The 2018 State of the Octoverse report from GitHub's Data Science Team provides an analysis of the popularity and trends of programming languages on GitHub. JavaScript emerges as the most popular language, with the highest number of repositories and contributors globally, driven in part by the advent of Node.js, which enables the use of the same code for both client and server. TypeScript has gained significant traction, entering the top 10 for public, private, and open-source repositories, particularly in South America and Africa, possibly due to these regions having newer developer communities. While Ruby's popularity is declining, other languages like Python and JavaScript are experiencing faster growth. The report also highlights the rise of statically-typed languages such as Kotlin, TypeScript, and Rust, which offer type safety and interoperability benefits, contributing to their increasing adoption. The open-source nature of these languages fosters community support and resource creation, enhancing their appeal to developers working on large applications.