The State of JavaScript with Sacha Greif
===

Paul: [00:00:00] Hi there. And welcome to PodRocket, a web development podcast brought to you by LogRocket. LogRocket helps software teams improve user experience with session replay, error tracking, and product analytics. Try it for free at logrocket. com today. My name is Paul, and joined with us is Sacha Grief. He's a designer, developer, and entrepreneur, and we're here to talk about the state of JavaScript, specifically state of JavaScript 2023.

Welcome to the show, Sacha.

Sacha: Hey, thanks for having me.

Paul: Yeah. Thank you for coming on. ~I mean, ~it's a huge privilege to get to talk to somebody who has such like a deep insight into the JavaScript community. It's something that so many people use every day. And I'm curious, I'm eager to ~like ~pick your brain right now and learn a little bit about not only what brought you to creating the survey, how you think about the survey, but the results of 2023.

So right before we hop in, I mean, one question is it is June of 2024. Why did it take a little bit for the results of the 2023 to come out?

Sacha: ~Well, ~when people have asked me that,~ uh,~ I like to say [00:01:00] that,~ uh,~ JavaScript is a zero index language. So it's ~like, ~it's easy ~to, ~to get it off by one, you know?~ Um, ~but no, the real reason is that,~ um, yeah, we, ~we did a lot of things differently, I guess last year in 2023. And so if you want the details,~ well, um, ~first of all, ~you know, ~there's, as there always is, there's where a lot of code changes and things we did to improve.

Like ~the, ~the maintainability of the project going forward. So I rewrote a lot of the charts, for example, to, ~you know, ~rewrite them from scratch myself using HTML CSS,~ uh,~ so that they're more flexible,~ uh,~ instead of depending on like a third party. ~Uh, ~database library, like we were doing before. And what's cool is now it lets us do things like use like CSS grid subgrid to adapt the chart responsibly, instead of just scaling it.

~Uh, ~it's also better in the future for,~ um,~ accessibility. Things like that. ~So, ~so that's one reason. ~Uh, ~another reason is that for mainly for another survey, the state of HTML survey,~ uh,~ which we were doing for the first time, [00:02:00] we collected a lot of,~ uh,~ free form data. In other words, data where people can write in their own answer in their own words, which,~ uh,~ we can attend to do when we're doing a survey for the first time, just cause we don't want to prime the survey ~and like ~in a specific direction, right?

Cause if we ask you. What's your favorite color? And the options are red, green, blue. Then obviously those three are going to dominate the rankings. Whereas if we let people. Say it in their own words. They might say purple, gray, and so on. So that's the principle why we collected so much freeform data. But then in turn, that takes a lot of time to analyze.

And I ended up building,~ uh,~ like a new dashboard internal tool, ~you know, to, ~to help us analyze that data better. So there were a bunch of reasons like that. And also just,~ um, you know, ~trying not to burn out because it's actually ~kind of ~a pretty big and diverse, especially if you. ~Uh, ~think about all the surveys.

So we have HTML,~ uh,~ JS, but also CSS,~ uh,~ react. And then I'm also doing a survey for a [00:03:00] local company here in Japan called Tokyo dev. So managing all these surveys mostly by myself is ~kind of ~a, it can sometimes be a lot. And, ~you know, ~I was also traveling at some point anyway, not to make excuses,~ uh,~ but there were a bunch of reasons why it ended up taking so long.

~Uh, ~but hopefully it's like a one time thing. And going forward,~ we,~ we. laid the groundwork to be able to move faster and release the, ~you know, ~2024 surveys. ~Uh, ~results in 2024,

Paul: ~Well, I mean, ~no need for excuses. It's a huge undertaking, like you said, and I think a lot of people are more than grateful to get this sort of insight and honesty, because honesty can be difficult, especially in the open source community, because there's this like hive mentality sometimes about what is good and what is bad.

So it's an amazing open product for everybody to use. And ~there's no ~there's no need to excuses. I just thought it was an interesting way to open up like how deeply you're involved as ~like, ~somebody who put forth this into the world. And that kind of leads me to The next thing I want to talk about, we are going to talk about the results.

~That's, ~that's very important. We're going to get to [00:04:00] that in this pod. But where,~ like,~ what's your background, Satya? What inspired you to do this? How long did it take you to get the MVP up at the, of the first survey? And is there something like you were trying to fix, address, or get at in the community by putting this out?

Sacha: right. So I've been doing,~ uh, ~both design and development for a long time. ~Um, you know, ~I've always done both mostly. I like, I had ~a background, like ~a more technical background on computer science and stuff like that. But then. Because of the early days of the web, ~you know, ~the tools weren't that great. So I went more in the direction of pure design, just working in Photoshop and stuff like that.

But then eventually the web ~kind of caught back, ~caught up ~with, uh, ~with the design aspect. And then it became more fun and more productive to design right in the browser, at least for me. So I ~kind of ~always moved back and forth between both, ~you know, ~ends of the spectrum. And I think that's why it ~kind of ~makes sense that I ended up doing a project like this, where there's a big technical component because all our stack is basically custom.

~Uh, ~but there's also a fun [00:05:00] design side to it with the data visualizations ~and, ~and all the other aspects. ~So that, that's my background. I'm sorry. Go ahead.~

Paul: ~no, I didn't mean to interrupt. Please continue.~

Sacha: Yeah. So, so just to give you a quick overview of my background, um, and I'm definitely more of a generalist. Like I'm definitely not a great developer or a great designer compared to some other people.

But I think having ~both, ~both skills is sometimes interesting. Also, it lets me be,~ uh, kind of ~autonomous and do a lot of things by myself ~and ~which works pretty well for this project, at least.

Paul: Right,

Sacha: your other question was more about how the project itself got started. ~Right,~

Paul: Yeah. And ~kind of ~your inner motivation to put in all the work to launch something.

Sacha: right. ~So, um, ~basically what happened is I was very involved. ~Yeah. Cause ~cause like I said, ~what attracts me, um,~ what's attractive to me as being. Independent and being able to move on my own. And for that reason,~ um,~ like almost, ~I guess, ~more than 10 years ago, ~there were, ~there was a framework called Meteor JS that came out, which,~ uh,~ promised and ~kind of ~delivered on that promise, but it was all about empowering,~ um,~ solo developers, [00:06:00] designers,~ uh,~ small teams to move faster by giving you a lot of built in tools, like, you know, templates, a backend, the front end, the data layer, A lot of the things that we're still working out to this, they actually were already present in Meteor JS.

And so I was very involved in that community. But then a side effect of that is because Meteor itself was so self contained. Once I kinda, ~you know, um, ~started looking outside of that little bubble, I got quickly very confused by the overall JavaScript ecosystem. And that was around 2016. And at the time, ~you know, uh, ~Angular was very dominant, but it was probably before Angular 2.

0. So The, what's now called AngularJS,~ the,~ the reviews weren't that good. Like people weren't that happy with it. ~Uh, ~React was coming up, but still new. You had things like Redux, which on one hand seemed great, but were ~kind of ~[00:07:00] complex. And I remember everybody was talking at the time about JavaScript fatigue, right?

And people still are, but even more back then, I think. And this is what prompted me to create the first edition of the state of JS surveyor. It was mostly as a way for myself to ~kind of ~figure things out and now know which framework I should learn next and where I should put my energy and my time. And then my main, ~I guess, uh, ~insight, ~I guess, ~was we had a lot of,~ uh,~ quantitative data.

Like we had NPM downloads,~ uh, you know, ~you could look at, ~you know, ~All kinds of, ~you know, ~statistical analysis of that ~or, ~or hard metrics. ~Right. ~But it only told you about the, ~I guess, ~popularity of a framework or a tool in terms of raw usage. It didn't really tell you if people were actually happy with that tool.

And so that, that's what I was trying to,~ uh, ~solve. And that's the gap I was trying to fill, ~right. ~Asking people if they actually enjoy using,~ uh,~ their tools in the JavaScript ecosystem. And so that was back in 2016. ~Uh, ~the first edition was fairly simple. Like I used a off the [00:08:00] shelf,~ uh,~ survey service. ~Um, ~the probably also made some quick charts in SVG.

And yeah, it took me maybe a couple months altogether, maybe two, three months.

And at the time I didn't really think about,~ you know, ~doing it as a long term project. It was more of a one time thing just to figure things out. But, ~you know, ~given the success and the popularity of that first ~Uh, ~I decided to keep doing it ~and,~

~um, do we need to start over?~

Paul: ~Okay. ~

Sacha: ~Oh, I just said I was explaining why I created the original state of JS survey, and I guess I was about done. Uh, oh yeah, yeah, we can do that. Oh, no, I was done. I was just wondering if maybe something hadn't been recorded or,~

~okay.~

Paul: ~Yeah, I'm ready to tee up another question, but Sasha, I'll leave that up to you if you feel like there was, I ~

Sacha: ~Okay. Perfect. Um, I can't click the call settings button for some reason. I mean, did you hear any different difference in my audio? Just want to make sure that ~

Paul: ~I feel like we arrived at a good stopping point, maybe twice. So~

Sacha: ~Okay.~

Paul: ~it'd be good to move on. Okay.~

Sacha: ~Can, oh, I can't see my way form. That's weird. Okay. ~

~Okay. I still have my local copy anyway, I think. Uh, okay. Yeah, I'm ready to move on.~

Paul: ~All right. I'm good. If you're good. Okay. ~So Sasha, that's a really, ~you know, ~like naturally born motivation, as we can see for like making the state of JS. When you first put it out. Because ~it was so, you know, ~it was so purely coming from this like place of curiosity and like just expansion in your own development life or those questions, ~you know, ~from for you, like you were

the first user story for where those questions were and subsequently like for 2023. ~ ~Was it just you or were you colluding with some other parties to help net good questions? How do you 

evaluate a good question. for the survey? 

~ ~So 

Sacha: a great question. So things have ~definitely~ changed a lot. ~Um, um, Well, I'm~ still, I [00:09:00] would call myself the lead ~ ~of the project. So I still, I'm still the person who spends the most time. ~uh, ~but I do work with other people. So, uh, for the state of HTML survey, for example, I worked with,~ uh,~ Leah Veru,~ uh,~ and she also put in a lot of her time to design the questions, help me design the UI, and she was very involved for, uh, state of JS.~ ~ ~ ~I guess I took the lead on designing the questions because that's a topic I'm more familiar with, but I also had feedback, um, from the community via GitHub,~ uh,~ discord. So, you know, which obviously ~it's ~it's kind of hard because~ You know, ~it's hard to make everybody aware of everything that's going on, but we do try to be as transparent as possible and ~ ~people,~ um, ~ in the whole process. So ~ ~from, you know, designing the questions to giving feedback on the survey, when ~it's, ~it's in a preview state to also having feedback on the survey results,~ uh,~ once they're out. And,~ uh,~ I also have another [00:10:00] contributor,~ uh,~ Eric. ~Um,~ and ~he,~ he's helping more with the backend side of things. ~Um, uh, very, uh,~ goes very in depth in ~like~ all the Next.

js, ~um,~ config stuff. So it's been very helpful to, to have him around as well.~ Um, ~ 

Paul: I'd love to dig into. What you found in 2023, like what questions were there, what responses, what was shocking because we're ~kind of ~getting at the halfway mark. But right before we do that, I just want to remind our listeners that this conversation and podcast you're listening to today is brought to you by log rocket.

So if you are overwhelmed by JavaScript and all the things out there, you can use this tool to find errors faster, spend less time debugging odd stuff in the console that you might not have expected from this SDK and that library. And there's cool AI features about to drop that we have that you can, ~you know, ~find in surface trends that you might not have noticed.

So go to log rocket. com today, check it out and see if you can truly. Supercharge your building and your delivery to the right customers. So Satya, I want to dig into these, the survey of 2023. ~I mean, ~let's start with~ ~a brief [00:11:00] overview of the questions. ~I, ~I can't size how long it would take to go over all of them.

So maybe if we could talk about a few of them that you felt were like provided a 

great lens into what's going on. 

Sacha: Yeah,~ so~ there's,~ uh,~ for people who are, aren't that familiar with the survey, there's four kind of broad categories. Like we ask about regular demographics questions like age, ~uh,~ years of experience,~ uh,~ salary and so on. ~uh, ~we asked about,~ uh, features Um, ~so which features of the JavaScript language are you using? And this wasn't very emphasized in the JavaScript survey this year,~ um,~ because the JavaScript survey always has a lot of libraries, which is the third category. And ~that, ~that's the bulk. So, uh, front end frameworks,~ uh,~ or front end libraries, um, meta frameworks. So things like Next. js, Astro, build tools, testing,~ um,~ and a couple of other categories, and then we have a couple more, ~um,~ sections about more generic stuff, like which,~ uh,~ podcasts you listen to,~ um,~ which,~ uh,~ YouTubers or Twitch streamers you [00:12:00] follow.

So And, and So on. So, um, in terms of,~ um, ~I guess libraries,~ I think the main,~ there weren't that many new trends. ~Um, ~in fact, the only really new entrant we had, we added was, uh, HTMX, I think for, ~uh,~ frontend libraries. And it was the first year we asked questions about that. So, you know, it's been quite popular, but we'll have to wait until ~next year to see like, or~ next edition, I guess, to see if the trend is,~ uh, you know, ~Like a blip or actually something that goes on longer. ~Uh,~ other than that, you know, you still have the usual suspects. We have react, view, ~ ~Angular.~ Now, uh, one ~one interesting data point is that for the first time ever,~ uh, ~view,~ uh,~ has overtaken,~ um,~ Angular In terms of usage. Now, a ~few, ~few caveats. ~Um, ~this is, ~you know, ~in our own data, in our data set, it doesn't mean like In the whole world, there's more Vue developers than Angular developers.

We can't say anything about that, but at least within survey respondents, more people answered that they have used or are using Vue [00:13:00] than,~ uh,~ Angular, which is interesting because Angular has been a dominant force,~ uh,~ for so long, but Vue has shown really,~ uh,~ consistent growth. ~Um, ~especially,~ um,~ now that,~ uh, you know, ~the Vue team is also releasing things like Vite.

And, uh, V test, both of those are like among the I think they're the top two projects in terms of satisfaction of how happy people are with them. And they're gaining a ~huge, ~hugely in usage as well. So I think the whole view ecosystem, knocks as well. Um, that ecosystem, All that team, they are doing amazing work.

And,~ uh, you know, ~people often say, Oh, the survey is biased because ~you, you know,~ you guys use react and although I do use react, just, Because that's what I used. There's no deeper reason. ~Uh, ~I can recognize that the ecosystem is, ~uh,~ doing pretty amazing. And I think that the survey definitely shows that ~um, ~that being said,~ uh,~ I think Angular is actually ~ ~doing [00:14:00] okay. So even though it's kind of losing market share, uh, clear that a couple of years ago, there was like ~a, ~a descent, like a,~ uh,~ a quick fall in all metrics, but now it's stabilized. And I think there is. ~You know, ~people are talking about an Angular,~ uh,~ Renaissance, ~uh, ~

Paul: ~Yeah, ~

Sacha: ~way.~ And I think it shows in the metrics, not so same, like really fast growth that, that newer Svelte or Solid might be showing, but in terms of more like stabilizing,~ uh,~ the trend.

So I think that's actually positive for Angular as well. And then yeah, things like Svelte,~ uh,~ Solid,~ um,~ you know, interest,~ uh,~ is high awareness, especially for Svelte is growing a lot. Uh, solid, in two years, it went ~for,~ from 37 percent of respondents knowing what solid is to today's 76%. So it's like doubled, which is,~ uh,~ pretty amazing. So ~ ~yeah, I would say you have the main players, which. Are still doing great things. Like ~we, we, ~we're not seeing really ~any, ~any framework where ~like, ~[00:15:00] there's a big drop off because people aren't happy with it. So it. ~kind of ~goes against the narrative where people are like, Hey, react. ~Uh, ~it's too It's changing too much. it's not changing enough. People like to complain, but when you look at the data, you actually see that, um, the, the main players are doing a good job of keeping their user base happy. And then the smaller ones are also. Uh, coming up really quickly. 

Paul: Yeah, so you mentioned VEET as a build tool. I mean, that's been sweeping and. positive. People love VEET. Are there any,~ um,~ other like build tools

or task

runners or CICD related ~ ~technologies and packages that you ask questions about that

people might not be aware of or

other interesting findings?

Sacha: ~well,~ I think to talk a little bit about,~ uh,~ build tools, I think webpack is interesting to look at because it's been the dominant, uh, option for so long that it's kind of going through a phenomenon that, you know, almost every library goes through, which is [00:16:00] as, things grow more popular, the people can,~ uh,~ start finding more, ~you know,~ things to complain about.

~Uh, ~which is also warranted sometimes. And it's a twofold effect, right? Where people ~you know, ~it's not, it's normal to, as you interact more with a tool, you can run into GED edge cases more, you bump into those ~ ~things that are hard to do or impossible to do. And that's definitely something that we see with Webpack. where it's so feature rich, there's so much config options that people often,~ you know, ~prefer~ ~the simplicity of Vite.~ Uh, ~but maybe they're not ~also not~ trying to do the exact same things with Vite that they might have tried to do with Webpack. And then the other aspect is,~ uh, uh, ~grows, uh, you know, it's like a, a tree, right? With all the rings. I feel like the tools also ~accumulate,~ accumulate layers of features and compatibility, uh, legacy code. So it's normal that the tool will ~kind of ~lose traction and lose ~a~ bit of positivity towards [00:17:00] itself as it matures.~ Um, ~but the reason I mentioned that is because I think it's important to remember that all the next generation of tools is built on top of You know, those older tools, like Vite is not literally built on top of Webpack, but definitely in terms of learning from Webpack, even just learning which features ~uh, ~are good to keep, which ones are only relevant for,~ uh, you know, ~smaller proportion of the the, the population, ~you know, the, ~the 80 20 rule, it's like, even if you know that only 20 percent of features are useful for 80 percent of developers, knowing which 20 percent Is the whole problem, right? So, um, yeah, I think it's worth looking at the stats and being like, Oh, Webpack is losing steam or whatever. But,~ uh, we, ~we also need to remember,~ uh,~ that everything that we have now was pioneered ~by project~ by projects like Webpack. And it's good to be grateful to, ~uh,~ the Webpack team as well as to the Vite team, because, they're both doing amazing work. 

Paul: And [00:18:00] it's important 

to arguably stay knowledgeable of them because no matter where you go,

you're probably still going to find Webpack because of 

its prevalence. ~ ~

Sacha: Yeah, for sure. ~I mean, ~that's also something I ~like ~remind,~ uh,~ folks off that the survey, the state of JS survey, I know the name is. Lead you to think it's of the whole state of JS. every single JavaScript developer has answered a survey and we have the objective truth of the world, but obviously it's not that, and the mission, the actual mission of the survey is to measure that like ~ ~early adopter. ~ ~Sub population that's really cutting edge part of the developer ecosystem that almost always is like leads to trends. So the hope is to identify what's popular today among that population, because eventually it will become the more mainstream option in a couple of years. ~So, ~

Paul: Got it. 

Sacha: yeah, I think that's,~ uh,~ an important point because ~ ~sure, there, there's even a ~ ~sticking something like, ~uh,~ Amber, for example, which doesn't do great in the survey.

[00:19:00] And we haven't really asked about it in the last edition, but there's still a ton of Amber codebases out there. ~Uh, ~there's still a ton of people. ~Uh, ~happy with Amber, ~ um, ~all the survey says is that population of developers who is now getting into Vite, into Svelte, into Solid, ~uh,~ those developers weren't,~ um,~ that enthusiastic about Amber anymore.

And, ~you know, ~I pick Amber because that's a good example of a ~ ~popular project that ~had,~ didn't have a great showing in our community. Specific stats, but ~there are, ~there are plenty of projects like that. Even something like jQuery,~ uh,~ is still out there and people are using it to do great work. ~So, ~ 

Paul: The bleeding edge. That was going to be my next question of ~like, you know,~ these frameworks. I understand what you're saying, but where are these people coming from? So that's a great light to shine and declaration of, ~you know, ~listen to this with a grain of salt. I also like how you painted this in a picture of this is the bleeding edge that comes with caveats.

You have to acknowledge the bleeding edge, but because it's the bleeding edge. It's a good,~ like,~ foreshadowing [00:20:00] into what could then come as the herd follows. ~So, um, there's, ~there's value through and through,~ uh,~ nonetheless.~ And, ~and this kind of then brings me to, ~you know, the, ~the great flippening that everybody talks about.

~I mean, ~there's the Ethereum

Bitcoin flippening, and then there's the JavaScript TypeScript flippening. Is it, is that a thing? Is it happening? Are more people switching off of

JavaScript? importing everything to TypeScript? Or is there some slog in the momentum there? 

Sacha: No, I think that's definitely happening at least in so far as I can see from our data. ~Um, ~yeah, I think TypeScript is now that the default pretty much now personally, my personal belief is what will or might eventually happen is that types get built into JavaScript because there's such a strong demand that that's the number one missing feature that people keep bringing up again and again. And. ~I mean, uh, yeah,~ I think the ecosystem is going to trend towards, uh, types being ~ ~more standard either via TypeScript or via something else that like emulates or [00:21:00] sticks close to TypeScript.~ Um, ~you know, even TypeScript, like~ you you,~ you can use it in a like semi optional fashion, right? you you can do strict mode, but You, don't have to, you can do what I often do and put like any everywhere. ~ ~Um, no, that's not true. Don't, don't tell the TypeScript people I said that. ~Um, ~but yeah, so~ I think there's a~ I'm sure there's a part of the community that's like, Hey, JavaScript is fine. Right? Like it is don't don't put, don't bring types into it ~They, ~they like being able to move fast. But even with TypeScript,~ I don't,~ I think it's totally okay to ~kind of ~adopt it at your own pace.

was scared of TypeScript for a long time. ~Uh, ~I probably adopted it years later than~ I~ should have. And that's mainly because I thought, Oh, that's, it's going to be a huge cost. It's going to slow me down. It's going to cause all these problems. And. It didn't happen like that. It was mostly, I started using like other people's TypeScript ~ ~basis first, and then slowly injecting it little by little into my own work.

And now ~I'm, ~I'm [00:22:00] comfortable, but I was able to do it at my own pace. So I'm hopeful ~that ~that will happen for, ~uh,~ the ecosystem as a whole, where, yeah, whether it's by TypeScript itself or by some ~other, you know,~ other thing built into the language, people will little by little adopt types at their own rhythm. 

Paul: And I love 

hearing that it's a slow and steady momentum that is moving in that direction because it ~kind of ~speaks to~ If you're, ~if you're listening to this and you're still using JavaScript and you're in this place that Satya and I myself have

also felt like oh my gosh, TypeScript's cost, time, ~ ~maintenance.

I mean, if lots of other

people are trying it and sticking to it, something's working

there. And it's a good sign to go try it if 

you haven't given it, a go. 

Sacha: Yeah. And if you don't use it, like there were,~ uh,~ there was ~some, ~some news about maybe it was it's felt moving off of TypeScript, ~um,~ correct me if that's wrong, but,~ um,~ that's totally fine too. They had their reasons. They, it was like a very considered choice. And So.

I, yeah, there's, I think there's [00:23:00] basically no reason to be dogmatic about any of this.

~Um,~ and that's what I actually love about TypeScript. That you can definitely, you know, adopt it at your own rhythm. ~So. ~ 

Paul: Switching away from the tech conversation strictly, what about

the people answering the survey? And we kind of already mentioned like bleeding edge folks. Did you ask any questions about where they're 

from?~ ~

Sacha: ~Oh, yeah. ~

Paul: ~know, ~what their diversities are and if there's

any changing or

interesting trends on that front? ~ ~

Sacha: So as you might expect, we have a lot of respondents from the U S, um, also Europe. So France, Germany, and the UK.~ Um, ~and yeah,~ um,~ I think ~the, okay. ~What's relevant from looking at countries is that, uh, India, for example, is only has 3 percent of respondents, even though it has A huge developer population.

So it's still. A little bit underrepresented, um, China also,~ uh,~ only has 2%, Japan, 2%. So there's definitely, ~ uh,~ with big developer ecosystems that aren't well represented yet. [00:24:00] Uh, it's very hard, you know, like it's already hard to get people to answer a survey to begin with. And now ~if, ~

~if ~

~you.~ In addition to that, if you want to target specifically people in a specific country, ~um,~ of course there's things you can do like translate the survey,~ uh,~ try to share it on, ~you know, local, uh,~ more local social media,~ uh,~ blogs, so on, but all of that takes a ton of time.

And as you can see by the fact that, you know, we're releasing this six months late, we don't have that much time, sadly. So definitely a lot of room to grow and improve in that area for the future. But for now. ~Um, ~it is what it is. And ~ ~the other aspect that you asked about, diversity is also a similar story where,~ uh,~ it's also very skewed towards a specific demographic and in this case,~ uh, White males. ~

White man,~ um,~ and ~ ~it's a bit of the same story. ~It's there.~ There's two factors at play, right? One,~ um,~ first of all, if you have, we have to be honest about the fact that the ecosystem is skewed in that fashion. [00:25:00] So there are more, ~uh,~ men than women and people, ~uh,~ who might identify as non binary or other identifications. So men are the dominant population. That's true. ~Uh,~ but then also, ~ um, ~I guess there's three things. Second thing is. ~Um, ~their survey itself might have its own bias. So that's possible. It's possible that for whatever reason, men have maybe more, ~uh, and~ and okay, that's, those are not things that I know from the data.

It's just theories that people had advanced. So I want to be clear about that, but it's possible that men are more confident in their opinions. So they might be to share them in the survey. Maybe they have, uh, more confidence to take, take time during their word date to answer a survey. Okay. There could be factors like that just due to the way, you society works. And also, there is bias inherent in,~ uh,~ the spaces where the survey is shared. So, like, Twitter has its own,~ um, ~gender bias, right? I think,~ um, ~okay, not to get too political, but when you have somebody like [00:26:00] Elon Musk taking over a platform,~ um,~ I think it sends a certain message, and it, it, that bias was there before, but it's just an example that ~ uh, ~you can definitely see how,~ uh,~ If someone takes over and goes from a kind of gender neutral name like Twitter to something that's more sounds more bro y like Axe. ~It's more like, uh, and~ that whole vibe is going to change and ~that might, ~that might mean that women feel less welcome on Axe. ~Uh, ~again, it's speculation on my part. I'm just, I just, want to explain that whether it's Axe, Hacker News, Reddit, and so on, all these platforms have their own bias one way or another.

the survey gets shared. Through these platforms that compounds the bias that already exists in the industry 

Paul: Of course. 

Sacha: and in you combine all three of those biases that kind of layers, and we end up with a very sad that like 94 percent of respondents were men. ~ ~And I think the same thing with race and ethnicity. Uh, we have a ~70%, uh, white or sorry,~ 70 percent white [00:27:00] respondents. ~Um,~ now the more hopeful,~ um,~ side of things is that this, ~um,~ bias is less present when you look at.~ Uh, the, the ~respondents with,~ uh,~ less experience or, ~uh,~ a younger age,~ ~right? ~So there's two ways that, uh, the, by the , would be, or the bad way that, ~the pessimistic way to interpret that would be that, ~um,~ you have a lot of hopeful young entrants in the industry that are women,~ uh,~ non binary,~ uh,~ transgender.

People of colors and then they get like ground out by the, you know, the industry and kind of Eject just quit and go do something else. So that's why the younger populations are more diverse or ~ ~What i'm hoping is the case is that? ~um,~ there's actually like a change happening right now where more women are entering more,~ uh,~ BIPOC people are entering And look at people who have like just experience, two years of experience, that's like a showing you the future of the industry and we are going to see a a change in these trends.~ ~Now, we are not seeing that yet, and I haven't ~ ~really done ~ ~[00:28:00] enough of an analysis on our own data to be able to confirm that. ~ ~And there's also the fact that we don't have ~like ~a fixed audience, year to year ~ one, we might have more a link. Like~ if the if the survey announcement does great on hacker news or Reddit, that's going to send thousands of people that we didn't have preceding year.

So ~ ~it's very hard to,~ um,~ make any judgments when we ~are, ~are another based on our data, at least. But,~ um,~ I guess I can only share my, my vision of things and how I interpret it to work. What little data we have. ~Uh,~ one thing I do want to mention is,~ um,~ I think a lot of other surveys don't collect that data or at least don't make it public because, ~ ~it makes you look very bad.

~So, uh, ~I'm as much as I take the blame for our poor, ~um,~ you know, poor audience demographics and our poor showing in terms of, you know, gender equality, hopefully I can also get a little bit of credit to at least Still make that data public and still, uh, for the foreseeable at least I want to keep making it public [00:29:00] and keep collecting it. 

Paul: Speaking of 

publicity, where can folks find the Satya if they 

want to see 

for themselves? 

Sacha: Yeah. So, um, they can go to state of JS. com 

Paul: Awesome. State of JS. com is definitely easy to remember.~ Uh, ~so continuing our conversation about people here, are people facing more or less challenges getting into JavaScript or they're in JavaScript? And maybe they're getting overwhelmed. ~I'm not, ~I'm not really sure ~like ~what insights you could have perhaps extracted from this, but it's definitely a hot topic of conversation that we have here at PodRocket of,~ you know, ~we got server components, we got like

Next.

js 13, which is a whole big thing. And then we have ~ ~

frameworks coming out. And some people are saying this is it's worse than it's ever been. And some people are saying it's better than it's ever been. ~So~ tell us what the data says if you have 

collected data and any insights. 

Sacha: ~Yeah.~ So we, for each section, we, ask people about their, their happiness level,~ uh,~ from, ~you know, ~zero to four and happiness is pretty [00:30:00] constant. I don't think there's any huge trends.~ Um,~ I think one thing that you.~ like, ~I think there might be a correlation between options coming out and happiness going down because,~ uh,~ definitely a big source of anxiety is, ~you know, ~the choice ~ ~And I think ~that's a~ kind of paradoxical, right? Because people, developers will complain that Hey, you can't do X with whatever framework, whatever library. So naturally the market,~ uh,~ addresses that need and, ~you know, ~new library comes out that does X. But then now you have to choose between the old one that's like trusted and reliable but doesn't do X and the new one that does X but isn't proven.

So that's a cause of anxiety and So you're less happy, but then a couple years later ~Everybody~ has adopted the new library that does X but not that new library So they're happy but the new library doesn't do Y so a third library comes out that does Y And now everybody is [00:31:00] anxious again, ~because, well, do you do you use the first one that's ~like super popular and well adopted ~and used in~ enterprise, but actually people aren't happy with it because it doesn't do X or the second ~one that does~ X but not Y or the third one that does ~kind of ~a cycle where,~ um, you know, ~there, there's not really any way out of it. ~Um, ~unless you do what I do, which is just wait a couple of years ~before adopting any ~any new technology. Okay. I've been on the ~ ~bleeding edge. So I've been part of that early ~movement, trying~ to ~ ~hype everybody up about~ a new technology~ and new framework. ~Um, ~so like I said, I was super involved in the Meteor JS community. I wrote a book. ~Uh, ~I built open source ~ ~apps.~ Um, ~and then, ~you know, ~I that Meteor was ~kind of ~going away and other things came and took its place. And so I think that's given me perspective that maybe newer developers don't have that.

Things ~kind of ~move in cycle and you don't have to always be at the cutting edge. You can wait a cycle or ~even~ two and only then, ~like~ literally if you were adopting react today, ~that would~ be fine. Like it's been around for 10 years, but if you adopted today, you don't miss out on having to learn a class [00:32:00] components,~ uh,~ create class, 

~uh, ~higher order components, 

Paul: Sasha, let me say ~like, ~I'm so I'm 28, I've only been in this industry for ~like, ~I think seven years now. I've never written a real

enterprise class component in my life ever.~ You know, ~like it's all been functional components. So ~I, ~I can definitely

relate to that. And I'm like, wow, what was that world

that,~ you know, ~it was just five years

behind, 

totally different. 

Sacha: and there's no value in no, it's not a skill. It's not ~like, You know, ~if you're into woodworking you're like hey, I know how to use a chisel That's like how the old masters would do it That's a skill to have ~ ~and you can use a table saw as well You can do both if you're into react like ~there's zero value~ in knowing how class components work Except maybe working on old code bases, which you probably don't want to do anyway So I think a lot of it is ~kind of ~self made ~anxiety~ where people have this FOMO and this, ~you know, ~choice paralysis.

But if you just take a step ~back and realize~ that being late to the game is actually a plus in [00:33:00] a lot of cases,~ um, I~ think that's, ~ ~you'll do much better and you'll Be able to sleep at night And be happier with your,~ uh,~ your career Now, the only exception is if you actually do want to be on that cutting edge, because you're ~ ~writing tutorials, you're, ~you know, ~trying to,~ uh,~ get ~on podcasts, speak~ at conferences. Then that's how,~ ~

Paul: ~I, ~I love hearing about the general slowdown sentiment because I've definitely fallen victim to that before trying to do, ~you know, ~just trying to write an

everyday app. You reach for the latest build and you get frustrated, you get

anxious. ~Um, ~so it's nice to be reminded you can slow down. It's probably a good choice if you just want to build something.

And you'd want to do

a less headache.~ yeah, yeah,~ yeah, following 

suit.~ ~

~Uh, ~so one thing we do in our panel episodes here on Potterocket is at the end we do this hot takes section where we just ~kind of, ~it's almost like a prediction sort of thing or ~like, ~maybe somewhat controversial. Maybe we're trying to piss somebody off. It depends, ~you know, ~how much coffee the person wants.

speaker has had that day.

~Given~ the results and data and assumptions that you've been looking at, [00:34:00] could you give us a hot take? Maybe you can make it two hot takes

if you want. Floor is yours. I'm just curious where your mind

~is~ going for the next one to three years. ~ ~

Sacha: ~Um, ~

Paul: ~You can totally~

take a sec to think 

about that too. 

Sacha: yeah, let me take a second. ~ ~In a way, I feel I'm the worst person to ~ask for a hot take because I just look at the data that confirms, like, current trends. I almost feel like for a hot take, you need to be, like, kind of removed from the hard data and be able to kind of ~

~think outside the box for a good outcome. ~

~I'll take ~

~at least, but, um,~ 

Paul: is there something that you feel speculative about that maybe

some of your colleagues don't feel as speculative

about?

Sacha: ~well, ~So this is going to be a cold ~take. right? It's going~ to be the opposite of hot take. I think react is not going anywhere.~ Um, ~I think so ~again,~ that goes along with what I was saying. like even though react is ~like ~10 year old or however old it is, going to~ remain dominant for a long time.~

And I think people are going to be happy with it for a ~long time. I think. Uh, ~recent months ~ ~have shown that the react team is still innovating, even leading the industry in many ways. And ~ so, um, ~yeah, I think~ there, there might~ be a,~ so, you know, ~something like Svelte, for example, in the past, ~you know ~five years ago, I would look at the trends and be like, yes, Svelte is going to ~be the next number one, just~ because it's moving up [00:35:00] so fast.~ Uh, ~but ~I~ think react is ~kind of ~special in a way. ~Uh, ~I think it's still. I ~don't know if it's the ~react team or the~ ecosystem,~ but I think it has something that enables it to keep up with,~ um,~ the competition ~unusual for all the projects I have to say, like, uh, ~so ~my, ~my call takes ~number one is react is gonna stay in ~the lead for a long~ time, at least~ for the next five years.~ ~

Paul: ~It's a pretty good~

cold take. I like that too. I'm going to

~steal it. It's a~ cold take. 

Sacha: I don't think I ~it, but, um,~ another,~ um,~ I don't know if a hot take, I think ~p. m. ~p. it's going to become the default. ~ Um, ~At least I've been using it and it seems so much better than ~ ~anything else. Like regular 

Paul: ~that definitely, ~that 

definitely qualifies. Yeah.~ Um, well, ~Sasha,~ this, ~this is, we could continue talking about the types of people that are answering. And ~I mean, ~I want to ask about industries. I want to ask about,~ uh,~ other technologies,~ uh, such~ as bun ~ ~and digging into them a little bit, but we are running up on time.

Is there any like last things that you feel like we didn't touch

on for the state of JS 2023, you design that you want to let out before 

we seal the podcast up? 

Sacha: ~Um, not ~really. ~I mean, I'm glad I was able to ~to make that [00:36:00] point that you can afford to slow down and you can, ~you ~be a couple of years~ even~ removed from the cutting edge and that's fine.~ Um, ~I ~ ~Yeah, we have the, we still have the state of react data for last year that hasn't ~ ~So that's going to~ be, uh, ~next on my plate and look ~for that in a~ couple of~ weeks~ if everything goes along to plan. ~Uh, ~and then it's going to be time for the ~2024 round~ of surveys. So ~I don't know, uh, ~I might be able to take ~like ~a day's vacation ~in~ between. ~um, ~but,~ um, yeah,~ that's going to be very interesting. Hopefully, like I said, there's A ~A~ shorter~ ~much, much shorter turnaround. And,~ um,~ hopefully I'm able to~ kind of ~put the focus more on the content,~ uh,~ rather than on doing things behind the scenes, because, ~you know, I kind of ~realized that~ for a lot of people who have been ~following the projects for a couple of years now, it might seem a bit stale where every year that the graphs are pretty similar and the trends are pretty similar.

And that's because I just spent, always spent so much time ~kind of ~refactoring,~ um, ~and making ~ ~sure things work ~that I don't ~ ~have that much~ time to actually~ find new~ insights or~ see the~ results of

Paul: And,~ ~

~you know, ~we're talking to developers [00:37:00] here,~ uh,~ quite a

~wide~ viewing audience. So just to remind folks, you can go to state of js. com. Thank you. State of js. com,~ uh,~ to fill out the 2024 survey. Do you 

know when that's going to launch 

or TBD as

Sacha: Yeah. Yeah. TBD at the end of the year. ~Um, ~so usually in November, something ~like that.~

Paul: And is there any way for folks to reach out and maybe contribute?

~ ~of what would be interesting

to contribute,~ uh, ~

~question wise.~ 

Sacha: Yeah, for sure.~ We have~ a GitHub repo. We have a discord. ~Uh, ~there's an ~page at~ the end of the survey results where you can find feedback is more than~ ~

Paul: ~Well, ~Sasha, thanks so much again for your time coming on chatting with us, letting us pick your brain.

~Uh, ~again,~ it's,~ It's a really great opportunity for us listeners and just people coming to the website to see what's going on ~amidst the,~ amidst 

Sacha: Yeah, no problem. 

Paul: and stuff that gets 

advertised.

So yeah, thank you. Thanks again. It's been an absolute 

pleasure.