Zach Tollman –

Zach will be presenting Speed as a Feature: Getting a Handle on Page Load Time on Sunday in the Advanced Development track

Residing in Portland, Oregon, Zack longs for the cold, snowy days of his Alaskan youth. He enjoys strumming his guitar, playing hockey, and spending time with his wife and dog.

Otherwise, you’ll find him at his computer meticulously spinning lines of clean code as a developer at The Theme Foundry.

Interview:

Why do you use WordPress?
I use WordPress because of the amazing community around the software. People of WordPress are universally exceptional and it is a wonderful to work alongside so many talented individuals.

What would you say to convince someone to attend a WordCamp?
In order to understand why the WordPress community is so great, you need to start interacting with it. The best place to start is at a WordCamp. With very little effort, you will begin to build lifelong relationships that will affect many aspects of your life.

What is your favorite WordPress project you have worked on recently?
At The Theme Foundry, we recently rebuilt our servers in order to improve security and performance. We were able to implement SSL everywhere, while not sacrificing (and in some cases, improving) performance of our site. Much of this work has inspired my WordCamp Chicago talk.

Do you have any advice for someone looking to start or grow a WordPress based business?
Talk to people. WordPress business owners are competitive, yet very helpful. The business “stars” of our community tend to be more than willing to share information to help you be successful. The more successful businesses that champion WordPress, the more successful WordPress will be overall.

What is your favorite WordPress-related resource?
As a developer, I used to rely on what other people had to say about WordPress code; however, overtime, I’ve learned that it’s best to just go to the “horse’s mouth” to get the information that you need. In this case, that is the WordPress core code itself. You will learn more about WordPress, PHP, and development practices by reading core code than any one else’s writing about it.

Tell us something awesome about yourself that is not WordPress related
I’m a huge hockey fan and because my wife is from Chicago, I’ve adopted the Blackhawks as my team. I’m hoping for another parade during WordCamp Chicago this year.