The Landscape — Shapes of Intelligence

Frontend Frameworks

How do I build the UI?

Libraries and frameworks for building web interfaces. React dominates, but the landscape is fragmenting toward lighter, faster alternatives.

React Component model, massive ecosystem, Meta-backed. The default for most teams. dominant

Next.js React framework with routing, SSR, and deployment story. Vercel's flagship. dominant

TanStack Headless utilities — Query (data fetching), Router, Table, Form. Framework-agnostic, React-first. strong

Vue Approachable, incrementally adoptable. Strong in Asia and indie projects. Nuxt is its Next.js equivalent. strong

Svelte Compiles away the framework. No virtual DOM. SvelteKit for full apps. Loved by developers, smaller ecosystem. rising

SolidJS React-like API, fine-grained reactivity, no virtual DOM. Fast. SolidStart for full-stack. rising

Astro Content-focused, ships zero JS by default. Use any component framework inside it. Great for static sites. rising

htmx HTML attributes for AJAX, WebSockets, SSE. No build step. The anti-framework framework. rising

Angular Google's enterprise framework. Opinionated, batteries-included. Big in corporate environments. legacy

JavaScript Runtimes

What runs my code?

Engines that execute JavaScript and TypeScript outside the browser. Node was the only option for a decade. Now there are real alternatives.

Node.js The original server-side JS runtime. Massive ecosystem via npm. V8 engine. Everything supports it. dominant

Bun All-in-one: runtime, bundler, package manager, test runner. Extremely fast. Node-compatible. JavaScriptCore engine. rising

Deno By Node's creator. Secure by default, native TypeScript, web-standard APIs. Deno Deploy for edge hosting. niche

Hosting & Deployment

Where does my site/app live?

Services that put your code on the internet. Ranges from "git push and done" platforms to "here's a Linux box, figure it out" VPS providers.

Vercel Deploy from git. Edge functions, preview deploys, analytics. Made for Next.js but works with anything. dominant

Cloudflare Pages Global edge network. Workers for serverless. R2 for storage. D1 for database. Aggressive free tier. strong

Netlify Git-based deploys, serverless functions, form handling. Pioneer of the Jamstack era. Generous free tier. strong

Railway Deploy anything — web apps, databases, cron jobs. Simple UI. Good for backends and full-stack. rising

Render Heroku replacement. Web services, databases, cron, static sites. Auto-deploy from git. rising

Fly.io Run Docker containers close to users. Good for stateful apps, databases at the edge. Developer-loved. rising

exe.dev Your own server. SSH in, rsync files, nginx serves them. Full control. No platform lock-in. niche

GitHub Pages Free static hosting from any GitHub repo. Custom domains. No backend. Good for docs and project sites. niche

Heroku The original "git push to deploy." Killed its free tier. Still works, but most devs have moved on. legacy

Cloud Providers

Where do I run infrastructure?

Full cloud platforms: compute, storage, databases, networking, AI services, everything. Priced to confuse. Start simple.

AWS Amazon. The biggest. 200+ services. EC2, S3, Lambda, RDS, SQS, everything. Complex, powerful, expensive to learn. dominant

Google Cloud GCP. Strong in AI/ML (Vertex, TPUs), BigQuery, Kubernetes (they invented it). Firebase for app backends. strong

Azure Microsoft. Dominant in enterprise. Deep Office 365 / Active Directory integration. OpenAI's exclusive cloud partner. strong

Contabo Budget VPS. Cheap dedicated resources (not shared). German. Good for personal projects where you want a real box. niche

Hetzner German. Excellent price-to-performance VPS and dedicated servers. Developer favorite for indie projects. rising

DigitalOcean Simple cloud. Droplets (VPS), managed databases, app platform. Good docs. The "I just want a server" option. strong

Linode Now owned by Akamai. Simple VPS, managed Kubernetes. Similar to DigitalOcean. Loyal developer base. niche

Oracle Cloud Generous always-free tier (ARM instances). Enterprise-focused. Surprisingly competitive on price. niche

Systems Languages

What if JavaScript isn't fast enough?

Compiled languages for performance-critical work: CLIs, game engines, operating systems, databases, network services. Different tradeoffs than scripting languages.

Rust Memory safety without garbage collection. Steep learning curve, loved once learned. Powers parts of Firefox, Linux kernel, Cloudflare. rising

Go Google. Simple, fast compilation, built-in concurrency. The language of cloud infrastructure: Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform. strong

C The foundation. Operating systems, embedded, everything low-level. No safety nets. Still everywhere under the hood. dominant

C++ C with objects, templates, and decades of features. Games, browsers, databases, trading systems. Complex but fast. dominant

Zig A better C. No hidden allocations, no hidden control flow. Bun is written in Zig. Small but enthusiastic community. rising

Swift Apple's language. iOS, macOS, server-side. Modern safety features. Required for Apple platform development. strong

Mobile Development

How do I build phone apps?

Native means one codebase per platform (fast, full access). Cross-platform means one codebase for both (faster to ship, some tradeoffs).

SwiftUI Apple's native UI framework. iPhone, iPad, Mac, Watch, TV. Declarative. Xcode required. The Apple way. dominant

Android (Kotlin) Google's platform. Kotlin is the modern language, Java still works. Android Studio. Jetpack Compose for declarative UI. dominant

React Native Write React, get native apps. JavaScript bridge to native components. Expo simplifies everything. Meta-backed. strong

Flutter Google's cross-platform toolkit. Dart language. Custom rendering engine (not native components). Beautiful defaults. strong

Kotlin Multiplatform Share business logic across Android, iOS, web, desktop. Native UI per platform. JetBrains-backed. rising

PWA Progressive Web App. A website that acts like an app. No app store. Works offline. Limited native API access. niche

Capacitor Wrap any web app in a native shell. Access native APIs from JavaScript. Ionic's successor to Cordova. niche

AI Coding Agents

What writes code for me?

CLI agents that read your codebase, write code, run commands, and iterate. The newest category. Moving fast.

Claude Code Anthropic. Terminal agent with file access, shell, web. Claude Pro/Max/Team. Deep context understanding. strong

Codex CLI OpenAI. Zero-dependency install via Homebrew. ChatGPT Plus/Pro/Team. Sandboxed execution. strong

Gemini CLI Google. Free with Google account. Gemini models. Shell and file access. Newest of the three. rising

Cursor AI-native code editor (VS Code fork). Inline completions, chat, agent mode. Own subscription, multiple models. strong

GitHub Copilot Microsoft/OpenAI. Lives in your editor. Autocomplete and chat. The first mainstream AI coding tool. dominant

Windsurf AI editor from Codeium. "Flows" for multi-step tasks. Cascade agent. VS Code-based. rising

Aider Open source CLI agent. Works with any model. Git-aware — every edit is a commit. Developer favorite. niche

Productivity Suites

Where do I write docs, make spreadsheets, check email?

The tools everyone uses daily. The AI layer is being bolted on fast — Gemini in Google, Copilot in Microsoft, Claude in standalone apps.

Google Workspace Gmail, Docs, Sheets, Drive, Calendar, Meet. Web-first. Real-time collaboration. Gemini AI built in. dominant

Microsoft 365 Outlook, Word, Excel, Teams, OneDrive. Desktop + web. Enterprise standard. Copilot AI across all apps. dominant

Apple iWork Pages, Numbers, Keynote. Free on Apple devices. iCloud sync. Clean design. Less powerful, more than enough. niche

Notion Docs, wikis, databases, project management in one tool. Blocks-based. AI features. Popular with startups. strong

Obsidian Local-first markdown notes. Backlinks, graph view, plugins. Your files, your machine. No cloud required. rising

LibreOffice Open source Office suite. Writer, Calc, Impress. Free. Runs everywhere. Compatible with Microsoft formats (mostly). niche

Databases

Where does my data live?

Where structured data goes. SQL databases store rows in tables. NoSQL databases store documents, key-value pairs, or graphs. Pick based on your data shape.

PostgreSQL The serious open-source database. Relational, extensible, reliable. Supports JSON, full-text search, vectors. The default choice. dominant

SQLite Database in a single file. No server needed. Embedded in everything — phones, browsers, desktop apps. Perfect for local-first. dominant

MySQL The web's database. WordPress, most PHP apps. Oracle-owned. MariaDB is the community fork. strong

MongoDB Document database. JSON-like documents instead of rows. Flexible schema. Good for prototyping. Atlas for managed hosting. strong

Redis In-memory key-value store. Blazing fast. Caching, sessions, queues, pub/sub. Not a primary database — a sidekick. strong

Supabase Open-source Firebase alternative. Postgres underneath. Auth, storage, realtime, edge functions. Generous free tier. rising

TimescaleDB PostgreSQL extension for time-series data. IoT, metrics, analytics. Full SQL. Scales to billions of rows. niche

Turso SQLite at the edge. LibSQL fork. Embedded replicas. Good for local-first apps that sync. rising

Firebase Google. Firestore (NoSQL), Auth, Hosting, Functions. Great for prototypes and mobile apps. Vendor lock-in. strong

Scripting Languages

What do I write everyday code in?

Higher-level languages for apps, scripts, automation, data, and AI. You trade raw speed for developer speed.

Python The everything language. AI/ML, data science, web (Django/Flask), scripting, automation. Huge ecosystem. Readable. Slow, but rarely matters. dominant

JavaScript The web's language. Browser-native. Node.js for server. npm ecosystem. TypeScript for type safety. Inescapable. dominant

TypeScript JavaScript with types. Catches bugs at compile time. Industry standard for serious JS projects. Compiles to plain JS. dominant

Ruby Elegant, developer-friendly. Rails framework. Shopify, GitHub, Basecamp. Smaller than it was, still beloved. niche

PHP Powers WordPress (43% of the web). Laravel framework is modern and good. Easy to dismiss, hard to kill. strong

Elixir Functional, concurrent, fault-tolerant. Phoenix framework. LiveView for real-time UIs. Built on Erlang's VM. Small but passionate. niche

Game Engines & Graphics

How do I build games and 3D?

From full game engines to browser-based 3D. The gap between "indie game" and "AAA" is smaller than ever.

Unity C#. 2D and 3D. Mobile, desktop, console, VR. Massive asset store. Most-used game engine by count. Indie to mid-tier. dominant

Unreal Engine C++ and Blueprints. Photorealistic 3D. AAA games, film, architecture. Epic-backed. Free until you make money. dominant

Godot Open source. GDScript (Python-like) or C#. 2D is excellent, 3D is catching up. No royalties, no strings. rising

Three.js 3D in the browser. WebGL wrapper. Scenes, cameras, lights, meshes in JavaScript. React Three Fiber for React integration. dominant

Pygame Python 2D game library. Simple, educational. Good for prototypes and learning. Not for production games. niche

Phaser JavaScript 2D game framework. Browser-native. Sprites, physics, tilemaps. Good for web games and prototypes. niche

Bevy Rust game engine. Entity Component System. Data-driven. Early but promising. The Rust community's engine. rising

PlayCanvas Browser-based 3D engine with visual editor. WebGL. Good for interactive web experiences and lightweight 3D. niche

AI Model Providers

Whose brain am I using?

Companies that make and serve the large language models. You access them through APIs, apps, or agents. Different models have different strengths.

OpenAI GPT-4o, o1, o3. ChatGPT. The company that started the wave. Strongest brand recognition. API and consumer products. dominant

Anthropic Claude (Opus, Sonnet, Haiku). Long context, strong reasoning, safety-focused. Claude Code for agents. This is Claude. strong

Google Gemini (Ultra, Pro, Flash). Integrated into Search, Workspace, Android. Multimodal. Massive distribution. strong

Meta Llama (open weights). Free to use and modify. Powers most open-source AI. Not a hosted service — you run it yourself or use a host. strong

Mistral French. Efficient open models. Mixtral (mixture of experts). Strong in Europe. Le Chat consumer app. rising

xAI Grok. Musk-backed. Integrated with X (Twitter). Large model training on Colossus cluster. rising

DeepSeek Chinese. Open models competitive with frontier labs at fraction of cost. R1 reasoning model. Disrupted pricing assumptions. rising