Is there a ranking site for web frameworks?

Question

A site that tracks which ones are being used the most?

I ask because I'm interested in expanding my skills by learning some web stuff, so that I have options if the bottom falls out of my current gig. So I figure I grab a toolset and try and build a basic site, learning as I go, which leads straight to the question of which toolset. And one input into that decision is current popularity.

I realize that there are other considerations, like what OS I use most, what languages I know already, what jobs are going in my local area etc. But right here I'm specifically looking for a ranking site, like Alexa for web frameworks.

Answer 1

To some extent, it depends on your location. Take a look in the job ads for your area.

If you learn Ruby-on-Rails and all the local employers want ASP.NET, it won't be much use.

But if you're doing it purely out of interest, pick the technology that is the most interesting to you.

Possibles:

• ASP.NET
• Ruby-on-Rails
• PHP

Answer 2

I don't think there will be a site that does exactly what you want; I think you're going to have to find some proxy and count that.

You could start here - take a look at the number of questions tagged with each framework's name. The number of people asking questions should be a reasonable proxy for the popularity of the framework.

You could look at the number of books available on Amazon for each framework - publishers tend not to publish books if they don't think there's a market for them.

You could count the number of jobs available on your favourite job board, using the framework names as keywords.

I can't think of any more right now, but I bet there are plenty...

Answer 3

Google Trends is also a good measure of popularity.

http://google.com/trends?q=rails%2C+asp.net%2C+php&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=1

It could also mean complexity.. harder languages/frameworks/whatever get more searches. :-)