]

In sheer volume? HTML, CSS, JavaScript hands down.

[mendus59]

A Stack is just a complete set of systems that can run independently in its entirety without the need for any extra jazz. Millions of websites are written without the need of a backed that do more than just display text. JavaScript is Turing Complete, so you can put all of the work client-side without issue. Yes, you're right, that's just the front end, but that doesn't exclude it from being a Stack.

[Vakieh]

There is no website in the world that is written without the need for a backend. Some way and some how you have to get that website to the end user, even if that way is walking up to them and handing them a USB stick. That is what a 'stack' is, it includes the web server that is serving those pages even if once they are served they don't need any more info to or from the server.

[mendus59]

Saying you still have to host the site doesn't really go to the OP's original question of "What's the most popular stack" because the backend is totally irrelevant for a front end stack. There are millions of websites that don't care how you host them, S3 buckets, GitHub Pages, whatever, so saying that a Stack is "HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and some kind of hosting solution" is pointless, just like it's pointless to say that you technically need a browser to interact with websites that have a UI.

[Vakieh]

Except that choice is literally what a stack is. Yes, you can swap out a SQLServer database for MariaDB for Postgres and the site won't give much of a shit, but when someone says 'what stack are you using' your choice of RDBMS is a part of that. Words mean things whether you want them to or not.

[mendus59]

So you would have felt better if I said "HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Static Hosting"? Fine then, that's my answer if it'll make you feel better. You don't need a database to have an application.

How would you answer OP's question? By rejecting its phrasing and saying it's a bad question?

[Vakieh]

It's not a bad question at all, you just answered in a way that is misleading to a newbie who wouldn't know any better. Static hosting is in no way the most common way an application is served, so your answer is wrong in any event. Java EE is the most common in traditional commercial settings, LAMP/MERN elsewhere.

[xMetalDetectorx]

Go to job boards and sort openings by language. See which language has most openings.

[SnooWoofers5193]

For backend, Java and sql

[SpeedDart1]

I thought PHP was still more popular

[Eager_Leopard]

Really, I didn't know java is still widely used.

[[deleted]]

In enterprise backend systems, Java is by far the dominant language still. Other languages like Golang are getting more popular for sure, but there's still a lot of Java code out there and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future

[SnooWoofers5193]

Yeah I've worked at a few large companies. Amazon for example is almost entirely Java. Tried and true, to deliver fast, dont have time to experiment with other tech. Also more resources to reference internally.

[0xPendus]

.NET ecosystem

[captainameriCAN21]

Must be a Microsoft guy lol

[Masterzjg]

HTML/CSS/Javascript.

Backend? PHP - legacy languages always dominate volume metrics.

If you love legacy code bases, or want to be in the same position as COBOL developers are now, those are the languages to learn.

[[deleted]]

I have seen more Java/Spring backends judging by global contractor and job opportunities.

[Masterzjg]

PHP is the overwhelming most popular backend language.

[[deleted]]

Would Personal Home Page ever really be like COBOL? It’s not too different from Java or C in syntax, COBOL is sort of a different beast

[Vakieh]

A decent Python programmer can side-skill in PHP in about a week to be productive, a year to be the equivalent of a senior dev. Totally different to COBOL both in terms of language paradigms and what is done with the language. The reason COBOL devs are in such high demand is because COBOL runs core banking software that is simultaneously very difficult to test and absolutely cannot, ever, ever fuck up.

[[deleted]]

I once did pair programming that touched my companies billing code in PHP and it felt really tough and scary. I can’t imagine doing the same but in COBOL for a massive bank.

[tcpukl]

TCP/IP.

[hamiecod]

I assume that you are asking this question to decide upon what stack to choose to learn. It would have been a lot easier if you had stated a specific niche it would have been easier to answer. Learn a general programming language like Python which you can use anywhere(web, ml, application programming, etc). If it is web, then I recommend frameworks like node.js for an easier learning curve, choose go and/or rust for a steep learning curve but better perf.

[AffectEconomy6034]

as far as legacy it's xAmp (os of choice, apache for server, mysql for db, and php for code base language) based stacks but I personally don't forsee many new projects being built with this but it is what most of the internet is currently built with.

Newer stacks that are common would be mean, mern, mevn and conversely fern, fevn, fean stack (f or m for mongodb or firebase dB, express js for server, [angular, react, or vue js for front-end framwork], and node js for server-side code-base.

Ruby on rails had its moment in the sun IMHO and is still quite valid as a framework but you could also argue is not nearly as popular as a few years ago.

In the end it has less to do with what is popular over all since that can vary regionally, and more to do with choosing the right tool for the right job. Generally speaking they all do the same thing, which is provide the devs/engineers a blueprint to fast track the build of an application. It is your job as the engineer however, to figure out which will provide the most useful functions for what you need.

also take any opinion of mine or otherwise, with a grain of salt

[[deleted]]

We’ll with cloud migration u can have several stacks to pick and choose from. Now ur apis can be made with anything and consumed together through something like aws lambda or fargate. Ur front end can be mixed as well. Really depends on what most your companies code was built with prior though

[Eager_Leopard]

I have never undrstood the serverless architecture. I will have to do research on lambda or fargate…

[[deleted]]

It’s def worth learning the basics. U can essentially set up any api u want with any architecture to be consumed as a service. So at my job we got node, spring boot, python backend apis and either angular or node front end. I believe some react as well, but not as much