The Future of Software Industry-A look into the current trends
In what direction is the software industry heading, let's have a look to get some knowledge about it.
Let us first know what is Software Industry?
According to Wikipedia, the software industry includes businesses for development, maintenance, and publication of software that are using different business models, mainly either “license/maintenance based” (on-premises) or “Cloud-based” (such as SaaS, PaaS, IaaS, MaaS, AaaS, etc.). The industry also includes software services, such as training, documentation, consulting and data recovery.
History of the Software Industry
The word “software” was coined as a prank as early as 1953 but did not appear in print until the 1960s. Before this time, computers were programmed either by customers, or the few commercial computer vendors of the time, such as UNIVAC and IBM. The first company founded to provide software products and services was Computer Usage Company in 1955.
The software industry expanded in the early 1960s, almost immediately after computers were first sold in mass-produced quantities. Universities, government, and business customers created a demand for software. Many of these programs were written in-house by full-time staff programmers. Some were distributed freely between users of a particular machine for no charge. Others were done on a commercial basis, and other firms such as Computer Sciences Corporation (founded in 1959) started to grow. Other influential or typical software companies begun in the early 1960s included Advanced Computer Techniques, Automatic Data Processing, Applied Data Research, and Informatics General. The computer/hardware makers started bundling operating systems, systems software and programming environments with their machines.
Future
You would think that we might have developed enough software by now in 2019. It appears not. There is still massive growth in the software industry and tech analysts are spending even more time trying to fashion their predictions for and of the road ahead. So in what direction is the software industry heading, let’s have a look through the analysis of Stack Overflow 2019 Developer Survey Results.
Opensource Programming
The term “open source” refers to something people can modify and share because its design is publicly accessible. People prefer Opensource Programming because they have more control over that kind of software. They can examine the code to make sure it’s not doing anything they don’t want it to do, and they can change parts of it they don’t like. In this context, the first question I have formed is
- How many developers are writing code for opensource?
From the graph, it is quite clear that people are still not able to adapt to Opensource Programming as the number is almost half compared to non-opensource programming. The reason is quite obvious, though opensource programming has many benefits, it also has a big worry which is it is not secure since the code is open, any opportunist can identify and exploit the program through hacking and viruses.
Salary
Salary, which is always a developer’s, in fact, everyone’s prime aim in life. In today’s world, it plays a major part in dividing people into different strata in any community. So, my next question is
2. How much money do the Developers get throughout the globe?
And as expected the United States tops the list with an average income of approximately 175000 USD. It is quite shocking to see Switzerland, being a small country is in the second position and where is India, oh there in the 27th position. Most of the Asian countries rank down the list.
Job Satisfaction
Employee satisfaction is of utmost importance for employees to remain happy and also deliver their level best. Employees need to be passionate about their work and passion comes only when employees are satisfied with their job and organization on the whole. And the next question is
3. How much are the Developers satisfied with their jobs throughout the globe?
This shows that most of the developers are satisfied with their jobs as almost 80–90% of the developers prefer Slightly satisfied or Very satisfied. Though some people are hanging in between with their opinion being Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied. Some having opinion of Slightly dissatisfied and very few being very dissatisfied with their job as developers.
Age
Let’s be quite clear about this criteria. Age depends and it depends a lot in the industry. A fresher with 25–30 years of age would like to work more compared to a 10–20 years experienced guy. With increasing age, everyone’s dream is to become the head of the group and hence the tendency to develop new projects decreases. Okay here is my next question
4. What is the relation between the age of a developer and his work?
And it is quite clear from the above graph that the most active time when a developer works are during their fresh joining time at 25–30 years. The tendency to develop new software decreases with increasing age as we can see the number decreases a lot from 35 years or so and it goes to 0 at 60–65 years of age.
Social Media
Social Media has influenced many people from the first day when it started. Some of the biggest Social Media websites are Facebook, WhatsApp, LinkedIn, etc. In today’s world, almost everyone uses Social Media but it would be interesting to see what Social Media accounts have the developers created for themselves and hence my next question is
5. What are the social media sites that the developer uses?
Reddit tops the chart followed by Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube, and others. Quite shocking to see LinkedIn way down there at 8th position and Instagram above LinkedIn. People who do not use Social Media are also more than LinkedIn and it almost touches Instagram. In spite of all these, Reddit dominates to hold on to the top position.
Operating System
It does not matter too much as nowadays every OS is featured with all the programs and everything could be done through any of the Operating Systems. The next question is
6. Which is the most popular Operating System among the Developers?
Here, we can see that developers who use Windows are maximum in number followed by macOS and Linux. None of the developers use BSD, maybe it is used by Others like students or non-developers. I thought Linux, being a good programming environment, would be preferred by most developers but nevermind, most of the developers prefer Windows just like me : D.
CV/RESUME
CV/RESUME is a document used and created by a person to present their background, skills, and accomplishments. RESUMEs can be used for a variety of reasons, but most often they are used to secure new employment. RESUMEs need to be updated regularly and the same relating to my next question which is
7. Why do most of the Developers update their RESUME?
So, it is seen that over 25000 developers update their RESUME with the reason for new job search and change of job. It is quite obvious for a normal person to update their RESUME for these reasons and the same goes for developers too. Very few developers change their RESUME with the reason for re-entry into the workforce.
Now comes the common questions which everyone would be having
8. What are the platforms that the developers had used extensively and what platforms do they want to use in the Future?
9. What are the programming languages that the developers had worked with and what languages do they want to use in Future?
10. What are the Database Servers that the Developers use to while coding and what Database Servers do they want to use in the Future?
11. What are the WebFrames that the Developers use and what WebFrame do they want to use in the Future?
12. Which type of work location is preferred by the Developers?
As expected, many developers prefer to work from home and other places compared to the office. 55.8% belong to the category of office lovers, who love to spend time at the office. 31.9% belong to my category of working from home and the rest 12.3% like to work from any cafe, parks, etc.
Conclusion
With the evolution of new technologies every day or two, it is certain that the future of a software developer is bright. From my analysis, I can say the salary which the developers get is very high and most of the developers are satisfied too in their jobs. The only thing most of the developers need to work on is coding on an open-source environment that will help others.
The dataset which I have used for my analysis is available in:-
You can check my analysis from the given links mentioned below:-
Thank You for spending your precious time and having a read at my blog.
