The biggest developer trends of 2016 tell the story of the constantly-changing tech industry and the innovative developers at its core. Here’s a look at 5 leading stories that defined the dev world in 2016:

Open-Source Fallout Breaks the Internet

The interdependence of the open-source community and the websites, apps and services that depend on shared code became very clear after a big-time communication breakdown in March.

When Azer Koçulu deleted all of his code packages from the open-source JavaScript resource npm, developers and major websites around the world faced serious ERR! messages. Koçulu’s brief feud with Kik had led him to delete a piece of code that turned out to be crucial to multiple widely-used packages. npm, facing a tough decision, undeleted the 11 lines of code in question, prioritizing the needs of the community over the wishes of the individual author.

Big Data’s Big Numbers Became Impossible to Ignore

The big data market hit a valuation of $28.65 billion in 2016, with a forecast of $66.79 billion by 2021. How did this affect developers? Big-time demand for skills relating to big data development, of course. The need for sophisticated analytics software is poised to become a huge growth element in this new industry subsection.

IoT Security Woes Became World Headlines

Remember that big IoT hack in October? Twitter, Spotify and Amazon sure do: they were among the many websites that were rendered inaccessible to many users, as a result of a DDoS attack on internet traffic-and-routing service Dyn. The assault was carried out through IoT devices.

While much of the non-dev world was annoyed enough to be locked out of Netflix for a few hours, security-minded developers saw the October outage as a sign of things to come. The forecast isn’t doom and gloom, but what lies ahead is a large-scale refocusing on making the IoT not just convenient, innovative and exciting, but also secure.

Linux Turned 25

Linux, the hobby project that evolved to become part of the DNA of the web and countless smart devices, had a milestone anniversary in August. As a testament to what the curiosity and collaboration of passionate developers can build, the Linux success story is one close to this community’s heart.

Education Finally Caught Up To Reality

While there’s still some debate about the future of coding, educators, toymakers and governments finally embraced software development as an important part of a complete education. With tech being a ubiquitous part of our environment, understanding a developer’s skillset has become as relevant as learning math and languages.