Technology startups and innovation are central to the growth of Africa and African economies. At the heart of tech and innovation in tech are the actual guys who create the cool apps and the neat websites and the frameworks around which these are built, the programmers! So the question is - how is Africa doing in terms of the programmer skill pool?
The survey attracted a total of 181 responses to date from across Africa and the African diaspora. The distribution from different regions of Africa was as follows:
![[image_library_tag 3438a49d-13f7-4991-b1cd-4b3c61d5850b 320x198 alt="image1-" title="image1-" class="center " width="320" height="198" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/Region.png){kind=link}
The countries represented included: Kenya, South Africa, Ghana, Cameroun, Tanzania, Nigeria, Malawi, Senegal, Uganda, Mali, DR Congo and Sudan.
There was a massive difference in the number of responses that came from male respondents (172) versus female respondents (9):
![[image_library_tag 6690bb17-f94d-40b6-b6b4-6290d288a3d2 270x167 alt="image-2" title="image-2" class="center " width="270" height="167" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/gender.png){kind=link}
In terms of number of years programming, most are between the 1 to 10 years range:
![[image_library_tag b36dd6b0-40f2-4758-81f6-adf7b9c1481a 370x229 alt="image-3" title="image-3" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/Experience.png){kind=link}
In terms of mode of learning, most learnt how to program from university or college but there's also a good number who are self taught:
![[image_library_tag 967aabce-8cf7-40e2-b58d-2b2837076eda 370x229 alt="image4" title="image4" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/Learning.png){kind=link}
Most are applications programmers. Looking at platforms and programming languages - most program applications for the web; the most popular programming languages are Java, followed by PHP and the least popular languages are F#, Smalltalk, Lisp and Objective C; finally, in terms of platform, most developers are using the Windows OS, Linux comes in second and the Mac has least users with 9% of the respondents programming on Mac:
![[image_library_tag f51f1eb2-d3ad-4866-b1aa-1fd95f341fa2 370x229 alt="image-5" title="image-5" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/Type.png){kind=link}
For those involved in mobile applications programming, the most popular platform is Android, followed by Java ME and the least popular is the Qt platform:
![[image_library_tag 3b1eb4f2-6ff9-4d9f-9763-73c77e3a8103 370x229 alt="image-6" title="image-6" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/Platforms.png){kind=link}
![[image_library_tag c4537756-4b6c-4870-84b3-5cacb33a555a 370x229 alt="image7" title="image7" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/Language.png){kind=link}
![[image_library_tag f95adc05-a1fd-484b-a4fc-23abbb8fc93c 370x229 alt="image-8" title="image-8" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/OS.png){kind=link}
![[image_library_tag 7b59fc68-2217-4e58-956a-62d7effe58b1 370x229 alt="image-9" title="image-9" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]](http://afrinnovator.com/wp-content/uploads/MobilePlatforms.png){kind=link}
Fewer respondents are involved in Open Source projects (65 out of the total 181). Some of the Open Source projects African programmers have been involved in include: Ushahidi, OpenRAVE, Javarosa, OpenXdata, OpenDataKit, Quantum GIS, Eclipse, Firefox, RapidSMS, Joomla, Drupal, WordPress, OpenMRS amongst others.
[image_library_tag 15f594cc-9540-4d2a-9c84-2e06303b4cab 370x229 alt="image-10" title="image-10" class="center " width="370" height="229" border="0" ]
By Will Moria, Founder of Afrinnovator