The $15 WordPress gig

Three weeks ago I received the following message on LinkedIn: Hello, I'm looking for someone who could customize a WordPress plugin we bought. It's a car reservation system, we need to change the pricing model and add a few extra SQL tables that would operate with the plugin. The contact is a manager of some small agency, in his 50s, so I replied with my usual template for people who get in touch with me as I do dozens of WordPress things here and don't look like scam - that I can forward that to my peers and share it in the relevant… Continue Reading

WordPress Products and Demos

Last year at WordCamp Sofia I gave a talk named "Choosing the right WordPress theme". Contrary to the first guesses title-wise, since I'm not a designer at all, my topic was focused on the different sources to find a theme, based on a given set of requirements. [slideshare id=36183038&doc=choosing-a-wordpress-theme-140623021748-phpapp01] Few of my slides were referring to the product piracy - the humongous number of products being pirated. Or probably the high percentage of users using illegal products. I know of thousands of people using non-licensed operating systems or other cracked products. It's a painful experience really, and it's hard for a product company to… Continue Reading

Get your WordCamp Europe ticket now!

The tickets for WordCamp Europe 2014 are on sale - get your ticket now! Few hundred dedicated WordPress enthusiasts and professionals already booked their flights and reserved their seats. The attendee list is growing and everyone is excited for the largest WordPress event in Europe. If you've missed the big news, Sofia is hosting WCEU on September 27-29.  My colleague Stanko has shared a futuristic video about our culture and area, take a quick peek here: Continue Reading

WordCamp Hamburg

I'm leaving for Hamburg in an hour and I'll be presenting at WordCamp Hamburg over the weekend. I haven't practiced my Deutsch in years so I hope that I could pick some phrases back and even learn something helpful from the German speakers in the next few days. Additionally, I'm looking forward to the Contributor Day on Monday and I'll be happy to help the local community with their first contributions to WordPress. If you're attending WordCamp Hamburg, don't forget to say "Hi", or "Hallo" or even "Guten Tag" :) Continue Reading

WordPress Code Architecture talk notes

I've presented the WordPress Code Architecture talk at WordCamp Netherlands this weekend in Utrecht and I got lots of positive replies from the local community members - thanks everyone for getting back to me! I've invested around 50 hours worth of time/effort in the presentation and I had to refactor it a few times until it gets to the point where it is now. The slides are available here, and I'll cover them with a few extra notes here. Again, this is a personal opinion of mine based on my experience and observations over other frameworks, platforms, programming languages and general concepts. I had a… Continue Reading

See you at WordCamp Norrköping next week

I'll be joining the fun at WordCamp Norrköping next week from Friday to Sunday: I'll be helping with the Contributor Day over the weekend and I'll give my Debugging WordPress talk to the dev community there. If you're into WordPress development or interested in a secure and scalable managed WordPress hosting, meet me there and I'd be happy to chat.   Continue Reading

WordCamp Europe 2014 – Sep 27-29 in Sofia

I'm thrilled to share the news here as well - WordCamp Europe 2014 will be held in Sofia, Bulgaria on Sep 27-29. Hooray! :) Sofia has been accepted as the host of the largest WordCamp in Europe this year and we're excited for that great opportunity. For those of you who hasn't been following, WordCamp Europe's first occurrence was in 2013 in Leiden, The Netherlands, and it was legendary.  More information would be available soon for 2014 as well. If you're interested in the cultural background and the history of Sofia, check out this video: Additionally, we're known for other… Continue Reading

WP Mentor, Helping and Community

Last month Matt from Matt Report launched a great site called WP Mentor. Setting up a mentorship program for the WordPress community is an incredible idea so kudos to Matt who made it happen :) If you can't see the value in that site, let me explain. Balance and Entertainment I've been helping people since I've started teaching classes in 2006 and I've always enjoyed that. It's challenging to explain a concept, technology or an idea to someone else and it's a process that actually entertains and educates both sides. If you're a senior engineer with a team formed by… Continue Reading

WordSesh – Dec 7

In April Scott Basgaard organized the first virtual WordPress conference called WordSesh. It's a 24-hours online event with presentations starting at 0 o'clock UTC. Scott managed to pull an all-nighter (which was literally 24h managing all the things) so major props for his organization skills and devotion :) I wrote a quick post after the last WordSesh and my talk there, there were also numerous amazing talks available, and the best part is that you don't have to leave your house in order to enjoy this - stay at home, prep your tea or beer (up to you), pants are optional… Continue Reading