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Interview with Rick Baker, creator of WWWThreads
(Click here to view the original thread with full colors/images)
Posted by: OTS Staff
<b><font color="#FFFFCC">EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH RICK BAKER</font></b>
<i>Creator/Developer of WWWThreads
<font size="1">Conducted on July 9, 2001</font></i>
OTS: Tell us your background. Who are you and what do you do?
Rick Baker: Let's see. I've been in the internet industry for 5 years now. Started out doing static HTML and moved on to PERL programming from there and picked up PHP about a year ago. Outside of the business I work a full time job at www.techline.com as a software engineer. So, I program during the day at my day job and then program in the evenings and on weekends for the business.
OTS: Tell us a little history of WWWThreads, like what made you decide to create it and what factors led to the creation of this forum script?
RB: One of the first things I was supposed to do was find a good discussion board for our company site when I first started working for Techline. We spent several thousand dollars trying out every discussion forum package you could imagine only to be sorely dissapointed. Now, this was several years ago so at that point the selection wasn't all that great. So, since I was learning PERL I decided to write my own.
OTS: What do you think makes WWWThreads better than the competition's?
RB: I'm not sure that it's *better* than the others. It's just different. Every website admin has their own idea of what their forums should offer and what they should look like. That's why the wide selection of software available is great. The one thing that I have tried to concentrate on is flexibility. Now matter how the admin sets up their forums there are always going to be users that want it to be different. Colors, fonts, layout, etc. So, I have focused on making these options available to the individual users so they can customize the look of the forums to their own preferences. This keeps them happy and returning to the site.
OTS: How hard is it to develop a script like this?
RB: It's definitely been a challenge. Some of the features can be quite complicated, especially trying to make them play nicely with other features. Combining all of the scripts in the PERL version add up to about 40K lines of code. That's not a huge amount but it's large enough that it does get challenging to keep everything running smoothly as you add new features.
OTS: What do you think about the other forum scripts that are available out there? Do you sometimes wish you had a feature on your forum that is visible on theirs?
RB: To be honest I have made it a point not to visit other forums. The main reason behind this is I don't want WWWThreads to end up looking like a clone. If you use another script you will probably see something that you like, and since you saw it in a certain context, chances are it will end up looking the same when you try to import it into your own forums. Naturally I frequent some sites that use other forum products, but I try not to pay attention to the features.
My users are the ones that tell me what to add. If they see something on another forum that they want added they will suggest it, and then I will work on getting the feature added and chances are it will be implemented differently than the other forum so it won't look like a clone.
OTS: What do you think of the script-hacking community. Do they significantly help you improve your script?
RB: Definitely! If it wasn't for these people then WWWThreads wouldn't progress as quickly as it does. Bug testing, suggestions, hacks, etc. They are a very big part of the whole process.
OTS: Will you be sticking with the current programming architecture of your forum script, or are you planning any further enhancements and/or improvements for the current version of WWWThreads? If so, how about giving us a hint?
RB: It's basically a never-ending cycle. A couple years back I thought about branching out and writing other scripts as well, but I decided to scratch that idea and just focus on WWWThreads. I always try to focus on a certain area for upcoming upgrades, and I let my users choose which I should focus on. It's usually, layout, site integration, user features, or admin features. Probably the next couple of upgrades will concentrate on layout and site integration.
OTS: What part of WWWThreads would you have re-done or improved if you had the chance to do it all over again?
RB: Well, it's been close to 5 years now since I wrote the first version of WWWThreads. So I have had the chance to redo things  There have been times when I have scratched an entire section of the program because it just wasn't going to be scaleable. Sometimes you have to take a couple steps back to start moving forward again, and this is something that I have never hesitated to do. I'd like WWWThreads to keep evolving so there are just times that things need to be redone so you have to keep an open mind about it.
OTS: What do you do in your spare time, if you have any?
RB: In my free time I try to just get completely away from computers. I spend roughly 80 hours a week in front of a keyboard so when I do get a chance to do something else I like to golf, at least try to golf . I bowl, work on the house just try to relax.
OTS: If you were asked to describe your forum script in one sentence, what would it be?
RB: A product with enough flexibility for the admin and the end user to keep both happy.
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Many thanks to Rick Baker and Wired Community Software for this interview.
Visit WWWThreads.Com for more information on their great forum script.
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