NYCPHP Meetup

[David Krings]

André Pitanga wrote:
> Hey David Krings,
> 
> Thanks for the awesome, sometimes passionate, responses!

You are welcome, passionate responses are my speciality.


>> I'd pass it and I think I'd be the worst webmaster you ever had.
> 
> The test is non eliminatory, and is not the sole factor being 
> considered.  It's just a basic test...
> Why do you say you'd be the worst webmaster we ever had? We've had 
> *terrible* webmasters in the past! You'd have your work cut out for you! 
> lol

Because I run one web server at home using the prepackaged system from 
Apachefriends.org. I let others think for me and they even do it for free. The 
nice thing is that they even do a pretty decent job.


>> I'd rather ask the candidate where they'd look that up in case they 
>> don't know. I'd expect that they mention one of the leading XHTML 
>> references. The answers to these questions can be answered by someone 
>> who is often broed and looks at the source of web pages in notepad.
> 
> "often bored and looks at the source of web pages in notepad"
> Great! This is exactly who we want to hire! I'm adding this to the job 
> description... ;)

This is how I "learned". I found out that way what needs to go into the header 
section and started to just copy and paste it. By now I have some idea what 
the different pieces mean, but that's about it.

>> anyone who seriously wants to design pages is likely to use a design 
>> tool that comes with a decent CSS editor. 
> 
> Sorry, David Krings, but this is not true. Many times you won't have 
> access to a wysiwyg tool.  You may not even have access to X (i.e. bash 
> via ssh), and still need to perform work.
> What would you do in that situation?

See, that is where I am not sure who you are looking for. Are you looking for 
a web designer who is a Flash god and wrote a thesis on UI design or do you 
look for someone who you can hand five card board boxes and a CD and then come 
back a few hours later and see a working server with the code running. The 
difference is that the first one is an artist and the second one is a techie. 
I guess you are looking for an artistical techie.
Sure, you can code major pages by hand from scratch with just a text editor. 
But if that is the way it is supposed to be I wonder why there are so many 
breaking their necks making IDEs and other development tools. I'm not saying 
that it is pointless in knowing how to edit a file via CLI, but for anything 
that is more involved why would anyone not use a tool?

>> That is something I'd trust a piece of software to do it correctly.
> 
> lol :-D  +1funny!

You may laugh, but after a while doing everything by hand and from scratch is 
getting old.


> 
>> That depends, in PHP you'd get a syntax error right in the first line 
>> and both a and b remain undefined. 
> 
> Do you think you could make sense of it and answer it correctly 
> nevertheless, though? It's not meant to be PHP specific...

A gets the value of B and B keeps its value (I think that was 20, wasn't it). 
There is quite some research done with this test debating various thinking 
models that each have some merit and logic, OK, except for those who claim the 
results is that B turns into a string and A is the square root of seven.

>> I also wonder if you are looking for a web master who runs and 
>> configures your servers or if you are looking for a web developer who 
>> creates content and writes scripts or if you are looking for both.
> 
> Great question!
> 
> This is the heart of the question.
> 
> Ideally a webmaster will do both (code and admin).  This is what makes 
> the job really interesting, in my opinion. This is what attracted me to 
> being a webmaster to begin with.
> But lately I've been noticing that the profession "webmaster" is 
> becoming... old-fashioned?

No, not really, but since there is so much stuff to do and to know in regards 
to web it is less likely and maybe not even desired for one person to know it 
all well enough. Such a person is ideal for support. The best supporter is 
like a duck, can swim, but not like a dolphin, can run, but not like leopard, 
and can fly, but not as well as an eagle. For development you don't want a 
duck, you want a dolphin, a leopard, and an eagle. So the "knows it all" is a 
rare breed and chances are you get the duck, who can do a little bit of 
everything, but nothing well.

> I attended the "future of web design" conference in NY last year, and a 
> constant theme across many speakers was "the need for specialization".
> 
> It was stated that webmasters are a dying breed, and that now one should 
> hire a web designer, a web developer, and a train a monkey for sysadmin. 
> (jk)

Yes, because your design goddess doesn't give a damn where the files need to 
go on the server and how to make sure the backups are fine and that the logs 
get evaluated. And honestly, I think that is OK, after all you hired the sys 
admin monkey for those tasks.

> I think webmasters need to stand up and be proud of their triple threat 
> status!
> 
> So, yeah, where have all the webmasters gone?

Well, back then when there wasn't all this flashy stuff and people stared at 
you in disbelief when your page looked like Craigslist and you knew how to 
deal with a server you were the (web) master. Now you have to be certified for 
networking, sys admininstration, be a security expert, know all the software 
development stuff, and be awesome at graphics and UI design. There is no way 
to master all this in perfection, have all the certs, 10 years experience, and 
be an under 20 year old who can work 80 hour weeks straight for peanuts and 
Mountain Dew.
So you need to figure out who you need and in which area you can accept 
weaknesses. It comes down to which skills you need from the new web master now 
and which ones can wait until they are acquired or deemed not needed.

David