Python vs. IDL?

A recent shift in astronomy has been the favored choice of interpreted programming language for day-to-day analysis work. In the previous section we showed that Python has overtaken IDL in popularity. This may not have been true three to five years ago, but today Python is, by a wide margin, the most popular interpreted language in astronomy (at least insofar as this survey is representative). Still, there is a significant overlap between the users of both languages as many people are either transitioning from one to the other or using both in their research. In Figure \ref{fig:venn} we show a Venn diagram of the Python and IDL users. In total 984 (86%) of the survey participants use either Python or IDL. Of those, 764 use Python and 497 use IDL. Both are chosen by 277 or 25% of all survey participants. This indicates substantial overlap: 36% of Python users also use IDL and 55% of IDL users also use Python. Finally, 158 survey participants (14% of the full sample) chose neither option.