Recruit.net has just launched it’s Australian job search site.  Their listings seem to come from a combination of the major job sites like MyCareer & Seek as well as listings directly from advertisers & companies.  It’s a nice looking site with a fairly decent interface, but that’s not what’s interesting.  What I found on their site was their Job Index Trends.  By filling in the form you can compare the trends of job listings for the keywords you enter and the cities and/or regions you select.

So you can see the difference between the major programming languages. Java is still killing everything else in Australia, but the .NET languages are gaining, while Java is dropping.  Also as that graph shows, if you take .NET as a whole, it’s outstripped Java.

For this one we’ve got the job listing trends for the various major database systems.  Surprisingly enough (well, surprising to me anyway) Oracle is still a fair way ahead, with SQL Server coming in a not-too-far-off second.  However this may be misleading, because I’ve seen a fair few listings that want SQL Server, but just refer to it as SQL.

Now before anyone jumps up and down about their favourite language/db not ranking highly enough, it should be noted that this data is by no means:

• comprehensive,
• peer-reviewed or
• indicative of language/db quality or even usage in the industry

They’re just some interesting stats, especially for those in the job market, or for prospective employers looking to see what the market is doing.  Also it’s a great example of a company providing data to the community for free as a service.