Tim: What’s your WordPress “origin” story?
When I first learned about WordPress I said, “I can build a CMS, why would I use an existing one?” After a few months of working for an agency where WordPress was the standard, I fully understood that benefit of this remarkable open source platform. I now embraced WordPress with the zeal of a convert, as an active member of my local WordPress Meet-Up and by attending WordCamps wherever possible. As a freelancer, I specialize in custom theme development. I have recently joined the theme review team and am preparing to submit my first theme to the WordPress Repository.
Tim: Whats your top 3 WordPress plugins? Why?
- iThemes Security, because every site needs to be locked down
- WordPress SEO by YOAST, because it is SEO made simple
- Advanced Custom Fields, because of all the doors it opens!
Tim: Whats your most proud achievement around WordPress?
I built the site for Verulam Farm (verulamfarm.com) as a completely custom theme (a predecessor for the boilerplate I now use regularly). At the client’s insistence, it was developed to look exactly like the existing static & non-responsive site they had in place. Since then I have used ACF and custom post types to radically increase functionality, giving them a custom cataloging system fro their horses.
Tim: What do you want our readers to know about you?
I am really excited to be here. ‘Here’ at word camp, and ‘here’ as a developer in this stage and place in my life. I take great pride in the work I do, and I enjoy *almost* every minute of it.
When I’m not at the computer, I am at my jeweler’s bench creating other beautiful functional things, or outside digging in the dirt for rocks and mineral specimens.
Tim: Define yourself with one word.
interested
Shayna is speaking on Adding Functionality with Custom Post Types and Custom Fields at 2 pm.