I just found out Python has been around since 1991 and it blew my mind

I was reading through some old coding forums last night and stumbled on a timeline of when different languages came out. Python was released in 1991, same year I was learning how to tie my shoes. I always thought it was a newer thing, like from the early 2000s. It looks so modern compared to C or Java from that era. Kinda wild that people were using it before the internet was even a big deal. Makes me wonder what other things I just assume are new but have been around forever. Has anyone else been surprised by how old some popular tools actually are?

2 comments

2 Comments

david8211mo ago

Oh boy, I remember when Python started getting popular in the early 2000s and thinking the same thing. It was a real shocker to find out Guido van Rossum had been working on it for over a decade before it really took off. If you want to check the age of other tools, look up the release dates for things like SQLite or Git - those caught me off guard too. Oh, and text editors like Vim and Emacs are way older than most people realize, Vim came out in 1991 as well. Just goes to show how much good software sticks around long after it first shows up.

wyatt_ross271mo ago

Man, that Vim fact just blew my mind, I always assumed it came out way later than that. Tbh it kinda makes me wonder what other "new" stuff is secretly ancient.