A new report released today by O’Reilly Media Inc. finds, not surprisingly, that there was an unprecedented surge of interest in generative artificial intelligence in 2023, based on usage metrics from the O’Reilly Learning Platform.

Last year, O’Reilly saw a 3,600% increase in topics relating to generative AI and generative pretrained transformer models, or GPTs. Natural language processing was the most widely consumed AI topic, up 195% year-over-year, with related topics such as generative models up 900%, transformers up 325% and prompt engineering — a topic that didn’t exist in 2022 — also seeing surging interest.

Security was another topic that saw gains, with almost all related security topics showcasing growth from 2022 to 2023. Network security was the most popular topic, seeing 5% year-over-year growth, followed by governance with 22% growth. Interest in application security topics rose 42% and DevSecOps experienced one of the highest increases with 30% year-over-year growth. The increased interest in security topics is said to signal a shift toward incorporating security throughout the software development process.

“Cloud native” surged in 2023 to become the most popular cloud-related topic with 175% growth, which shows that companies are moving to building for the cloud as their primary deployment platform. Hybrid cloud is another topic area that grew significantly, up 145%, while interest in private and public cloud usage dropped 46% and 10%, respectively.

The report also found that developers are looking to grow their “soft skills,” with a rising focus on project communications skills, up 23%. Professional development rose 22% and project management rose 13%.

The report suggests that the shifts in learning and development priorities is influenced by the broader changes in the tech landscape. The integration of AI and cloud computing is transforming how technologies are developed and deployed and also reshaping the skillsets required for tech professionals.

As AI continues to penetrate various facets of technology, the ability to understand and work alongside AI-driven systems is arguably becoming crucial. Similarly, the move toward cloud-native architectures demands new competencies in cloud management and operations.

“This year was one of the few years that could genuinely be called disruptive,” the report concludes. “Generative AI will change this industry in important ways. Programmers won’t become obsolete, but programming as we know it might. Programming will have more to do with understanding problems and designing good solutions than specifying, step-by-step, what a computer needs to do.”

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