An Opinionated Guide to 2019's Programming Languages
Description
A two-part meme evaluating programming languages. The top section, labeled 'Google:', shows a search result for 'Here Are The Best Programming Languages to learn in 2019,' featuring logos for Rust, Swift, Kotlin, C++, TypeScript, JavaScript, and Java. The bottom section, labeled 'Actually:', provides a heavily opinionated review of these languages. Kotlin is a 'Good choice,' Rust is 'Very nice to use,' Swift is 'IOS exclusive but still viable,' C++ is 'Useful but difficult to learn,' and TypeScript is a 'More convenient JavaScrpıt' (sic). The meme disses Java, suggesting to 'Try Kotlin instead.' The final punchline is aimed at JavaScript, which is paired with an 'expanding brain' meme image and the text 'What the fuck is this?'. A small note at the very bottom adds, 'respect to all the JavaScript programmers out there!'. The meme satirizes the passionate and often tribalistic 'language wars' within the developer community, reflecting the 2019 trend of favoring newer, type-safe languages over older ones like Java and the often-maligned JavaScript
Comments
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The JavaScript entry is perfect. It's the only language where you can write a ten-page think-piece on the event loop and still not be sure why your `this` is undefined in a callback
Google’s algorithm says all seven languages are must-learn, but by the time C++ finishes compiling that list Rust has added three ownership models and the front-end team has already migrated the slide deck to TypeScript
JavaScript is the only language where you can spend 20 years mastering it and still discover that `['1', '7', '11'].map(parseInt)` returns `[1, NaN, 3]` and somehow that's considered normal behavior
This meme perfectly captures the moment when Google's Android team finally admitted what Kotlin developers knew all along: Java's verbosity and null-safety issues were a self-inflicted wound. The real irony? Google spent years promoting Java for Android, only to pivot so hard to Kotlin that Java developers now get the 'try Kotlin instead' treatment - the enterprise equivalent of 'we need to talk.' Meanwhile, JavaScript sits at the bottom with the galaxy brain meme, representing every senior engineer's existential crisis when they realize they've spent 15 years mastering a language where `[] + {} !== {} + []` and `typeof null === 'object'`. At least with Kotlin's null-safety and coroutines, you can sleep at night knowing your code won't NullPointerException at 3 AM - unlike that legacy Java service still running on Java 8 because 'the migration is scheduled for next quarter.'
Language rankings are cute until prod pages you at 3am: Kotlin murders NPEs, Rust murders footguns, TypeScript murders “undefined is not a function,” and JavaScript murders your build by dragging in 600 transitive dependencies to render a button
Only JavaScript can make 'WTF is this?' a legitimate debugging question whose answer depends on call site, strict mode, and whatever your bundler emitted after transpiling
Google's tier list: Kotlin inherits the JVM throne painlessly, while Java devs inherit the exploding-brain refactor mandate