And then when I went self-employed I was doing some web development or web application development really using Ruby on Rails and a little bit of WordPress.
My background is in computer science before even working with WordPress, I was working professionally with ‘.net’ building web applications for a large Internet company here in Atlanta. And then sometimes I will write about my thoughts, my perspectives or how I tackled the problem, why I tackled it a certain way, or how I handled things in a certain way. And then I see, I treat WordPress as a black box and then I build solutions for others on top of it. I tend to treat WordPress actually as a black box and I build solutions for other people for a living and for fun or for fun as profit is all the cool kids say. Now when I say problems in WordPress I don’t mean like “Oh, WordPress has a problem or a bug and we’re gonna apply all of this enterprise-level methodology, and here’s how we’re gonna fix” I don’t mean that at all.
Now, what is that entail because that can cast a pretty wide net? The short answer is that I try to take a computer science-based approach or a software engineering-based approach to tackling problems in WordPress.
A blog pretty much every single day about some aspect of professional WordPress development. I am on Twitter and you can find my blog at or Tommcfarlin.blog, it’s actually already in the same place but, you know, is there. So as Joe mentioned, my name is Tom McFarland. Yeah, so why don’t you tell the listeners a little bit about who you are and then kind of how you came up with the idea for the Page Template Dashboard? They’re Twitter or both at the same time. But yeah, I think that’s where our paths crossed the first time. This year I’m going to rain it back in a little bit. And I still write when I have the chance but last year I did a lot of writing.
I’ve been, I’ve written tutorials for them on and off since 2011 and now I help edit code and game development posts, so. Now, we just recently met in real life for the first time but we met through Envato, I think, right? Like we were both writing tutorials for them at some point?
Well name aside, I’m excited to talk about it too. I’m excited to talk about it but it’s definitely, this is a terribly named plugin that will talk a little bit more of it later in the show that ended up turning out to be something people wanted more than I realized. Tom Mcfarlin: Yeah, it’s terribly named but I’m excited to talk. So today we’re going to talk about one of your plugins, right, Page Template Dashboard? It’s warmer than the weather in January, warmer weather than usual in January as we record this so I’m very happy about that. Welcome to How I Built It, the podcast that asks “How did you build that?” Today, I am honored to have my good friend and guest Tom Mcfarlin. If this sounds like your kind of gig, check out their open positions at /prospress. But the best benefit is the autonomy to do your best work however you work best. They offer some neat benefits like stock options, hardware allowance, and professional development. Prospress is a distributed company with employees all over the world. If you dream of working in your pajamas, sipping macchiatos at your favorite cafe, or while soaking up the sun in Costa Rica, you can make it happen. Prospress has some new products in the works and they’re looking for talented folks to help them. They’re the company behind WooCommerce subscriptions, a plugin with thousands of users.
They’re a small but friendly bunch that loves building software for entrepreneurs. If you like building things on the Internet, especially e-commerce things, check out the open jobs with Prospress. And the BoldGrid page builder allows you to easily drag and drop and edit the content as you see fit all with that having to use shortcodes.
BoldGrid will improve your workflow by providing direct access to free themes, page templates, photography, design elements, forms, galleries, and much more right from your dashboard. BoldGrid works as a suite of plugins designed to help you create WordPress websites faster and easier than ever. Joe Casabona: This episode is brought to you by our great sponsors.