I have just read the "
2007 Ajax Tools Usage Survey".
Very interesting results are published on the site:
| Answer | Percents (Dec-07) |
|---|
| Prototype | 34.10% |
| jQuery | 29.30% |
| Ext JS | 22.50% |
| Script.aculo.us | 22.30% |
| Mootools | 14.30% |
| YUI | 13.00% |
| I use raw Ajax | 13.00% |
| JSON | 12.90% |
| Dojo | 11.90% |
| Backbase | 8.30% |
I'm especially impressed how
Ext JS' popularity is rising with time.
There is at least one thing I can disagree. The
Prototype+Scriptaculous are presented as separate libraries which is not really correct. Scriptaculous is built on top of Prototype.
Some people might tell "
Well, this means Prototype is the most popular library because of 34.10%+22.30%=56.40%".
But it is not correct at all. All this means for me that Prototype+Scriptaculous gets less responses. This is because of ALL Scriptaculous users do also use Prototype. This is not just a mathematical addition. Especially keeping in mind that the question was
multiple choice.
So please do not double the results here. They are separate. According to this I would rewrite the resulting table different way.
My interpretation includes Prototype as a standalone (relatively to Scriptaculous) and Scriptaculous+Prototype which seems to be more correct.
| Answer | Percents (Dec-07) |
|---|
| jQuery | 29.30% |
| Ext JS | 22.50% |
| Script.aculo.us (+Prototype) | 22.30% |
| Mootools | 14.30% |
| YUI | 13.00% |
| I use raw Ajax | 13.00% |
| JSON | 12.90% |
| Dojo | 11.90% |
| Prototype(Standalone) | 11.80%(34.10-22.30) |
| Backbase | 8.30% |
As we can see the picture has changed. I think Prototype is losing the rating with time and, as we can see, used more often for visual effects (eg: with Scriptaculous).
I think I can explain why jQuery in this table is on top. It seems it is better for visual tricks than Prototype standalone. I also think Prototype is still heavily used because of large and mature communities like Ruby On Rails developers.
The most interesting animal is ExtJS. This library wasn't even in top on the previous results. Now it got 2nd winning place. Just during one year.
And it is also might be because of it is a good visual (user interface) library.
ExtJS team, congratulation! Great work!
On the other hand I am a bit disappointed with YUI and don't know why it is bitten by Mootools (I haven't even tried this library). Anyway if so many people use Mootools, I am sure - it deserves it.
As a summary I should mention that I feel people choose JavaScript libraries according to "visual" requirements.
And this is where jQuery and ExtJS come to the world.