RIA Job Trends 2010
Last year around this time I was asked to make a presentation on RIA trends to developers. With the down economy (something just don’t change do they?) people in the group were really interested in the job trends for some of the different RIA development languages. Using indeed.com I was able to find the following stats.
I’ve made some updates to this to make it a bit more specific in the search. Hopefully the new results are more reflective of the actual current environment.
Breaking out the individual sections you will see…
Adobe Flex (Macromedia Flex)
Keeping strong and great growth!
| ((flex developer) or (macromedia flex) or (adobe flex) or (actionscript flex)) Job Trends | ((flex Developer) or (macromedia Flex) or (adobe Flex) or (actionscript Flex)) jobs |
Microsoft Silverlight
Wow! Look at that growth!
| ((silverlight) or (microsoft silverlight)) Job Trends | ((silverlight) or (microsoft Silverlight)) jobs |
OpenLaszlo
It jumped for a bit, but I think this is the last year to include this chart.
Ajax (Specifically Dojo and JQuery)
Ajax is a hard one to include. Not because I don’t believe that it is an RIA technology, but because of how encompassing the word is. For this I will break it down to Dojo & JQuery, two of the specific frameworks. Similar to how Actionscript is to Flex, Javascript is to Dojo/JQuery. I would argue that Dojo/JQuery are the most popular Javascript framework for creating RIAs.
JavaFx
Last year it was the new kid on the block and has had it’s ups and downs.
New Additions
This year I wanted to add a few more to my search. Obviously there are other technologies that go into RIAs, but to just say “Flash” or “HTML” would definitely get a different result then what we are looking for. And yes, I didn’t include any server-side technologies as I am focusing on front-end pieces. Though they are also important in the RIA stack.
Objective-C
Had to include this in there as a representative of the iPhone Apps market.
GWT (Google Web Toolkit)
By request, the addition of GWT. Again, strong growths as in all RIA sectors.
And Finally, the Superchart with all the technologies together. This just tells me that RIA technologies are just growing immensely.
And finally, the salary trend comparison for each:
Salary Comparison
Salary Trends
Good stuff. It’s interesting that the more postings there are for a technology, the lower the average salary.
Do a search for “Macromedia Flex” and “Adobe Flex” for a better representation, since just Flex likely picks up many non-technology jobs:
Search for http://www.indeed.com/jobtrends?q=“macromedia+flex”%2C+”adobe+Flex”
That chart shows the reality of things a little bit better, as things in Flex really only started to take off after Flex 2 was released.
Same thing with salary, which is closer to what I’ve seen in the industry than the low salary that you get with just Flex:
http://www.indeed.com/salary?q1=adobe+flex&l1=&q2=silverlight&l2=&q3=openlaszlo&l3=&q4=ajax&l4=&q5=javafx&l5=&q6=objective-c&l6=
very cool, will definitely make that update
Made that update and also changed out Ajax for Dojo. Again, ajax is way to general. The new charts should be much better.
I think it isn’t really fair for Dojo being the AJAX equivalent – in reality, there are a number of libraries that this represents:
Dojo JavaScript Toolkit, MooTools, jQuery, Prototype, Scriptaculous, ExtJS and YUI being the probably most well known. With several others available, those represent what I have most often come across in work, in sites, or in job postings.
I completely agree that this was the hardest one to make up a name for. So I thought like a recruiter and tried to come up with a keyword that they might latch on to. Not a perfect science, I completely admit that. Is there a better term(s) that you think would be better? I am just afraid that putting “ajax” is still too broad.
Social comments and analytics for this post…
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I think you should include GWT into your investigation
good point. I haven’t seen a lot of requests for that, but it would be a good addition for curiosity sake.
[...] Dena Cassella wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptvery cool, will definitely make that update. Jonathan CamposFebruary 3rd, 2010 at 1:00 pm. Made that update and also changed out Ajax for Dojo. Again, ajax is way to general. The new charts should be much better. … [...]
The problem with putting the company names in queries for things like Flex and Silverlight is that they narrow the search too much. Here’s another query that might be a little better:
http://www.indeed.com/jobtrends?q=((flex+developer)+or+(adobe+flex)+or+(actionscript+flex)),+silverlight,+jquery,+dojo&l=
Note that jquery is experiencing a lot of interest.
Cheers,
-Brian
I will check ou that search shortly and update. Getting perfect data from indeed isn’t easy.
I knew someone would ask about jquery. While I concede it is popular and very well done, I am not sure that most jquery requests are for RIA applications. That is the only reason I didn’t include it. If we can get a few more responses on it from others I’d be happy to add it.
Hi Jonathan,
I guess it depends on how rich your RIAs have to be… Maybe have a look at the JQuery plugin page: http://plugins.jquery.com/ and decide based on that?
Cheers,
-Brian
I completely agree it can do it. I just don’t know how many people really use it for rias compared to those that use it just to make a normal site more dynamic. Similar to why I didn’t add a search for “flash”. Because you can make an ria with flash, but I believe the majority of flash only requests are for sites and advertising.
Updated to include JQuery and OR statements in search
[...] create the content is another. Here too, Silverlight seems to be finding its way as evidenced by Jonathan Campos blog which analyzes indeed.com job [...]
[...] The World in a State of Flex [...]