Max Morgan is the Lead Frontend Developer at Linchpin and once again is one of the organizers for WordCamp RI. He’s presented at WordCamp, but also remembers the first time he attended a WordCamp. He’s gone from a member of the audience who was nervous to a knowledgeable speaker (okay maybe he was still nervous then too.)
Q:
Max, you are back again this year as WordCamp RI is planned and coordinated. What draws you back?
A:
The community and my passion for WordPress is what draws me in! I’ve been attending Rhode Island’s annual WordCamp since 2012, and no matter how many WordCamps I attend I am always going to learn something valuable or meet someone with a perspective that hasn’t crossed my mind. It’s a great place to network and learn, and as a developer who makes a living utilizing WordPress this is SO valuable and I love being involved with any aspect I can help with.
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Q:
You presented at an in-depth session on Sass (Syntactically Awesome Style Sheets) last year at WordCamp. Tell me about that experience.
A:
My experience was amazing, I had never held a session – never mind a 6-hour workshop – so honestly I was very nervous to be in front of all the folks who attended, and the turnout was AMAZING! Once it got rolling everything went great though. We spent some time exploring what Sass is and why Sass is such an amazing tool for any frontend developer to leverage. We had discussions around some CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) best practices and why things should be done a certain way. Plus, we covered how folks can easily improve upon their daily workflow to make Sass work for them. I had some help from a good friend and an amazing developer, Jeff Golenski from the Jetpack team at Automattic, who had a lot of valuable insight on using Sass in a distributed team and staying organized. The whole experience was great and I think those who attended got a good understanding of how to move forward and use Sass in their projects.
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Q:
In your professional life, when you’re not helping to organize WordCamp RI, what do you do? What role does WordPress play?
A:
WordPress plays a huge role in my professional life. I am the Lead Frontend Developer at Linchpin, an agency out of Pawtucket, and a majority of our clients are built on WordPress. As a Frontend at Linchpin my role is take our client’s vision of functionality, our designer’s vision of the site and tie it all together. This ranges from building plugins and themes to writing the JS (JavaScript) and Sass.
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Q:
WordCamp RI is two days of all things WordPress. For someone attending for the first time, what advice do you offer to get the most out of WordCamp?
A:
When I attended my first WordCamps (Boston and Rhode Island in 2012) I was SO overwhelmed. The company I was with at the time was making a transition to WordPress, which at the time I had ZERO experience in, so I sat through a lot of talks that I knew were valuable but went way over my head. Looking back at that now, my advice would be to enjoy your time, meet like-minded people – AKA everyone at WordCamp, the community is super friendly 🙂 – and take some minimal notes. Every talk (except the workshops) will make its way to WordPress.tv. So pin-point the talks that really made something click for you, understand what drew you into it, and watch it again. If you attend a talk and then jot down to revisit after you’ve explored WordPress more, the video will be there and it WILL make sense.
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Q:
Friday there are day-long in-depth sessions on various topics. Saturday is made up of a variety of 45-minute seminars through-out the day. What is the advantage of taking the two approaches over the course of WordCamp RI?
Q:
I think Friday’s in-depth sessions are very valuable, as you can get a real hands-on approach to certain aspects of WordPress. Typically, the workshops encourage attendees to bring a laptop and code along, and for a lot people like myself this is the best way to learn something. Of course Saturday is also a valuable experience, covering a range of topics from child themes, to security, to content, etc. Just about every aspect of WordPress is covered and this really expands people’s knowledge on WordPress in general. The best part is you can always sit down with speakers at the Happiness Bar after their session, if you have more questions or want to dig a little deeper.
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Q:
What’s this Happiness Bar everyone is talking about? Why would I want to stop by?
A:
The Happiness Bar is there to help attendees with all things WordPress, plain and simple. You can pick speakers’ or volunteers’ brains on a crazy range of topics, from getting advice about what theme you should (or shouldn’t) use, why is this bug happening, what plugin should be used, or asking speakers to expand on certain parts of their session. Anything WordPress, we’re there to help! 🙂
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Q:
After WordCamp RI is over, there is the After-Party. What is that? Why should I attend?
A:
It’s a celebration of all the things you’ve learned over the past 2 days and a great opportunity to network. A lot of the time things can get pretty hectic at WordCamp for organizers, volunteers and speakers, and you may not get to have a 1-on-1 with a speaker you enjoyed and this is the perfect place to get that time.
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Q:
WordCamp draws a diverse crowd: beginners, experienced coders, people who provide web content, project managers, and more. What approach does WordCamp RI take that such a varying group attends each year?
A:
We try to recognize the needs of everyone involved, the community is huge and WordPress isn’t just for the developer or copywriter. We get feedback every year on what folks found useful, what they didn’t, and what they’d like to see next year… and we listen! We don’t want someone to attend if there isn’t something for them and we want anyone who has any interaction with WordPress to be able to attend and get something out of it.
Some examples from last year: John Eckman held a session that was focused on designers, Aileen McDonough had a great session on handling content in WordPress, Jonathan Desroisers had an amazing workshop on how to contribute to WordPress Core, and of course there was a rad-tad group of folks (Lydia Rogers, Colin Murphy, Daniella Norwood) who held a workshop geared toward getting started with WordPress and using it for a business. Pile my Sass workshop on top of that and that covers a wide-range of groups, and that’s only a handful of all the sessions we held.
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Q:
What tips and tricks do you recommend to get the most out of WordCamp RI? What should I bring? What should I do? Does it matter if I look at the schedule posted on the WordCamp RI website a day or two before I attend?
A:
You should bring your preferred note taking devices – pen/paper or laptop – and take some notes! Just jot down some keywords or sessions/speakers that really made a light go off for you because you can always watch the sessions again on WordPress.tv to focus on some key points that interest you. Also, bring something to keep swag in! There’s a lot of swag to be had 🙂 It doesn’t hurt to look at the schedule beforehand and get a game plan for what session you want to attend. Every session has a description so you can find early on if it’s right for you.
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Q:
Once the actual days of WordCamp RI arrive, what do you personally like to make sure you do?
A:
I soak up as much knowledge as I can, talk with folks I haven’t seen in a while, try to meet some new people and just enjoy my time with the community.
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Q:
Is there any follow-up that makes sense once WordCamp RI is over?
A:
Just stay connected with people you’ve met, put some of your new-found knowledge to work, build skills that sparked an interest in you, and keep updated with the WordPress Rhode Island Meetup Group (http://www.meetup.com/wordpressri/). WordCamp is held for your benefit, so take advantage of everything you’ve learned!
You can reach Max at:
Twitter: @maxinacube
Slack: @maxinacube