D popularity

[Joakim]

On Monday, 21 January 2013 at 21:27:54 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> If text editors written in JavaScript have become
> commonplace (<sarcasm>Thanks, Google!</sarcasm>), I'm sure 
> JS-based
> interpreters, JS-based codecs and "F"FTs (rather SFTs), and 
> other
> such nonsense aren't far behind.
You probably already saw these, but an x86 emulator that runs 
linux, written in javascript:

http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/javascript-emulator-lets-linux-run-in-a-browser-tab-20110517/

Forge, a Transport Layer Security implementation written in 
javascript:

http://digitalbazaar.com/2010/07/20/javascript-tls-1/

Not quite FFTs or codecs, but not far off. :) I think these are 
horribly dumb ideas, just pointing out that they exist.

> A roundabout way to say it, but I guess the point I started out 
> trying to make is this: The popularity of 
> dynamic/interpreted/sandboxed/etc
> languages *is* IMO one of the more significant roadblocks in 
> the way of D popularity. Silent fire alarms are what's hip, and 
> here we are
> peddling an old-fashioned sounds-and-lights fire alarm. We're 
> pragmatic instead of cool.

I agree with this generally, but I'll note that those dynamic 
languages really aren't that popular.  Using TIOBE data, (yes, 
yes, I know it's not good data, but I'm going to keep looking 
under the streetlight, dammit ;) )

http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html

Three out of the top four languages are now native compiled, with 
C even beating back Java for the top spot recently.  D is 
probably in the top 7 for compiled languages and the only one to 
be designed in the last decade or so (I don't think Pascal and 
Ada are coming back ;) ).  So I think D is well-positioned to hit 
that top spot, or at least that's what I told a friend recently 
when I explained why I'm trying to use D. :)