Well, regardless of age, anyone is statistically very unlikely to create a popular programming language.
It would have been more interesting to have statistics focusing on where the people worked at language creation time (kind of social structure, in which country), what purpose it was trying to fill.
As other said, just do what you enjoy. It's unlikely you are going to face any issue for which creating a whole new programming language will a be more efficient approach than using any of the plethora which are already existing with mature ecosystems and many production applications working on top of it. But if you desire to create one, don't let popularity probability temper your quest.
I agree with this approach. I tried to make a few on my own and no one liked them. I wasted a lot of time making good dependencies for them because it felt like the right way and made me intellectually satisfied even though it really burned time towards the end result.
Turns out the dependencies got thousands of downloads vs the actual product.
Unless you need the money, if you are trying to be productive in free time have a strong bias towards things that make you happy and don’t worry about the outcome so much.
When creating a new programming language, age is never an issue. You can create everything by following your heart. However, please avoid getting stuck in the mindset of "I must make this new language popular". Creating a language just for fun or to solve a problem will bring you happiness.
Waking up at 40 and telling yourself "I need to accomplish something great" seems like a waste of time, unless you're already ambitious and working towards it. (And if you are, you don't need my advice.)
If you're not building out of genuine interest and instead trying to compensate for something, what you're lacking is not a new programming language.
100%. I’m a much happier tinkerer now that I don’t even try to publish/share/advertise my gadgets. They just quietly end up on my website that lacks a mailing list or comments sections or share buttons.
The data is a little bit off in the case of collaborative languages. For example, Scheme is credited to Guy Steele and Gerry Sussman, but only Steele's age is listed in the chart.
Independently, this kind of analysis furthers the mythology that popular programming languages have singular creators. It's true that the vast majority of these projects were started and led by a singular leader or small group in their initial days, but by the time anyone has heard of them, they typically are the result of a collaboration between a team and a community of users and this is only more true in the modern age.
When I was much younger I felt like I had enough skill to make a programming language, but not a good enough idea of what that should be. I thought I should consider the topic for 10 years and decide what would really make a good and distinctive new language.
It has been about 30 years now. I have a much better idea of what I would like, and yet despite all of the experience I have gained along the way, I feel like I lack the skill to implement it.
As long as you're mentally and physically fit you can do it at any age.
But I think the statistic skews way too low today because a lot of the existing popular languages are low hanging fruits. Eich I think said once that he wrote Javascript in ten days, and I don't think you're going to make a popular language in two weeks any more.
The standards and expectations on a language ecosystem are so much higher now if you want to add value I'd honestly even say no new popular language is going to be built by a single person. Unless the Lisan Al Gaib of programming comes along and invents an entirely new paradigm.
As a programming language researcher I'm definitely biased here. But I recommend anyone interested try to write their own programming language, because even if you never even finish the compiler, I think it's worthwhile.
Compilers include a lot of discrete algorithms and data-structures: trees (syntax), graphs (intermediate representation), fixed-point algorithms (static analysis); they also include a lot of difficult problems, like how to handle forward declarations (for recursive functions) and closures. And thinking about programming language design requires thinking about program design: deciding the set of features to make a language maximally expressive without over-complicating it or permitting spaghetti code, is a lot like deciding the set of methods to make an API maximally usable without over-complicating it or permitting invalid uses. Writing a programming language makes you a better programmer.
Similarly, designing and implementing a game engine makes you better understand game development (learn what is slow and how everything works, along with a lot of complex data-structures and algorithms). And writing an OS makes you better understand how to use maxOS/Windows/Linux. And writing a frontend/backend without using the popular frameworks probably makes you better understand how to use those frameworks...
Also, I recommend you try to make the language (or game engine or OS or ...) unique in some way that you think is better than how existing ones do it (and if you can't think of any improvements, don't make a new one, but you probably have at least some ideas). And try not to just read literature and re-implement it, it's OK to use libraries for parts that already exist. Otherwise you could just take an online (or in-person) course, which is fine, but it doesn't build critical thinking in the way that focusing on what you're interested in does.
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It would have been more interesting to have statistics focusing on where the people worked at language creation time (kind of social structure, in which country), what purpose it was trying to fill.
As other said, just do what you enjoy. It's unlikely you are going to face any issue for which creating a whole new programming language will a be more efficient approach than using any of the plethora which are already existing with mature ecosystems and many production applications working on top of it. But if you desire to create one, don't let popularity probability temper your quest.
Turns out the dependencies got thousands of downloads vs the actual product.
Unless you need the money, if you are trying to be productive in free time have a strong bias towards things that make you happy and don’t worry about the outcome so much.
Waking up at 40 and telling yourself "I need to accomplish something great" seems like a waste of time, unless you're already ambitious and working towards it. (And if you are, you don't need my advice.)
If you're not building out of genuine interest and instead trying to compensate for something, what you're lacking is not a new programming language.
Whenever someone asks “am I too old/young” for something, answer yes without elaborating, until they rephrase their question into one worth answering.
Independently, this kind of analysis furthers the mythology that popular programming languages have singular creators. It's true that the vast majority of these projects were started and led by a singular leader or small group in their initial days, but by the time anyone has heard of them, they typically are the result of a collaboration between a team and a community of users and this is only more true in the modern age.
It has been about 30 years now. I have a much better idea of what I would like, and yet despite all of the experience I have gained along the way, I feel like I lack the skill to implement it.
No.
This is just the observation that programming languages are created mostly by people in their 30s.
Whether or not your ability to do so peaks in your 30s is a totally different claim.
But I think the statistic skews way too low today because a lot of the existing popular languages are low hanging fruits. Eich I think said once that he wrote Javascript in ten days, and I don't think you're going to make a popular language in two weeks any more.
The standards and expectations on a language ecosystem are so much higher now if you want to add value I'd honestly even say no new popular language is going to be built by a single person. Unless the Lisan Al Gaib of programming comes along and invents an entirely new paradigm.
Compilers include a lot of discrete algorithms and data-structures: trees (syntax), graphs (intermediate representation), fixed-point algorithms (static analysis); they also include a lot of difficult problems, like how to handle forward declarations (for recursive functions) and closures. And thinking about programming language design requires thinking about program design: deciding the set of features to make a language maximally expressive without over-complicating it or permitting spaghetti code, is a lot like deciding the set of methods to make an API maximally usable without over-complicating it or permitting invalid uses. Writing a programming language makes you a better programmer.
Similarly, designing and implementing a game engine makes you better understand game development (learn what is slow and how everything works, along with a lot of complex data-structures and algorithms). And writing an OS makes you better understand how to use maxOS/Windows/Linux. And writing a frontend/backend without using the popular frameworks probably makes you better understand how to use those frameworks...
Also, I recommend you try to make the language (or game engine or OS or ...) unique in some way that you think is better than how existing ones do it (and if you can't think of any improvements, don't make a new one, but you probably have at least some ideas). And try not to just read literature and re-implement it, it's OK to use libraries for parts that already exist. Otherwise you could just take an online (or in-person) course, which is fine, but it doesn't build critical thinking in the way that focusing on what you're interested in does.