Systems programming language that aims to replace C makes the Tiobe index top 50 for the first time. The Google-led Carbon language, an alternative to C++, ranked 168th. Credit: Shutterstock/Tom Gowanlock Zig, a general purpose programming language that interacts with C/C++ programs and promises to be a modern alternative to C, has made an appearance in the Tiobe index of programming language popularity. Zig entered the top 50 in the April edition of the Tiobe Programming Community Index, ranking 46th, albeit with a rating of just 0.19%. By contrast, the Google-promoted Carbon language, positioned as an experimental successor to C++, ranked just 168th. Tiobe described Zig as having features of C and C++ such as explicit memory management enhanced with option types, while abandoning other features such as preprocessing. While entering the top 50 is no guarantee of success, it is a noteworthy first step, Tiobe said. The demand for high-performance languages capable of processing vast amounts of data has resulted in languages such as C, C++, and Rust rising in the index, according to Tiobe. The Tiobe index ranks language popularity based on searches in search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo, and YouTube for skilled engineers, programming courses, and third-party vendors related to each language. The Tiobe index’s top 10 languages for April 2023: Python, with a rating of 14.51% C, 14.41% Java, 13.23% C++, 12.96% C#, 8.21% Visual Basic, 4.4% JavaScript, 2.1% SQL, 1.68% PHP, 1.36% Go, 1.28% In last month’s Tiobe index, the Go language returned to the top 10 after a nearly six-year absence. Go held the 10th spot this month. The rival Pypl index determines programming language popularity based on how often language tutorials are searched in Google. Its top 10 for April 2023: Python, with a 27.43% share Java, 16.41% JavaScript, 9.57% C#, 6.9% C/C++, 6.65% PHP, 5.17% R, 4.22% TypeScript, 2.89% Swift, 2.31% Objective-C, 2.09% C LanguageC++Programming LanguagesSoftware Development