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I still haven't found what I'm malloc()ing for: U2 tops poll of music today's devs code to

🎶 Where the streets have no hostname 🎶

Time to put to bed once and for all the image of the hip young hacker pounding out code to cutting-edge techno music. It turns out that today's devs prefer to work to most of the same tunes your mom plays while driving to the store.

A study from survey and research company Qualtrics found that while nearly all developers like to listen to music while plying their trade, the overwhelming majority have astoundingly poor taste in it.

The top six most popular musicians for coding were, according to the survey:

  • U2
  • Taylor Swift
  • The Beatles
  • Maroon 5
  • Linkin Park
  • Katy Perry

Now, at this point we should point out that the study leaves plenty of room for error. Just 400 developers were surveyed, and it is entirely possible that a number of them were dads who had ended up playing their pre-teen kid's Pandora feed by mistake.

Some may also be iPhone owners who haven't gotten around to deleting that unwanted U2 album yet.

According to the study, 96 per cent of developers opt to put on headphones and listen to music when coding, and 80 per cent of those who do listen to music opt for headphones over external speakers (possibly to hide their shame).

The generation gap is very much in effect when it comes to the source of music. Developers over 35 were three times more likely to opt for radio, while those under preferred to listen to streaming services.

The researchers found that Pandora is the service of choice for developers, claiming a 29 per cent share. YouTube was second, at 23 per cent, followed by Spotify, with 19 per cent. Bose headphones are the most popular brand, followed by Sony and Beats. ®

Let us know in the comments what kind of music you like to program, hack and wrangle gear to!

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