Programming language Python's popularity: Ahead of Java for first time but still trailing C Python is now the second most popular language in the nearly 20-year-old Tiobe index.

For the first time in the history of TIOBE's index, Java has slipped out of the top two, leaving Python to occupy the spot behind reigning champion, C.

Not necessarily for the data-science and machine-learning communities built around Python extensions like NumPy and SciPy, but as a general programming language.

Python is the first programming language to climb to an 18% rating since Java, which rated 18% nearly eight years ago.