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web/news/nim_community_survey_results.rst
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Nim Community Survey Results
|
||||
============================
|
||||
|
||||
.. container:: metadata
|
||||
|
||||
Posted by Dominik Picheta on 20/08/2016
|
||||
|
||||
We have recently closed the 2016 Nim Community Survey. I am happy to
|
||||
say that we have received exactly 790 responses, huge thanks go to the people
|
||||
that took the time to respond. We're very thankful for this very valuable
|
||||
feedback.
|
||||
|
||||
This survey was inspired in part by the
|
||||
`2016 State of Rust <https://blog.rust-lang.org/2016/06/30/State-of-Rust-Survey-2016.html>`_
|
||||
survey. You will note that many of the questions were modelled after
|
||||
Rust's survey. One of the reasons for doing this was to allow us to easily
|
||||
compare our results against the results obtained in the Rust survey. In
|
||||
addition, we of course also liked many of their questions.
|
||||
|
||||
Our survey ran from the 23rd of June 2016 until the 8th of August 2016. The
|
||||
response numbers are impressive considering Nim's community size; at 790 they
|
||||
make up just over 25% of the Rust survey's responses.
|
||||
|
||||
The goal of this survey was to primarily determine how our community is using
|
||||
Nim, in order to better understand how we should be improving it. In particular,
|
||||
we wanted to know what people feel is missing from Nim in the lead up to
|
||||
version 1.0. We have also asked our respondents about how well the Nim tools
|
||||
worked, the challenges of adopting Nim, the resources that they used to learn
|
||||
Nim and more.
|
||||
|
||||
It is my hope that we will be able to run a similar survey in a years time,
|
||||
doing so should give us an idea of whether we are improving.
|
||||
With these general facts in mind, let's begin looking at specific questions.
|
||||
|
||||
How did you find out about Nim?
|
||||
-------------------------------
|
||||
|
||||
The rationale for the first question was simple, we wanted to know where our
|
||||
respondents found out about Nim. This is an interesting question for us, as
|
||||
we do occassionally get users asking us why it took so long for them to hear
|
||||
about Nim. It allows us to see how effective each website is at spreading the
|
||||
word about Nim.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_found.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_found.png" alt="How did you find out about Nim?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
The majority of our respondents found Nim via Reddit, HackerNews or a search
|
||||
engine such as Google. These results are not altogether surprising. There were
|
||||
also a lot of "Other" responses, some of which were a bit more
|
||||
interesting. These included multiple mentions of habrahabr.ru, Dr. Dobb's,
|
||||
and lobste.rs.
|
||||
|
||||
Do you use Nim?
|
||||
---------------
|
||||
|
||||
Just like the Rust survey creators, we wanted to ensure that our survey was
|
||||
open to both Nim users as well people who never used Nim. In addition to
|
||||
those two groups, we have also included a third group of people: ex-Nim
|
||||
users. All three are interesting, for many different reasons.
|
||||
Nim users can tell us how they are using Nim and also how Nim's
|
||||
tooling can improve. Ex-Nim users give us an
|
||||
idea of why they stopped using Nim. Finally, respondents who never used Nim
|
||||
can tell us the reasons for not adopting it.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/do_you_use_nim.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/do_you_use_nim.png" alt="Do you use Nim?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
It's nice to see that we have such a good range of respondents. The Rust survey
|
||||
had a much larger number of Rust users amongst their respondents, with
|
||||
no distinction between users that never used Rust and users that stopped using
|
||||
Rust.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="https://blog.rust-lang.org/images/2016-06-Survey/do_you_use_rust.png">
|
||||
<img src="https://blog.rust-lang.org/images/2016-06-Survey/do_you_use_rust.png" alt="Do you use Rust?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
Should we consider your answers to be invalid?
|
||||
----------------------------------------------
|
||||
|
||||
This was something I thought would be interesting to have, after I saw it
|
||||
being used in another survey. While it does pinpoint possibly
|
||||
invalid respondents, I have opted against filtering those out. Mainly because
|
||||
that would require re-creating each of the charts generated by Google Forms
|
||||
manually.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/reliability.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/reliability.png" alt="Should we consider your answers to be invalid?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
According to the responses to this question, around 94% of our responses
|
||||
can be considered reliable.
|
||||
|
||||
Nim users
|
||||
---------
|
||||
|
||||
The following questions were answered only by the 38.9% of our respondents
|
||||
who identified themselves as Nim users.
|
||||
|
||||
How long have you been using Nim?
|
||||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_time.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_time.png" alt="How long have you been using Nim?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
A large proportion of our Nim users were new. This is good news as it means that
|
||||
our community is growing, with a large proportion of new Nim users that could
|
||||
become long-term Nimians. In total, more than 35% of Nim users can be considered
|
||||
new having used Nim for less than 3 months. With 18% of Nim users that can
|
||||
be considered very new having used Nim for less than a month.
|
||||
This could suggest that 18% of our users have only just found out about Nim in
|
||||
the last week or so and have not yet got the chance to use it extensively.
|
||||
|
||||
The high percentages of long term Nim users are encouraging.
|
||||
They suggest
|
||||
that many users are continuing to use Nim after making it through the first
|
||||
few months. The sharp drop at 7-9 months is interesting, but may simply be
|
||||
due to the fact that there were fewer newcomers during that period, or it
|
||||
could be because our respondents are more likely to estimate that they have
|
||||
been using Nim for a year or half a year rather than the awkward 7-9 months.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_time_rust.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_time_rust.png" alt="Time using Nim and Rust" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
The results for Nim and Rust are actually remarkably similar. They both show a
|
||||
drop at 7-9 months, although Rust's isn't as dramatic. Nim on the other hand
|
||||
has a significantly higher percentage of new Nim users.
|
||||
|
||||
Do you use Nim at work?
|
||||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|
||||
|
||||
An important aspect of a language's adoption is whether it is being used for
|
||||
"real" work. We wanted to know how many people are using Nim in their day
|
||||
jobs and under what circumstances it is used.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_at_work.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_at_work.png" alt="Do you use Nim at work?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
While a vast majority of our users are not using Nim at work, more than 25%
|
||||
of them are. It's encouraging to see such a high number already, even before
|
||||
we have released version 1.0. In fact, this percentage is likely close to 30%,
|
||||
because many of the "Other" responses mention using Nim for the likes of
|
||||
internal tools or small scripts to help with the respondent's work.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="https://blog.rust-lang.org/images/2016-06-Survey/rust_at_work.png">
|
||||
<img src="https://blog.rust-lang.org/images/2016-06-Survey/rust_at_work.png" alt="Do you use Rust at work?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
Interestingly, a larger percentage of Nim users are using Nim at work than
|
||||
Rust users. The sample sizes are of course vastly different, but it's still an
|
||||
interesting result. Combined, nearly 1/5th of Rust users are using Rust
|
||||
commercially whereas more than a quarter of Nim users are using Nim
|
||||
commercially.
|
||||
|
||||
Approximately how large are all the Nim projects that you work on?
|
||||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|
||||
|
||||
Finding out how large the Nim projects worked on by Nim users are is also
|
||||
very valuable.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/project_size.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/project_size.png" alt="Nim project size for all users" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
This shows us that currently Nim is primarily being used for small scripts and
|
||||
applications, with nearly 60% of the projects consisting of less than 1,000
|
||||
lines of code. This makes sense as many of our users are not using Nim
|
||||
professionally, but are doing so in their spare time.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/project_size_work.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/project_size_work.png" alt="Nim project size for work users" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
The numbers for part-time and full-time work users of Nim tell a different
|
||||
story. Over 70% of the projects written by full-time users are between 10,001
|
||||
and 100,000 lines of code. Part-time users show a slightly different trend,
|
||||
with many more small projects, the majority being between 1,000 and
|
||||
10,000 lines of code.
|
||||
|
||||
Overall it's good to see that there is a few large projects out there which are
|
||||
composed of more than 100,000 lines of code. We expect to see the amount of
|
||||
large projects to grow with time, especially with version 1.0 on the way.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/project_size_nim_rust.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/project_size_nim_rust.png" alt="Nim project size for work users (Nim vs. Rust)" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
In comparison to Rust the proportion of project sizes for full-time users is
|
||||
vastly different. This is likely due to our small sample size. Project sizes for
|
||||
part-time users between Rust and Nim are somewhat similar, with differences of
|
||||
around 10% for each project size.
|
||||
|
||||
Do you plan to try to use Nim at work?
|
||||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/planning_to_use_at_work.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/planning_to_use_at_work.png" alt="Planning to use Nim at work?" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
It's also encouraging to see that over 50% of Nim users are planning to use
|
||||
Nim at work! This is slightly more than Rust's 40% and should help Nim's
|
||||
adoption into even more areas.
|
||||
|
||||
Nim and its tools
|
||||
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|
||||
|
||||
In this section of the survey, we wanted to find out the tools that Nim
|
||||
users are utilising when developing Nim applications.
|
||||
|
||||
What editor(s) do you use when writing Nim?
|
||||
___________________________________________
|
||||
|
||||
Programmers are very specific when it comes to their editor of choice, because
|
||||
of that it's good to know which editor is most popular among our community.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/editors.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/editors.png" alt="Editors used by Nim users" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
Looks like Vim is the winner with almost 30%. Followed by Sublime Text and
|
||||
Visual Studio Code. Aporia, the Nim IDE, gets a respectable 15.5%. There was
|
||||
also more than
|
||||
17% of answers which included "Other" editors, such as: Notepad++, Geany, gedit,
|
||||
and Kate.
|
||||
|
||||
What operating system(s) do you compile for and run your Nim projects on?
|
||||
_________________________________________________________________________
|
||||
|
||||
This question gave us information about the most popular target operating
|
||||
systems, as well as some of the more obscure ones. We have asked this question
|
||||
to find out the platforms on which Nim applications run on most frequently.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/target_os.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/target_os.png" alt="Target operating systems" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
This question allowed multiple choices, so each percentage is out of the total
|
||||
number of respondents for this question. For example, 80.7% of the
|
||||
respondents selected "Linux" but only 26.6% selected OS X.
|
||||
|
||||
This makes Linux by far the most popular target for Nim applications.
|
||||
Some "Other" targets included: BSD (OpenBSD, FreeBSD), iOS, Android, and
|
||||
JavaScript.
|
||||
It's great to see Nim being used on such a wide variety of platforms.
|
||||
|
||||
What operating system(s) do you develop Nim projects on?
|
||||
________________________________________________________
|
||||
|
||||
With this question, we wanted to know what operating systems are used for
|
||||
development.
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/dev_os.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/dev_os.png" alt="Development operating systems" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
This question also allowed multiple choices and ended up with very similar
|
||||
results.
|
||||
|
||||
You can see that Linux is also the most popular developmental
|
||||
platform for Nim. But it's more popular as a target platform.
|
||||
|
||||
Which version(s) of Nim do you use for your applications?
|
||||
_________________________________________________________
|
||||
|
||||
.. raw::html
|
||||
|
||||
<a href="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_versions.png">
|
||||
<img src="../assets/news/images/survey/nim_versions.png" alt="Version use" style="width:100%"/>
|
||||
</a>
|
||||
|
||||
At the time of this survey, version 0.14.2 was the latest stable release.
|
||||
It's no wonder that it is the most commonly used release of Nim. It's good to
|
||||
see that the older versions are not used as often. The high use of ``Git HEAD (devel)``
|
||||
(nightly builds) isn't surprising, Nim is still evolving rapidly and our
|
||||
release schedule is not regular or frequent.
|
||||
|
||||
Once we go past the 1.0 release, we expect to see much less use of the unstable
|
||||
``devel`` branch.
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||